Reply to At odds with spouse ove how much house we can afford

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Hey Chris, I read that book, too. Its called "the 4 hour work week" or "rich dad, poor dad" Great books. If OPs husband is in law, it does not work out quite that neatly. Law is time intensive -- they don't just give out the Million for a few brillant thoughts. Meetings, filings ect -- takes quite a bit of time. Fixing up those ailing apt buildings is not without a time component--OPs new job. We have friends who do this. They both have 9-5 government jobs, and they moonlight a lot to keep all these properties rented, renters happy, toilets flowing ect. Different life from that of a high powered lawyer with intellectual interests.
Perhaps the OP has realized, like many BigLaw wives, that DH is good at what he does, and for some reason wants to keep doing it. Perhaps she would like to secure a home for herself while DH is doing all that working. Maybe later in life, the DH will secure and income stream such as you describe. [/quote]

I am not passing judgement on people who do not wish to spend the time it takes to heavily leverage their cash. My brother-in-law and his wife are both attorneys, and they have zero interest in this sort of thing. They love their jobs and want to work their tails off for the rest of their lives, even if it costs them the other things they want to have in life. That's fine. Not everyone wants to be independently wealthy. To each his own. My greater point is not that my over-arching vision of how to manage this kind of earning power is better; my point is that the lack of a vision can be really frustrating and create dysfunction in a marriage over much smaller issues, like how much to spend on a house. Secondary to that, I am trying to make the point that this much discretionary income has the ability to create income streams that make the mortgage size debate a moot point, regardless of HHI in the future.

If you have no line-of-site to get from where you are now to where you want to go, then it can be difficult to make budgetary decisions in this kind of a vacuum. At that point, it will just come down to felt emotional needs and two spouses getting frustrated with one another's shallow reasons. If somebody doesn't "feel" like spending or saving a certain amount of money, that is fine; however, don't expect to get others to buy into that feeling without painting a compelling vision of how it helps you get to an end goal both spouses are excited about--whatever that is.

People have mentioned in this thread that DH just needs to see some examples of the types of homes each price point is able to buy, and this will win him over. Maybe. But it should be noted that this might not be adequate if the OP is looking for more than merely getting her way. If DH ends up dismayed over the housing prices and only reluctantly acquiesces to the pressures of providing for his family at a certain level of luxury and is unhappy as a result, then OP will have lost bigger than she ever thought she could win.

As for my specific example, it is one of many plans that could give a married couple some deeper, more fulfilling reason to live with less house for the short term. Investing in real estate is certainly not going to be everyone's cup of tea. I'm not making that claim. Nor am I claiming that they key to happiness is building wealth. But better leveraging cash as busy attorneys is not impossible, and doing so is a pragmatic way to solve this problem. By the by, purchasing a house with the end game in mind (the equity you stand to make) might help DH be more comfortable with a bigger capital outlay. But this requires buying the right type of house (one that is undervalued), and adding value to it (renovation). That might be a pain, but it is A WAY to double your investment, and that is A REASON to invest more in the first place. You can end up with a nicer house than you would have been able to otherwise buy.

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