Buying A House: C or D?

It would neat to find out ilx has a secret gazillionaire who buys $8M homes just because.

would *be

Not it.

I will not comment on this topic at this time

A Cleveland friend tipped me off to the property tax rate for that area and it's among the highest in all of Ohio. All relative of course, but (for example) in Lakewood it's $3,203 per $100K of home value.

http://www.cleveland.com/datacentral/index.ssf/2016/01/compare_property_tax_rates_in.html

daamn that's triple what we pay

yea it's pretty high for sure

usually areas with taxes that high have fancy public schools

yea they are currently renovating/rebuilding almost every school in the district

lakewood also has a huge amazing lakefront park that was completely renovated

Westchester Cty outside NYC has taxes like that, but the houses in a lot of the good towns are $600K and up, so the added taxes on top of that is a huge additional burden, like another $1500/month or more.

is that a one-off cost or a yearly one?

(actually, if it's monthly then it's a recurring one, i guess)

Yeah, it's recurring. I saw lots of listings in Westchester with taxes listed as being $18K - $24K a year. Lower end houses already looked like a stretch for us but becoming aware of the tax burden made it clear that we're staying put for a while.

Yow, even here in rich-ass Arlington Va. we typically pay $5-6K in real estate taxes, and in return get wonderful schools (especially for special needs).

I live in SF and these Cleveland houses are blowing my mind. What other cities have houses remotely this cheap? Open to anywhere in the US (would love to leave the country but the wife won't go for that right now).

Scott was posting similarly priced Western Mass houses a while back, but then you're not in a largish city. Also Detroit, of course. I think there are nice-ish areas in the city that are in this range.

detroit will prob have better deals than cleveland

st louis would be a good bet

pittsburgh maybe

buffalo

i don't know anything about milwaukee but it is a rust belt city right?

this is pretty sweet http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1506-Wayne-Ave-Lakewood-OH-44107/33489730_zpid/

this one too http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3818-Montevista-Rd-Cleveland-Heights-OH-44121/33654224_zpid/

Define "city." I'll sell you my house for $100K. 2400 sq ft, 3/2, 200 sq ft detached shop/office, new exterior paint, new roof. But you have to live in Buttnugget, Mississippi.

My parents live in St. Louis. It is a fine city - arts-filled, uncrowded, green, decent on transport, and with vastly cheaper housing than the coastal money-vacuums many of us call home.

yea definitely. one of my best friends lived in st louis for a long time, visted him a couple of times, i thought it was awesome

housing stock was neat, so much brick and stone

sad about all this, a healthy clips-dubs second round would've been neat

woops wrong thread sorry

lol was seriously trying to figure out whether griffin & paul were somehow tied to real estate prices somewhere for a sec

I always thought Denver seemed like a nice city -- not quite as cheap as Cleveland but cheap compared to coastal cities, with detached houses walking distance from nice commercial streets. Especially good if you are into outdoor sports.

lol xp

No ass tubs, but plenty of potential for the motivated buyer:

https://www.crye-leike.com/1422-s-summit/in-zip-code-72202-mgrp-2-tid-littlerock-mlsnum-16005323-ln-76-p-8-sm-1

― pplains, Tuesday, April 26, 2016 10:09 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

wow that is amazing

I live in SF and these Cleveland houses are blowing my mind. What other cities have houses remotely this cheap? Open to anywhere in the US (would love to leave the country but the wife won't go for that right now).

― SA, Wednesday, April 27, 2016 1:26 PM (53 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

honestly i could be wrong but probably most small- to mid-size american cities that are not on the coast are relatively cheap? louisville, kansas city, columbus, okc, tulsa, albuquerque, minneapolis, des moines, etc

pplains that is also a v beautiful street, lots of neat houses in that neighborhood

I wouldn't have thought of Denver as being cheap. I love skiing. So expensive though. I'm open! Probably not open to Buttnugget though, sorry. Minneapolis? I figured that place would be expensive.

Yeah Detroit is supposedly "over" already, hahaha(!?). Pittsburgh too. San Antonio is the new "cheap and in the near future cool place to move to" apparently but I don't want to go there. Cleveland, St. Louis, Milwaukee -- those places seem interesting. My wife thinks that anywhere that's cheap must mean it's too dangerous to live and/or the schools/city funding is too shitty.

