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Anonymous wrote:Bar harbor - summer
OBX - winter

Translation: we rent our OBX house out in the summer, so it’s an investment property

I’ve never been to OBX, but as someone who loves the beach in the off season, I can’t see anything but jealousy in this comment.

Anonymous wrote:We have a house in Hawaii. We go for a month in the summer and Christmas, sometimes other weeks. Now that our kids are in high school/college we come without them sometimes. We rent it out for some select weeks and plan to eventually retire here.

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Anonymous wrote:We have a house in Ocean City, New Jersey. Bought in 2016 when the market was much calmer. At the time it seems like a rash purchase but it's doubled in price so perhaps it was a good investment (who knows---we have no idea what the market will do and we're not currently selling).

One of our teenagers worked there this summer and we alternated living there with her. I did most of the time since my job is more flexible. Let me say, it was a great summer. I am more relaxed then i've been in a long time. DC is just STRESSFUL un many big and small ways that I didn't notice when i was here full time, year round. We're now in DC but going back for 2 more weeks on Wednesday.
This is the first summer we've spent that much time there.

it's 3 hours door-to-door. Holiday weekends can be rough if you attempt to travel during prime hours. Going up is easy (we travel late on a Friday evening). Coming back can be hard--you want to avoid the Monday afternoon of a 3 day weekend if at all possible. Monday mornings or late Monday night are usually fine.

Are you the one who posted about how much happier all the people from Philly are whose kids don't go to the Big 3 and end up at St Joe's and Villanova for college? I remember that laughable post . . . it's about as ridiculous as your "3 hours door to door" claim. It isn't three hours, even in the dead of winter. I grew up there, and it's closer to 4 on a good day.

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Anonymous wrote:We have a home in Bethany. The people claiming it isn’t an easy drive to the DE beaches are they knew who don’t own there - one of the huge benefits of owning is that you can time your travel to non-peak times because there is no check-in day or time. Only once this summer did we hit any traffic delay of more than 15 minutes, but we often head there Friday morning and return Monday night.

Yeah people who claim there is a ton of traffic really don’t go there often. I can’t remember the last time we hit any traffic of significance (more than a 15 minute delay) and even then it has been due to an accident.

Maybe true, but it's still a pretty long ride . . . to a mediocre beach.

My biggest issue is the traffic once you are there. If you need to run out for a "quick" errand you can get stuck in a massive traffic jam.

Depends on location, time of year and day of week. But tourist season can be tough on Coastal Highway.

Yeah, we stop for groceries on the way in, then don’t use the car again until we leave.

Yeah, sounds like a great "vacation" if you have to plan your entire stay around avoiding everybody and everything.

If your in Rehoboth there is no need to get in a car. Thats my favorite part of owning a home there. I dont have to drive, can walk, bike or boat to everything I need.

Anonymous wrote:We will have an empty nest soon so our plan is one of two:

A summer home in Cape Breton Nova Scotia - summer there, winter here.

Or Assuming dual citizenship comes through :

A home in county Kerry Ireland. Would prefer to just live there full time although it’s a hassle to get to so in reality maybe something closer to Dublin so the kids can get there easily.

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Anonymous wrote:One suggestion... rent a place for the year/3-6 months to see if you like the area. We did that in Canaan Valley and have since 2017. We love long-term renting, but ended up deciding not to buy. Renting gives you an idea of how the home will fit into your everyday life. If your kids play sports or have other activities, you can see if you realistically will use it enough to make it worth it. You can see what the drive is like at all times of the day/year. Our drive is 2 hours, 45 minutes. That is the longest I would ever want for a weekend home. We go out every weekend in the winter to ski. We use it other times of the year, but the kids are too busy now to go out on weekends consistently. Anyway... just an idea to evaluate an area before buying.

This is a great point. I think about a vacation home but, really, we have 3 young kids and as they years go by their schedules get busier and busier and they want to be in town with their friends. I think it likely makes more sense to rent for now and maybe buy down the road.

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Anonymous wrote:We have a home in Bethany. The people claiming it isn’t an easy drive to the DE beaches are they knew who don’t own there - one of the huge benefits of owning is that you can time your travel to non-peak times because there is no check-in day or time. Only once this summer did we hit any traffic delay of more than 15 minutes, but we often head there Friday morning and return Monday night.

Yeah people who claim there is a ton of traffic really don’t go there often. I can’t remember the last time we hit any traffic of significance (more than a 15 minute delay) and even then it has been due to an accident.

Maybe true, but it's still a pretty long ride . . . to a mediocre beach.

My biggest issue is the traffic once you are there. If you need to run out for a "quick" errand you can get stuck in a massive traffic jam.

Depends on location, time of year and day of week. But tourist season can be tough on Coastal Highway.

Yeah, we stop for groceries on the way in, then don’t use the car again until we leave.

Yeah, sounds like a great "vacation" if you have to plan your entire stay around avoiding everybody and everything.

Anonymous wrote:We have a home in Bethany. The people claiming it isn’t an easy drive to the DE beaches are they knew who don’t own there - one of the huge benefits of owning is that you can time your travel to non-peak times because there is no check-in day or time. Only once this summer did we hit any traffic delay of more than 15 minutes, but we often head there Friday morning and return Monday night.

Anonymous wrote:The idea of a vacation house has never appealed to me because I love traveling and exploring different countries and cultures. I understand the appeal if you’re in love with a certain area but the logistics always seem tough.

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Anonymous wrote:Bar harbor - summer
OBX - winter

Translation: we rent our OBX house out in the summer, so it’s an investment property

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Anonymous wrote:We want a house on cape cod. Been looking for a few years now but market is insane. Plus the drive is 10 hours. We spend 6 weeks there every summer though and rental prices are insane that we should just buy.

We are on the Cape, luckily bought our 1st house more than 15 years ago. No regrets, we get a ton of use and enjoyment from it.

We spend all summer on the Cape so don't rent.

The Cape is overcrowded, overrated, too snooty, too far away, and the water is too damned cold for swimming.

No way.

Anonymous wrote:Last year we wanted to buy a beach house and the one we wanted fell through. Then life got busy and we went on a bunch of vacations so the beach house was on the back burner. We now have 800k cash in a savings account. We still want a vacation home/potential retirement home.

Where is your vacation home?
Do you rent it out? How often do you use it?

Where would you buy one if you could?

Our problem is that between work, school and kids sports, we don’t have a ton of time. We also like to travel to new places so I feel like we may not go to this vacation home enough. I love the idea of having a house where we can bring our friends and my kids could one day bring their families. My kids are in elementary and middle school now.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bar harbor - summer
OBX - winter

Translation: we rent our OBX house out in the summer, so it’s an investment property