Reply to Just bought an $800,000 house on a $186,000 salary and now I'm panicking....

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]We totally fell in love with the house, saw it as our forever home, and went for it.

Now I am here in the light of day and panicking.

Trying to talk myself down from the ledge:

Total mortgage debt is $710,000
Total monthly payment, including principal, interest, taxes, and insurance, is $3,700.   (30 year fixed mortgage with a great rate).
No other major debts, and kids are done with daycare.
Our gross monthly income, before taxes, is $15,500.
So our mortgage debt payment is 24% of our gross monthly income.

On paper, that seems pretty reasonable.

What say you, DCUM?  Did I screw up and buy too much house?
[/quote]

Oh sheesh. Everyone on this board is SO dramatically conservative about money. It's really ridiculous.

OP, you're fine. We did basically the same thing ($190k HHI, $860k house, $710k mortgage) and we DO have childcare expenses. We feel great about it! I will say, a couple things that made us feel better 1) we both have very stable jobs. 2) if something did happen to our jobs, we have very, very marketable skills and would be able to get new jobs without a ton of fuss. 3) we have no other debt 4) We have a decent cash emergency fund (4 months expenses) plus we feel good about where we are on retirement.

If one of those things is NOT true for you, I would focus on that a bit, particularly bulking up your emergency fund.

Make sure that you can balance your budget, you can stay on your budget, and you're still saving.

We have also cut our retirement savings a bit for now (still saving, just not at the same rate). As our incomes increase (even just COLA) and the housing expenses stay the same, we'll bulk them back up. But the truth is, when you have a house that pricey on an income like that, your house is essentially part of your retirement savings.

Congrats on your new home![/quote]

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