My mom's 2BR/1.5 bath house (w/attic and basement yet to be developed) in a nice neighbourhood in an inner Minneapolis suburb with excellent schools is worth $300K. The Twin Cities aren't cheap.

ah ok i'm really not familiar with them

denver is cheaper than LA, NYC, or SF obv but it is not really that cheap iirc

About two years ago I paid 160k for a 2000 sq foot house with 4 BR/3 baths, pretty much fully updated, located in an established suburb about ten minutes from uptown Charlotte. Charlotte has a reputation for being boring bankertown, but there are a zillion breweries, the National Whitewater Center, a largely (imo) underrated arts scene, manageable cost of living, and of course tons of jobs. Schools are decent, taxes are low, the city itself is fairly progressive, and crime is not great, but not terrible either. Anyway, I like it here and I think the real estate is generally undervalued, particularly outside of the trendy neighborhoods.

XP Looks like it's the Cleve or nothin'.

I am reliably informed that the heart of rock and roll is still beating there.

Of all the places where I have friends, Minneapolis / St. Paul seems like the real sweet spot in terms of a city I'd want to live in combined with affordable housing. I'd never want to live anywhere in the Southeast or Texas though which limits my options.

I live a ways south of Spokane and I'm kind of waiting to see if it takes off in any way as people get priced out of Seattle and Portland; it's gotten a lot more "stuff" in the last ten years - restaurants, breweries, more visible music and arts scene, more bands passing through, etc. - but it's still vastly cheaper than the coastal cities with way more of crusty/methy underdog city feeling. And it's got mountains, woods, water, all that kind of stuff super close. Not Rainier or Hood or the ocean, but still.

Anecdotally I know a number of art school grads who have moved there recently because they couldn't comprehend paying three or four times as much to rent places in Seattle and feel they could more directly involve themselves in the future of the place.

If I lived a nice growing city in Washington with mountains and stuff I probably wouldn't have a ton of fire under me to move to Minneapolis, but I have enjoyed owning a home here for the year-ish I've done so. Renting here sucks a little right now from what friends tell me, but if you're looking to own it might be worth checking into

crusty/methy underdog

this shit is overwhelming huh

i don't understand any of it

our agent connected us to one of the in-house loan officers, my wife and i got terrible vibes from her, she was consistently awful, unclear, and confusing in all her answers both in person and in writing, i don't really want to work with her

i don't even really know what a loan officer does either

also apparently we won't be able to close on a loan until i've been working at my new job for a few weeks and can provide paystubs? i would've thought the offer letter w/ salary would've sufficed but i don't really know anything about this process and this person is super unhelpful. don't people relocate for a new job and buy a house before they officially start working?

Sellers like to be comfortable that you will be a good fit for the job and not get fired/quit in disgust in a few weeks. I wouldn't want to commit to buying a house in a new area with a new job.

If you don't have a good feeling about the loan officer, get a new one now. The mortgage paperwork and approval process was the biggest pain of both of my home purchases, and you really want someone you can trust to get things done on that end and be able to explain things to you. Even more important for you since you have the wrench of a new job thrown in the works. It's pretty typical for a history of paystubs to be required. Is the new job in the same field as your old one? If not expect even more delays. In my limited experience I found working with a local broker much easier than with a national bank.

Also, depending on how well you know and trust your agent, it's often recommended that you not use his or her referrals for loan officers, inspectors, attorneys (not sure if you use them in Ohio for real estate purchases), etc. Ideally those people will be working solely in your interest, but if they have an agent sending work their way they may feel pressure to move deals alongs even when they shouldn't so as to not jeopardize their relationship with the agent. If you have an excellent agent that you trust they can be a good source of recommendations, but you have to make that call. Don't feel pressure to use people you don't want to.

You're right, it can be overwhelming. I felt silly buying it, but I must admit that "Home Buying for Dummies" helped a lot for my first purchase.

thanks nick & er, i appreciate it. yea we are early enough in the process too (haven't even started the pre-approval process) that i think it is best to find a different loan officer