Does anyone else *not* live in a 200K+ house?

[yoopermom]

Back to the program, it was interesting, because they said that as baby boomers retire, there's going to be a rush of "McMansions" for sale, as these people sell out and move south or towards water. I would think you'd still have to sell your huge house for quite a profit, though, to be able to afford even a smaller retirement home in one of these "hot" areas. And who's going to be buying all of these McMansions? My generation (child of Boomers) is smaller and largely not as wealthy, at least not as young as our parents were (according to last night's experts). Amazing.
Terri

 

[Sparx]

I can't remember exactly how much ours cost, but it was no where near 200K. I live in middle TN about 2 hours SE of Nashville in a small town (nursery cap. of the world, don'tchaknow)

 

[yoopermom]

Chicago526, that's interesting about taxes. My parents, retired, live in SE WI, a hot area, in a house that's long paid off, but their taxes/house ins. payment is *more* than my mortgage payment, ouch!
Terri

 

[Bob Slydell]

Back to the program, it was interesting, because they said that as baby boomers retire, there's going to be a rush of "McMansions" for sale, as these people sell out and move south or towards water. I would think you'd still have to sell your huge house for quite a profit, though, to be able to afford even a smaller retirement home in one of these "hot" areas. And who's going to be buying all of these McMansions? My generation (child of Boomers) is smaller and largely not as wealthy, at least not as young as our parents were (according to last night's experts). Amazing.
Terri

I would have thought that less baby boomers and more Gen X/Y'ers would have been the ones with "McMansions". I would have guessed that many baby boomers are more likely to stay in one house for many years instead of "upgrading" to something much larger?

 

[CEDmom]

Ok, I'm one of those people that lives in a $350,000+ house and will be moving next spring to a better school district and of course a more expensive house. As far as the housing cost here on the east coast, I think it's all fairly relative when you factor in household income. To live comfortably where we are you'd be pulling in at least $100,000 but more likely closer to $150,000. I'm just wondering what the average income is in rural mid-west areas?

 

[Skylarr29]

I live in south Florida and I WISH I could buy just a 200k starter home. Homes here start at much more.... it seems impossible to find a house ( not a town house or condo) for under 300k. The condo we rent started at 210K for 2 bedrooms and no space.

 

[palmtreegirl]

We've owned two homes in the past, one in NJ and one we built in PA both were over 200,000. Now we live in a 2 bedroom apartment but we're about to move into a beautiful 3 bedroom in the Orlando area this Friday!

After owning both an older and brand new house, I love living in an apartment. It's so much easier and cheaper then owning a home. Maybe we'll buy another house sometime in the future but for now we're happy with the life we have living in an apartment.

 

[Magickndm]

Our mortgage payment is in the 3 digits too.
We bought our home as a repo from an atty's office, 2nd time I've lucked into that, so we got a fantastic price. FL real estate is insane right now, it was just appraised at over $140k more than we purchased it for less than 6 years ago.

 

[monarchsfan16]

In my town, "starter houses" are going for nearly half a million. That's with the minimum (for my town) 2 acres of land. And our taxes are through the roof. The "ghetto" houses can be found for the upper $100's, but those are really depressive houses. These "starter" houses are big, but definitely not mansions. With the exception of about 4 small streets in the town "ghetto" there are no real small houses. There are a few capes and ranches in town (old houses), and even those are in the low-mid 300's.
We don't live near any major water either. We're close to an hour from the ocean, and although there's a lake in town, it doesn't really add to the value of houses, surprisingly.

 

[Microcell]

We refinanced 18 months ago to put in a pool and our max value was under 200K. But the market went crazy--so though I didn't buy my home or get a 2nd mortage even for over $200K--my home is considered a $300K home. It makes looking at other areas very intriguing. A friend just returned from Oklahoma for a trip--said she saw BRAND NEW 3000sq ft homes with granite countertops in the low $200s. In my area--it is minimum Half-million...and if you are on the barrier island (as I am)--that my friend is 3/4 of a million...and if it is on navigable water--about a million.

In Oklahoma City were brand new three bed two bath homes for 140,000!!! I want to live there!

Here the starters are around 125,000 to 150,000 on the Missouri side, upper 180's for anything decent on the Kansas side.

 

[Bob Slydell]

To live comfortably where we are you'd be pulling in at least $100,000 but more likely closer to $150,000. I'm just wondering what the average income is in rural mid-west areas?

I don't have the stats available, but I'd venture to say that $100K is well above the median household income, even for your area. A $100K job in the NY area is around $80-$85K in a Midwest city.

 

[golfgal]

There are towns around us where you can get a pretty nice, but smaller home, for $50,000 or less. There is a home on the market in a town about 10 miles away that has beautiful woodwork and is probably 2500 sq feet for $29,000. Our town is more expensive, but still no where near Minneapolis/St. Paul suburbs. A nice new construction, you typical 4 bedroom 2 1 1/2 bath, two story would run with lot about $300,000 fully decked out with granite, whirlpool tubs, etc. Existing homes can be had for under $200,000 and for that you could get something built in say 1980 that might need some updated decorating but in a nice neighborhood and a good sized house. Your typical starter home in our town goes for about $80,000-100,000.

