How much mortgage can we afford?

[Anonymous]

The first step is tracking every penny that leaves either of your wallets for the next three months.

Then, reduce your spending and live on that reduced spending.

Your goal should be to be able to pay cash for your next car. Until you can do that and have a good emergency fund and are paying off your student loans, you shouldn't be buying a house.

Basically, unless you can get your spending under control you have no business buying a home at all. You'll end up in foreclosure some day if you do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The first step is tracking every penny that leaves either of your wallets for the next three months.

Then, reduce your spending and live on that reduced spending.

Your goal should be to be able to pay cash for your next car. Until you can do that and have a good emergency fund and are paying off your student loans, you shouldn't be buying a house.

Basically, unless you can get your spending under control you have no business buying a home at all. You'll end up in foreclosure some day if you do.

They saved a 100k downpayment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The first step is tracking every penny that leaves either of your wallets for the next three months.

Then, reduce your spending and live on that reduced spending.

Your goal should be to be able to pay cash for your next car. Until you can do that and have a good emergency fund and are paying off your student loans, you shouldn't be buying a house.

Basically, unless you can get your spending under control you have no business buying a home at all. You'll end up in foreclosure some day if you do.

They saved a 100k downpayment.

And they have a 50K car loan and 200K in student loans they haven't been paying. Pay off the car loan, keep the extra 50K as an emergency fund and then start saving an actual down payment because their entire financial ecosystem is fcked up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The first step is tracking every penny that leaves either of your wallets for the next three months.

Then, reduce your spending and live on that reduced spending.

Your goal should be to be able to pay cash for your next car. Until you can do that and have a good emergency fund and are paying off your student loans, you shouldn't be buying a house.

Basically, unless you can get your spending under control you have no business buying a home at all. You'll end up in foreclosure some day if you do.

They saved a 100k downpayment.

Doubt they really "saved" it the way you think. I'm sure its just OP's bonus and/or her husband sold a property. Its not like they took X amount from each paycheck - they don't have that kind of discipline.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:HHI - $300k
Student debt - $250k
Car debt and other debt -$50k
Retirement fund, IRAs and 401k balance- $170k
Monthly fixed expenses: $4k

That is absolutely not the take home for most folks at $300k. We make slightly more than that and our take home is $14k and we don’t even max 401k.

How old are you and how much do you THINK you can afford given the stats you provided? Happy to answer your question and tell you my story if you share that info! I'm guessing I am about 10 years older than you.

Op here: we are 33 and 36. I think $750k mortgage should be OK. Please do share. TIA!

DH here who did a very different path than you, but I can help you our. I need to know your long term goals, financial and otherwise.

Barring that, no, a $750k mortgage is nuts. Especially at 6%. You will forever be a wage slave.

750k at 6% is 4500 then if you add tax and insurance and maintenance it might come out to 6k a month. If the already have 4000 in expenses that’ll be 10k/mo bills. They make 300k as a couple so that’s like 17k take home per month. They have $7000 leftover to save or spend on other things.

We established burn rate was $8K, so add that to $6K and you have $14K. That leaves $3K for savings/emergency fund, 529s, kids activities, and retirement. What I would do with that:
$500/savings
$1250/retirement
$1000/529s ($6K a year per kid)
$250/kids activities

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:HHI - $300k
Student debt - $250k
Car debt and other debt -$50k
Retirement fund, IRAs and 401k balance- $170k
Monthly fixed expenses: $4k

How old are you and how much do you THINK you can afford given the stats you provided? Happy to answer your question and tell you my story if you share that info! I'm guessing I am about 10 years older than you.

Op here: we are 33 and 36. I think $750k mortgage should be OK. Please do share. TIA!

DH here who did a very different path than you, but I can help you our. I need to know your long term goals, financial and otherwise.

Barring that, no, a $750k mortgage is nuts. Especially at 6%. You will forever be a wage slave.

750k at 6% is 4500 then if you add tax and insurance and maintenance it might come out to 6k a month. If the already have 4000 in expenses that’ll be 10k/mo bills. They make 300k as a couple so that’s like 17k take home per month. They have $7000 leftover to save or spend on other things.

We established burn rate was $8K, so add that to $6K and you have $14K. That leaves $3K for savings/emergency fund, 529s, kids activities, and retirement. What I would do with that:
$500/savings
$1250/retirement
$1000/529s ($6K a year per kid)
$250/kids activities

That is absolutely not the take home for most folks at $300k. We make slightly more than that and our take home is $14k and we don’t even max 401k.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When we had student loans from DH's law degree we bought a cheap townhouse in a gentrifying area, and we didn't have any car or consumer loans. We drove an old sedan until the student debt was paid off.

750k is insane. Look for a condo or townhouse where your PITI costs are as close to rent as possible.

This. I cannot believe they have $50k (!!!) in car loans with that debt. I wouldn’t even do that with zero debt. The problem here is they rushed to have the kids and her DH doesn’t work. If they had waited a couple years to have kids after law school they could have eliminated the debt and saved some money before adding in kids. OP should absolutely rent something as cheap as possible until she gets those loans under control and for the love of God don’t have any more kids so DH can work the second the youngest hits school.

You know what else is expensive? IVF and adoption. I waited only 3 years after graduating law school to try for a kid, had one after a struggle, then was never able to have a second after much expensive fertility treatment. If I had a crystal ball, I would have started having kids exactly when OP did. You don't know her history, so don't pass judgment on her family planning choices.

An infertility mommy shows up in every thread. Wah wah. I had my kids at 36 and 39 about 11 months after stopping birth control and don't regret a single minute. I could actually afford both childcare and a nice house and paying off my loans all at the same time. It was amazing. Don't blame your infertility on your age. Blame genetics, sweetheart.

