What's your real estate pet peeve?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not sure if you count this as real estate it’s more mortgage. Charging people who don’t put 20% down PMI. It’s just an extra fee they charge and it’s not fair. If I can’t afford to save up 20% of a down payment gif have good enough credit to get a mortgage charging an extra fee is BS.

How about save 20% or rent? If you put very little money down, you have little incentive not to walk away if prices plunge 15%, which can happen. People seem to want a return to the mistakes of the 2008 bubble in the guise of “fairness”!

Paying high rents is why I couldn’t save 20% down. I still had really good credit though. That PMI could have been used towards the principal amount.

I get this but at some point people need to learn to save. Not everything is free!

In order to save 20% I lived in a less desirable area in a no frills tiny apartment and worked multiple jobs (FT and a side hustle). I did this for years knowing my goal was to buy a home.

A friend of mine said the same thing but she constantly goes out for meals, taking Ubers, and lived in a really nice apartment in Dupont. People will say saving that wouldn’t have given her the down payment but if you invest that $ it might. Everyone makes choices so own what you decide to do. I have friends who have moved from the DMV so they can own their own home. Many of them are happier.

My pet peeves are:

Cheap renos
Not fixing mechanicals/ plumbing and people not realizing you need to check that too
Renovated kitchens that cabinets don’t go to ceiling / cheap cabinets/ no inset

[Anonymous]

Mismatched wood flooring. Would rather buy a house with all carpet that I will want to rip and replace than a house with four different kinds of wood flooring.

Also hate when people put in "wood look" tile in kitchens, foyers, and baths when the rest of the house is real wood. Wood look tile never looks like wood but it especially doesn't look like wood when it's right next to actually wood. If you want to do tile in these areas because they get more moisture, fine -- just do tile.

I am slightly less annoyed by the mismatched flooring if at least all the flooring on each level matches. I still don't love it if the upstairs floor is a different wood than the downstairs floor, but at least it's not as jarring as being able to see three different types of flooring between the foyer, living room, and kitchen.

[Anonymous]

Mine is oversized houses 5k+ sq ft that result in stupidly large bedrooms upstairs. I don’t need a sitting room in my bedroom, I need well planned, smart layouts.

[Anonymous]

I hate when developers don’t account for each townhouse / condo having two or three cars plus a need for visitor parking. I live next to a high density building and it’s a big issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not sure if you count this as real estate it’s more mortgage. Charging people who don’t put 20% down PMI. It’s just an extra fee they charge and it’s not fair. If I can’t afford to save up 20% of a down payment gif have good enough credit to get a mortgage charging an extra fee is BS.

People who put down less than 20% have a demonstrated higher risk of default. Much higher. They didn't pick 20% for kicks. The data supports that cut-off.

If you have more than 20% down-payment, you're either (1) high income relative to home purchase value (especially if this is your first purchase) or (2) successfully managed to buy a previous home and made enough good financial choices to upgrade by rolling over equity gains + saving more money.

Either way, you're a low risk of default absent an idiosyncratic event not captured in credit risk data (eg, develop a mental illness, paralyzed in an accident and can't work, etc.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mine is oversized houses 5k+ sq ft that result in stupidly large bedrooms upstairs. I don’t need a sitting room in my bedroom, I need well planned, smart layouts.

+1 We're looking at second homes. There's one home that's the perfect size and location, but they made a 3K sq ft 3 BR home because each room has it's own office/sitting room that you can only access from that attached bedroom. I would have much rather had 5 bedrooms than these weird sitting rooms.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not sure if you count this as real estate it’s more mortgage. Charging people who don’t put 20% down PMI. It’s just an extra fee they charge and it’s not fair. If I can’t afford to save up 20% of a down payment gif have good enough credit to get a mortgage charging an extra fee is BS.

How about save 20% or rent? If you put very little money down, you have little incentive not to walk away if prices plunge 15%, which can happen. People seem to want a return to the mistakes of the 2008 bubble in the guise of “fairness”!

Paying high rents is why I couldn’t save 20% down. I still had really good credit though. That PMI could have been used towards the principal amount.

The alternative would be a higher interest rate for you. Things aren't free.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mine is oversized houses 5k+ sq ft that result in stupidly large bedrooms upstairs. I don’t need a sitting room in my bedroom, I need well planned, smart layouts.

+1 We're looking at second homes. There's one home that's the perfect size and location, but they made a 3K sq ft 3 BR home because each room has it's own office/sitting room that you can only access from that attached bedroom. I would have much rather had 5 bedrooms than these weird sitting rooms.

You can't move dry wall?

One option is to close off the sitting room with drywall and pocket door and then make that a bedroom for kids. Parents are in the main bedroom. We rent the same place in OBX with extended family year after year because two of the bedrooms have that separated space within the private suite - its really good for parents with young kids. Whichever set of parents have the youngest kid get those suites. Or kids get the main bedroom and au pair gets the pocket door side room.

It's actually a very nice option for a vacation home. Of course, you'd want to keep one or two configured for an office space so you can work remotely.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not sure if you count this as real estate it’s more mortgage. Charging people who don’t put 20% down PMI. It’s just an extra fee they charge and it’s not fair. If I can’t afford to save up 20% of a down payment gif have good enough credit to get a mortgage charging an extra fee is BS.

How about save 20% or rent? If you put very little money down, you have little incentive not to walk away if prices plunge 15%, which can happen. People seem to want a return to the mistakes of the 2008 bubble in the guise of “fairness”!

Paying high rents is why I couldn’t save 20% down. I still had really good credit though. That PMI could have been used towards the principal amount.

The alternative would be a higher interest rate for you. Things aren't free.

Yeah, you don't have to do PMI. Plenty of lenders will roll it into a higher interest rate so you have full tax deductibility.

[Anonymous]

Houses built with a second-story door for a deck but has no deck.

[Anonymous]

I say this every time so I will say it again: when you open the front door and the staircase is RIGHT in front of you. It feels confrontational to me.

For anyone tired of hearing me say that, here's another one: when the side of the bathroom vanity/sink is not flush against the wall, leaving a half inch gap where things can fall down but you'll never be able to get them. I've been seeing that more and more.

Lastly, I hate pedestal sinks. Have since the first time I saw one as a child.

[Anonymous]

No floor plans. We purchased a house a few years ago and over half of the houses had no floor plans.

[Anonymous]

Open floor plan because they're too cheap to pay for walls. It's a sound nightmare.

[Anonymous]

No bathroom on main/first floor. This is a deal breaker for me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mine is oversized houses 5k+ sq ft that result in stupidly large bedrooms upstairs. I don’t need a sitting room in my bedroom, I need well planned, smart layouts.

Agree. I really don't like these very large McMansion style houses with enormous footprints meaning vast wasted spaces upstairs and huge bedrooms and galleries and bonus rooms. I don't mind a proper mansion or anything very well designed, but there's a lot of wasteful square footage in these kinds of houses that would only annoy me.

I'd much rather have a well-planned 3k sqft house in the right location than a 6k sqft that's really 2k of pointless "finished basements" and another 2k of pointless suites and second family rooms.