Buying a house with young kids

[Anonymous]

Don't buy in Arlington unless you are OK with having sixplexes with no parking next to your house.

[Anonymous]

For around $1M in Arlington, the only place I would consider is Westover.

For around $1.25M, take a look at the townhouses near Haycock Elementary School and Haycock Longfellow Park. Here’s one listing as an example:

https://redf.in/eirGZb

[Anonymous]

everyone i know who didn't go to top of budget thinking they could upgrade later regretted it (myself included).

Transaction costs + hassle of moving + really hard to buy a house when you need to sell one (contingency affects your nego power) + inventory super low and will always be low.

I don't recommend being house poor but i def recommend buying the house you will need in 10 years when your kids are tweens.

The idea that you could price yourself away of families with young kids with a 1-1.5M budget is not correct except maybe if you buy the cheapest house in the most expensive neighborhood (which would be depressing anyway).

I live in Takoma in a 1.3M house. Tons of kids around and next door neighbors' houses ranging from 550K to 1.8M in same street.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for the responses all! I appreciate hearing your thoughts.

Part of my thinking is that since we’ve never lived in a house before (always lives in an apartment), pretty much any house with multiple floors seems like a big change in terms of having more space. But I can see myself getting used to the house and then wishing we had something nicer/bigger as the kids get older. If interest rates were lower I’d be less concerned, but the monthly payment gets pretty ridiculous.

In that case maybe get a house that can also grow? Meaning if you are stuck you have the yard space/the right configuration to add on instead of move. Not always worth it but nice to have the option.

[Anonymous]

Given the current state of affairs of the US ie if Trump wins you want to buy the lower end of your budget.

The US is going to go through a depression it has never ever seen before when he is installed.

Find a good public school single family home and do not stretch.

You should never "stretch" financially it's dumb

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Given the current state of affairs of the US ie if Trump wins you want to buy the lower end of your budget.

The US is going to go through a depression it has never ever seen before when he is installed.

Find a good public school single family home and do not stretch.

You should never "stretch" financially it's dumb

Stop making every real estate thread political.

[Anonymous]

People do that cause they don’t have money to stretch with. We went from 500K home to 1.1 m home about 10 years later. We just couldn’t stretch to 1.1 when we first bought. With 1-1.5 million range, you probably could aim for a longer term home, rather than aim to buy and move in 5-7 years, unless you think in 5-7 you’d want to move into 1.5-2 m home. Only you can answer this.

The transaction cost of buying, selling, moving is relatively high, so if you can stretch financially and get something you can stay in for the next 10-15 years, that would make more sense.

Of course, no one knows what happens in future, a new job, unexpected move, twins, so you could still end up moving.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Given the current state of affairs of the US ie if Trump wins you want to buy the lower end of your budget.

The US is going to go through a depression it has never ever seen before when he is installed.

Find a good public school single family home and do not stretch.

You should never "stretch" financially it's dumb

People have been crying recession for the past several years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Given the current state of affairs of the US ie if Trump wins you want to buy the lower end of your budget.

The US is going to go through a depression it has never ever seen before when he is installed.

Find a good public school single family home and do not stretch.

You should never "stretch" financially it's dumb

We “stretched” to buy in 2020. We could never afford our current house at today’s prices and rates. It would have been financially dumb to have followed your advice.

[Anonymous]

They don't usually convey