 

[rigs32]

We bought for $79k (assessed at $89k) in June 2004. We live in a small city/large town about 40 min from two medium sized cities. I commute west to one and DH commutes east to the other. Our house is 4BR 1.5baths, full attic (could be finished) and basement, but very little land - less than 0.1 acres. But we have no kids and aren't huge yard fans, so it works for us.

I would have preferred the 900 sq ft house we look at for less than $50k, but it was in a flood area and there was no shower - and with the slanted ceiling, we would not have been able to put one in.

Salaries around here are lower, but based on cost of living calculations, it doesn't make much sense for us to relocate, unless one of us got our dream job. Lower salary = lower tax rate, too.

 

[SC Minnie]

You can get a starter home here (1500 or so sq ft) for around 100K. Most of the new homes being built though are in the 150K - 250K range and avg about 2000 sq ft.

 

[malibuconlee]

Our house in Texas was $120K, and our house here in Iowa we paid $100K. Definitely more than anyone else in the immediate family has paid.

My SIL has her small 2BR on the market for about $42K right now.

 

[hentob]

This is going to be long and I am sorry if it sounds as if I am rambling. I have many things to type and feel like my hands are going a mile-a-minute.

I live in NE PA. It seems that there are a few of us posting in this thread also in Eastern PA.

I live in what they call the Coal Regions. People can still buy a house for under $100k. My first home that I DH and I bought in 1994 was $24,500 and our taxes were below $700. It had 3 bedrooms and we put in some hardwood, Berber and new windows. Nothing fancy, but we lived in that thing for 11 years!!! It was to be starter home, but in a short while we were living there for basically free. So we saved. And saved.

We just sold it for $40,000 as we moved into a "new" home.

We decided to stay in the same town. We bought a half double (duplex) for $80K. It is gorgeous. The woodwork is nicer than any McMansion I have yet to see. Open staircase. Hardwood throughout. Formal living room. Family room in basement. Four bedrooms. Dining room with built in china cabinets. Two bathrooms. New roof/oil burner. Two car garage. 2500 sq ft. (if you included the finished attic). I could go on and on. We are an hour and a half drive from Philly. My DH just drove to NYC last w/end to watch a Cross Country race, he was there in 2 hours. Beach? Three hour drive. Our children get to see movies at the IMAX, they get to go to museums, to the zoo, to the aquarium, etc. We just have to drive a bit to get there. And that drive is worth every minute. The money we save living in this tiny coal mining town is astounding.

Plus, every person that graduates from our local high school gets their college education for FREE if they choose to go to the new community college that was just built two blocks away from the high school.

But, many of our graduates go to schools like Penn State University and Kutztown University. I love to compare our school district with other, richer ones on greatschools.com. We have a WONDERFUL school system (with excellent teachers) and have sent many a student to excellent schools such as MIT, Harvard, Yale, Duke, etc. Infact, many people who go away to become doctors, lawyers, teachers and engineers come back here to live. They have seen how much it costs to live outside this One Horse Town and are willing to eat the commute to save hundreds of thousands of dollars.

I know this town will either be "discovered" and fill up with transplants or rot b/c there is no industry (DH commutes about an hour each way to work). Either way, we will stay. It is cheap. CHEAP. If we lived anywhere else, I would have to work. We would not be able to do the things we are used to doing (eating out, going to the movies, amusement parks, WDW, beach, etc). We don't stress about taxes (although ours did just go up--I think they are creeping up on $1800 for the year), we don't stress about HOA dues. We just live life.

So, yes, there are still places that you can live for under $200K

 

[SEAlla]

Around here (DC metro area) you'd be lucky to find a single family home for under $450k.

For example my friends neighbor sold their small (9 y/o at the time) 2300 sq. ft townhouse 2 years ago for $220k, just last year our friends sold theirs (same model) for $419K.

 

[mainewmn]

We brought our house last year and paid 150,000 for 4 bedrooms, living room, extra large kitchen, office/den, family room, 2 ½ bathrooms, 2 decks, pool, 2 ½ garage, shed on a 5 acres of woods on a lake. Our neighbor who has 3 bedrooms, no pool, 2 bathrooms, one deck, 1 car garage, overall older house then ours but they had more land then us, sold the house last month for a nice $200,000

 

[lap3]

Well, if you're looking for a new home in Southern California, expect to pay a lot of money for it...

Simi Valley is a nice city that's really safe and it's growing beyond leaps and bounds! 7 years ago, we paid $210k for a new 2000sq ft home. We had it appraised recently when we refinanced and it's value is now $635k! Even worse is that there is a new planned community near us that's going for in the high $900k! I imagine homes in Northern California will be even higher than what we have. Crazy, I tell you!

 

[Marseeya]

I live in NE PA. It seems that there are a few of us posting in this thread also in Eastern PA.

My DH's family lives in your area