[Anonymous]

OP never came back because she is ASHAMED.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The first step is tracking every penny that leaves either of your wallets for the next three months.

Then, reduce your spending and live on that reduced spending.

Your goal should be to be able to pay cash for your next car. Until you can do that and have a good emergency fund and are paying off your student loans, you shouldn't be buying a house.

Basically, unless you can get your spending under control you have no business buying a home at all. You'll end up in foreclosure some day if you do.

They saved a 100k downpayment.

Why didn’t they buy the car with that money? Makes no sense to me. Pay other people to borrow money you have?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The first step is tracking every penny that leaves either of your wallets for the next three months.

Then, reduce your spending and live on that reduced spending.

Your goal should be to be able to pay cash for your next car. Until you can do that and have a good emergency fund and are paying off your student loans, you shouldn't be buying a house.

Basically, unless you can get your spending under control you have no business buying a home at all. You'll end up in foreclosure some day if you do.

They saved a 100k downpayment.

Why didn’t they buy the car with that money? Makes no sense to me. Pay other people to borrow money you have?

Because a car isn't liquid and many people were able to get autoloans at virtually zero interest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When we had student loans from DH's law degree we bought a cheap townhouse in a gentrifying area, and we didn't have any car or consumer loans. We drove an old sedan until the student debt was paid off.

750k is insane. Look for a condo or townhouse where your PITI costs are as close to rent as possible.

This. I cannot believe they have $50k (!!!) in car loans with that debt. I wouldn’t even do that with zero debt. The problem here is they rushed to have the kids and her DH doesn’t work. If they had waited a couple years to have kids after law school they could have eliminated the debt and saved some money before adding in kids. OP should absolutely rent something as cheap as possible until she gets those loans under control and for the love of God don’t have any more kids so DH can work the second the youngest hits school.

You know what else is expensive? IVF and adoption. I waited only 3 years after graduating law school to try for a kid, had one after a struggle, then was never able to have a second after much expensive fertility treatment. If I had a crystal ball, I would have started having kids exactly when OP did. You don't know her history, so don't pass judgment on her family planning choices.

An infertility mommy shows up in every thread. Wah wah. I had my kids at 36 and 39 about 11 months after stopping birth control and don't regret a single minute. I could actually afford both childcare and a nice house and paying off my loans all at the same time. It was amazing. Don't blame your infertility on your age. Blame genetics, sweetheart.

Infertility is very much tied to age. I'm glad you had an easy time of it but your ignorance and lack of compassion for others who did not is astounding.

[Anonymous]

With your debt situtation, you are basically asking if you can take on a million dollars in debt. I would not do that it will drown you in stress.

Now, we took out a 700k mortgage on a HHI of about 300k, and its fine, we are able to max 401k each and put some toward the 529 each month. But we had no other debt and our rate is 3.125%. If I had 300k in debt I think the most we could do would be a 500k mortgage.

I would keep renting for 2-3 more years and pay down that 6% debt aggressively, or buy a place with mortgage max of 500k.

You need to run a bunch of mortgage/debt calculators and do some serious budgeting to see what you can actually afford.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When we had student loans from DH's law degree we bought a cheap townhouse in a gentrifying area, and we didn't have any car or consumer loans. We drove an old sedan until the student debt was paid off.

750k is insane. Look for a condo or townhouse where your PITI costs are as close to rent as possible.

This. I cannot believe they have $50k (!!!) in car loans with that debt. I wouldn’t even do that with zero debt. The problem here is they rushed to have the kids and her DH doesn’t work. If they had waited a couple years to have kids after law school they could have eliminated the debt and saved some money before adding in kids. OP should absolutely rent something as cheap as possible until she gets those loans under control and for the love of God don’t have any more kids so DH can work the second the youngest hits school.

You know what else is expensive? IVF and adoption. I waited only 3 years after graduating law school to try for a kid, had one after a struggle, then was never able to have a second after much expensive fertility treatment. If I had a crystal ball, I would have started having kids exactly when OP did. You don't know her history, so don't pass judgment on her family planning choices.

An infertility mommy shows up in every thread. Wah wah. I had my kids at 36 and 39 about 11 months after stopping birth control and don't regret a single minute. I could actually afford both childcare and a nice house and paying off my loans all at the same time. It was amazing. Don't blame your infertility on your age. Blame genetics, sweetheart.

Infertility is very much tied to age. I'm glad you had an easy time of it but your ignorance and lack of compassion for others who did not is astounding.

29 to 31 is not a meaningful difference.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The first step is tracking every penny that leaves either of your wallets for the next three months.

Then, reduce your spending and live on that reduced spending.

Your goal should be to be able to pay cash for your next car. Until you can do that and have a good emergency fund and are paying off your student loans, you shouldn't be buying a house.

Basically, unless you can get your spending under control you have no business buying a home at all. You'll end up in foreclosure some day if you do.

They saved a 100k downpayment.

So that's 20% of a 500K home. So they can afford a 500K home at most. IMO you should not buy unless you have 20% down, especially when you have so much else in loans.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The first step is tracking every penny that leaves either of your wallets for the next three months.

Then, reduce your spending and live on that reduced spending.

Your goal should be to be able to pay cash for your next car. Until you can do that and have a good emergency fund and are paying off your student loans, you shouldn't be buying a house.

Basically, unless you can get your spending under control you have no business buying a home at all. You'll end up in foreclosure some day if you do.

They saved a 100k downpayment.

And they have a 50K car loan and 200K in student loans they haven't been paying. Pay off the car loan, keep the extra 50K as an emergency fund and then start saving an actual down payment because their entire financial ecosystem is fcked up.

+1000