Downsize to townhouse?

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01/19/2019 08:22

Subject: Downsize to townhouse?

quote

Anonymous

Have you actually done the math on this yourself? (If not, that would be my first recommendation, rather than getting worried about conflicting advice from DCUM!).

By my quick calculations (rough estimates of property taxes and such), I’m thinking that you would save ~ $650/month on your mortgage (based on a $300k mortgage). If you assume $40k total moving costs, then you’d be to break-even after about 5 years. However, getting your mortgage down to $300k would only leave you an extra $50k in savings - is the extra commute time, hassle of moving, changing school districts,etc. worth it to you for this? Only you can really answer that question.

I live in a TH. Overall I like it, but the stairs are a bit of a pain - going up and down 2 flights of stairs every time I need to put something away in our bedroom. We don’t have a garage, so our Living room and kitchen are on the ground level - this is critical for us since we host most holiday celebrations and have elderly relatives who struggle with stairs and would likely have to decline if they had to take stairs to even get to the meal. I don’t know the state of your family’s knees and hips - once again, only a question that you can answer. Personally, I don’t see DH and myself retiring in a TH, due to the steps.

How important is a yard to you? Our TH does have a yard, and that’s critical to us, since we have a dog....it’s really nice to just let him out back in the mornings and evenings. However, we don’t have a garage, so bicycle storage is a major issue for us. (Yet another reason why we’ll eventually get a SFH). Very few THs have both a yard and a garage - those that do tend to have main living quarters starting on the second floor (so always have to lug groceries up to the 2nd floor kitchen). Once again, how important are a yard and a garage to your family?

Also, don’t assume that a TH won’t be a money pit. Our 1600’ TH was built in the late 90s and honestly, isn’t very high quality construction. We’ve spent tens of thousands in maintenance and repairs (plus quite a bit more for upgrades). However, overall maintenance is probably less than for a SFH, so long term, there probably is some savings there, both in time and money.

We don’t mind having neighbors next to us, but we’re in an end unit...and also my development has great landscaping with lots of trees. In the summertime, I can sit in our small backyard and I feel separated from the THs right behind us, since there’s a row of trees in-between and they can’t look down into our yard (with the leaves on the trees). I think that I’d feel different about this if we were in the sort of development where all of the THs are crammed close together.

If you’re seriously thinking about this, I would recommend 1. Running the numbers yourself, so that you can get a feel for actual savings, 2. Targeting some areas that you’re interested in and start going to open houses in those areas. How do those THs feel to you? Will your family have enough space? 3. Double/triple check the commute from those target areas that are a ‘little further out.’ In reality, is it an extra 10 minutes or an extra 40? Are you adding in extra tolls?