I don’t understand how my neighbors are paying for their renovation

[Anonymous]

I’d be surprised if a childhood home cost the child a penny.

[Anonymous]

Of one of them is a business owner there might be some under the table cash

[Anonymous]

I would guess the house was at least in part gifted so now they are using what they normally would have on down payment/mortgage on the renovation. We also could have had neighbors questioning our renovation this way and our answer was pretty significant frugality in our 20s while living in a less expensive place, one unexpected work related influx of funds that people may not have realized and a gift from family. So a combination (and wasn’t as big of a renovation)

[Anonymous]

More details. The 3 young kids are in daycare. If school, private or public.If we are going to be curious, I am going all in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's none of your business.

It's strange to me that you give this a moment's thought.

It's not particularly strange. It's perfectly natural to be curious about others, and because talking about personal finances with neighbors is generally taboo, there's an extra tantalizing zing.

What's strange is posting about it on a forum for moms in DC for validation.

[Anonymous]

If everyone MYOB there would be purpose for DCUM.

Your neighbors could make significantly more than you think. My husband's job title sounds like it pays far less than it actually does and I am SAHM. Like a PP, we actually underbought.

Someone once flat out asked me how we can afford our home and not in a nice way. That was rude. In person, MYOB. But if that someone wanted to chat about us anonymously on the internet that is fine with me.

[Anonymous]

What are their jobs?

You could search property records online to see clues. The house may still be owned by parents or a trust. But as many others said, if the parents owned the house previously then it's almost certainly a gift house. Don't look it in the mouth.

[Anonymous]

Ours is not to ask how, OP. Ours is to simply smile and nod and complement the backsplash.

[Anonymous]

Inheritance
Legal Settlement
Lucky investment
Higher salaries than you think
Lottery winnings
Genie
Fraud

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think questions like this are fair. We all want things we can't afford so when we see someone who appears to be doing something very expensive compared to what they appear to earn it kind of begs the question "what am I doing wrong that I can't afford the same or similar thing."

But to your question OP, I'd imagine the key is a gifted house and the only thing they're paying for is the renovation. Even if the house isn't gifted entirely, whatever they paid is likely much below market rate, or they're paying their parents directly and that is a whole lot easier than paying a bank who could take the house if you miss a payment.

+1

Also, a gifted or deeply discounted family house is “family help.” So is cash to purchase stock at a young age. Or a down payment on a condo that can be sold later. The people who insist these things don’t matter tend to be the ones who benefit from them; the downside of that is being completely out of touch with the reality of most other people. It’s great to accept family help, if you have it offered - just own that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:More details. The 3 young kids are in daycare. If school, private or public.If we are going to be curious, I am going all in.

OP here. I don't want to provide more details than I already have.

[Anonymous]

For context, my MIL recently passed away and my DH received $250k from her estate. I think it was in our bank account for about 48 hours when we committed all of it to a significant home renovation.

[Anonymous]

We did something similar, the trick is to live frugally and buy the house cheap. It’s entirely possible to do this without family help, and if they are not in a hcol like dc it’s less that 500k for a near tear down. Our house appreciated before renovations, we we cashed out half with a refinance and paid the balance with savings.

[Anonymous]

They got a free or nearly free house. That why they have so much money. I don't understand why you still think it's mystery where the money is coming from.

[Anonymous]

They are spies.