Can we afford a monthly mortgage payment of $4900?
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Anonymous
| Our HHI is $350k and we have around $2000 a month in debt with one toddler in full time daycare in Montgomery County. Plan to do public school in 2-3 years. I recently had a promotion and a raise of an additional $2000/month net so we thought we could easily go from our current $2200/month mortgage to $4200 but we've found a house we really love and are thinking about stretching our budget a little. I am a little worried. Sound outrageous? Anyone else with a mortgage payment close to $5000? |
Anonymous
We do it on $240k but we don't have that extra debt or child care expenses. |
Anonymous
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do you do anything like track all your monthly expenses in quicken? I think you need to have a very realistic look at what your budget is before oyu take on such a large mortgage. A bigger home will also mean more money for heating and cooling, maintenece and so forth. Just some things to think about. I have to think tha tmore than doubling your current mortgage would be pushing it, but every one has different comfort levels.
I also think that when buying a home you need to set a limit and stick to it. There will always be something a littleout of your budget and buying more than you can and should spend is a recipe for disaster. |
Anonymous
| OP here, we have done our budget (my husband tracks this every month) and it works out the we can "afford" up to $5200 a month while still living essentially as we live now - eating out a lot, maxing 401ks, and saving for college and still having our 3 month savings cushion. It just makes me nervous to see such a big number. |
Anonymous
| It depends on what sort of lifestyle you want as your kids get older. Kids activities aren't cheap - we pay $1k per month on activities for three kids and I still have one in full time daycare and another in before and aftercare. Also, there's vacations to budget for. And home renovations and repairs. For us, vacations cost us several thousand a year. I would also guess that home maintenance and repairs run us a couple of hundred a month (including things like maintenance on the heating and air conditioning, spring planting, and things that need to be replaced or repaired) and we're complete do it yourselfers, so our budget for this is about 1/3 to 1/2 less than someone who has to pay for services. Will the new house require a lawn service or other services you dont currently pay? For me, if you can afford $5200 with your current expenses, I think a $4900 mortgage would be too much. Only $300 extra cushion per month isn't enough for me. |
Anonymous
| Be forewarned that public school won't decrease your child care expenses to nothing - our school's before/aftercare program charges somewhere in the range of $750 per month for both services 5 days a week. Plus camps, which can run $500 per week and more with before/aftercare. And elementary kids do a lot more activities, we spend a few hundred each month for one or two sports programs per week. We have a similar income and would never take on such a large mortgage, but we're insanely conservative on this stuff. I do think a 3 month cushion is way too short, but maybe my views on that are skewed. |
Anonymous
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What is the $2000/month in debt for? Student loans or credit card? If the latter you may already be living beyond your means and shouldn't stretch that far. How stable are your jobs and your long term prospects? A 3 month cushion isn't very much these days to find a high paying job.
While we bought in a different housing market our mortgage was about $3300 against a similar income base at the time. However we had 2 kids in private school so that was a drain. It was certainly doable, although we were quite frugal on vacations and eating out, but I took some comfort in knowing that if something happened we could pull the kids from private school and the house payments would still be manageable on one income. |
Anonymous
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Wow! Interesting to read how rich people live!! Crazy to be spending that much money on activities and camps.
What would you do if one of you loses your job? With income that high, I'd think it prudent to live somewhere that you could afford on just one salary, in case something unforeseen happens. |
Anonymous
| We have a similar income and a $5300 mortgage payment (just to clarify, inclusive of taxes). We don't have any other debt but have two daycare payments. Are able to save for college for both kids and max out retirement contributions. There is not a ton left over but enough to live comfortably, including house maintenance and going on one or two vacations per year. |
Anonymous
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Our HHI is $450K. Our mortgage payment is $5K/month (15 year and we have 75% equity in the house) and we spend $5K/month in childcare (3 kids). We have no debt and we max out on 401Ks, 529s, etc. We do save in addition to that, but we don't have much left over. Our vacations are funded by airline/hotel points and shopping is all at Target and Costco.
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Anonymous
| OP here - monthly debt is student loans and car payment. We have no credit card debt. |
Anonymous
| If it works into you rbudget and you are still saving agressively for retirement, college and saving in general then i think you are in a good place. If you were going to cut back on savings then I would say no. |
Anonymous
| No, that is an insane amount of money for a mortgage. Save your money and make a big down payment in the future. Should one of you become unemployed you would sink and fast with those expenses. |
Anonymous
| How much is the house with a $5k/mo mortgage? Doesn't seem crazy to me. |
Anonymous
Wow. Our HHI is $435K and we save about 35% of our net income. |