Should I buy a house if I plan on moving in two years?

My comment stands...you were fortunate. Houses don't typically go up $250,000 in 2 years. You had desirable buying and selling times. Fortunate. Again, that is not something to PLAN to do. I'm not against people being fortunate. Good for you.

Webedumbmaybe wrote:

Girlfriend and I are currently renting an apartment, but have started looking at buying a house. We do plan on moving in two years and everything we've read says don't buy a house if you plan on moving within 4-5 years. To us it doesn't make sense to be paying rent when we could be paying a comparable mortgage (accounting for utilities, taxes, etc.). We are both in stable jobs. And the house we are looking at would need astetic work (bones of the house are good, but kitchen could use a face lift).

What are we missing and are we being idiots for thinking about buying a house?

House is $160,000 and we have collectively $7000 to put down. House is in an area that has been gentrifying over the past 5 years.

Get a McMansion

Webedumbmaybe wrote:

Girlfriend and I are currently renting an apartment, but have started looking at buying a house. We do plan on moving in two years and everything we've read says don't buy a house if you plan on moving within 4-5 years. To us it doesn't make sense to be paying rent when we could be paying a comparable mortgage (accounting for utilities, taxes, etc.). We are both in stable jobs. And the house we are looking at would need astetic work (bones of the house are good, but kitchen could use a face lift).

What are we missing and are we being idiots for thinking about buying a house?

House is $160,000 and we have collectively $7000 to put down. House is in an area that has been gentrifying over the past 5 years.

No. The market is sky high right now. You will lose a lot of money if you buy for the short term now.

Flagpole is right. Just because it worked out for you does not mean it is a very solid plan. Tomorrow the area where you live might get burned up by a wild fire and one year later by a huge mud slide.

I am sure you will not write an update when things don't turn out so well.

Just like you never hear about people who get burned by bit coin. You only hear the success stories.

No. No. No.

Fred with a trucker hat wrote:

Flagpole is right. Just because it worked out for you does not mean it is a very solid plan. Tomorrow the area where you live might get burned up by a wild fire and one year later by a huge mud slide.

I am sure you will not write an update when things don't turn out so well.

Just like you never hear about people who get burned by bit coin. You only hear the success stories.

CORRECT! Even without a horrible thing such as the house being lost, it's not a good plan to buy a house and expect to sell it for a big profit 2 years later. That's just pure luck when it happens. The fact is too, the house he then bought was likely much cheaper a couple years earlier too, so USUALLY that kind of gain on paper is really just a wash.

Didn’t read the thread after your post, but if you can rent it to cover costs once you move out, buy.

We did this and got lucky (did not plan on moving so soon). Bought in 2017 for 310k, sold in 2019 for 352k. We had 20% down so avoided PMI. However that doesn't mean we profited 42k. Realtor fees were 17.6k (3% to seller, 2% to buyer I believe). We actually listed the house on our own on Zillow to avoid realtor fees but no one was interested. Got a realtor and boom 30+ people at open house. We probably put close to 20k in repairs/maintenance during those 2 years. So at best we broke even vs paying rent.

We tried to get it ready to rent out, but it wasn't a good rental area. Even hired a property manager to look for tenants. We had to pay for asbestos removal, releading, new paint, etc. And it was all for nothing.

Another thing new homeowners don't think about it decorations, furniture, home insurance. Those things add up. A house is general larger than an apartment that you rent. So you fill those empty rooms with stuff like a guest bed, lamps, curtains, dressers, wall decorations etc. The bathrooms need new shower curtains, towels etc. All that stuff adds up and has no resale value. You have to own yard tools like a lawnmower and snowblower. These things also cost money to maintain.

When we rented, we got free heat and hot water! When we owned, our heating bill would be up to $300 in winter :( and since it was a larger space, electricity was of course higher. We didn't have to do any yardwork when we rented.

Overall it was stressful and if we knew we wouldn't stay in the area, we would have kept renting. We were just glad to get rid of it.

The thread is old, but I hope the OP did not decide to buy a house for two years. It seems that you will lose more than gain. If you’re planning to move in two years, I recommend you find a proper build-to-rent house and not bother with buying and repairing the old one. Also, the realtor fees when selling the house will probably be big, and the profit you’ll get is small. In general, the process of selling and buying a house might be stressful and dangerous. So, I would not bother. Better to look for decent housing in the place you will move to..

This thread and this reply I am quoting are from 2018.

Replies like this were cocky and wrong.
The OP would have done great if he bought a house in late 2018 and sold it two years later.

Should someone try this today?

I don’t know. And neither does anyone else.

Interest rates are creeping up and inventory is still low.
The mortgage will be high and it may be tough to rent it out at a price that covers the mortgage.

You should wait and maybe invest in something more useful than buying a new house, especially if you plan to move to another place. You can invest in cryptocurrency or buy this house and sell the property or rent this house to other people when you move. In any case, be aware that, according to multiple business-related experts, this summer, the real estate prices can collapse, so your property will cost nearly nothing. Be careful. I suggest you an article from Tim Thomas about these prognoses.

For sure. Why not?

I use cryptocurrency a lot. I enjoy investing and trading whenever I have the chance to do it. When I had to commercial move out, I freaked out about my coins and how to stow my computer in my self place. Even though I encrypted my hardware wallet, I was still afraid to cross borders. My friend told me he had the same problem, https://calgarymoverspro.ca/, and helped him store his progress. I assume I was lucky that no one searched my bags, and I managed to keep my seeds safe. However, it all depends on what you did to obtain the coins.

Personally, I would not consider buying a house unless I was reasonably sure I would be there for five years.

Transaction costs are very high, equity at risk, and you have exposure to potentially very large capital/repair expenses.

For me, five years is the threshold.

Just pay rent. Nice and clean.

Buying a house is a huge pain the ass OP. I just bought one for 160k and someone’s gonna have to take my a$$ out of here in a body bag I ain’t ever leaving.

That's exactly what I wanna say!

not the best times to buy a house or another property

Sounds like a rollercoaster! Did this adventure change your perspective on renting versus owning? Would you now lean more towards renting, given the financial unpredictability and the maintenance headache of homeownership you've experienced?