JoB
TheHouse…
a house is not always the path to economic security.
over the past 17 years, hubby and i have owned 3 homes.
the first was a great investment.. and we made a decent profit… so we traded up.
then the economy tanked, programmers were struggling to find any job and we relocated to Minnesota for hubby’s work.
We didn’t lose all of our equity in that move.. but we did find ourselves in the uncomfortable place of having made huge investments in our home that we knew wouldn’t pay off financially in the short run.. and they didn’t.
We bought in Minnesota… and after getting a job offer back in the Northwest.. found ourselves selling in a down market.. just days after the bridge collapse to a couple working on the wrong side of the bridge. oops… that deal fell through… and the one that replaced it wasn’t as lucrative.
all in all, i suspect we broke roughly even.. but we also rehabbed three houses.
i like the process.. so it wasn’t so terrible for me.. but hubby doesn’t and he never got to live with the fruits of his labor… or to realize the profits they would have brought long term.
I am not so sure about this home ownership deal if you can rent reasonably.. which is something i hope to rectify for us…
but in spite of his lifetime record of loss in real estate (the home he owned prior to our marriage was one of those that wasn’t so profitable in the combination of a “housing correction” and divorce.)… hubby likes the the “certainty” of owning. he wants a place of his own.. so we will likely buy again.
we are lucky in love.. and hubby has the most incredible vacation weather luck i have ever seen… but real estate? not so lucky there.
who knows? there is always next time… yes????