I've been a lifelong renter because I moved regularly for work. I'm settling down and would like to consider home ownership. I've been doing an enormous amount of theorycrafting and research over the years and would like input from the forum members.
First, I don't think renting is "throwing money away" so no need to go into that point. Maybe I'm wrong, and it is throwing money away, but for purposes of discussion I'm interested in purchasing something to improve my quality of life, not as a financial situation. If purchasing will not increase my quality of life, then I'd rather continue renting.
My main problems with renting are noisy neighbors, cigarette smoke from neighbors, my apartment manager has a key and access to my home (albeit for emergencies only, in theory), I can't customize security features of the home like strengthening the door, I can't store survival supplies like a few hundred gallons of water, there's uncertainty on how long I'll be able to continue renting there (or if they want to jack up the rents).
I have come up with three possible buying solutions that may improve my quality of life. Each one has pros and cons that I've considered. And I'm writing this post because there's pros/cons that I haven't considered that you all have experienced in your lives that I can learn vicariously from.
OPTION A) Buy a single family home, HOA-free, in the city I currently live, just outside of the downtown area. I refuse to own a home with an HOA, it defeats the purpose of owning a home. I like the idea of burying a 500 or 1000 gallon water tank in the ground. Possibly a deisel fuel or propane tank. I don't own a deisel vehicle yet but am considering buying a pickup truck. Propane may be able to run a generator for emergencies.
Downsides are that I would be responsible for everything and I am a massive tweaker (not of meth, but of customizing things). I fear my entire life may turn into projects such as re-plumbing and optimizing the hot water heater and researching optimal paint color patterns for rooms based on scientific light analysis of natural light. I get obsessive into things like this and at some point, the house owns me.
Other downsides are that the lots are pretty small (About 0.20 acres) and my neighbors would be pretty close. So I might hear barking dogs, playing/screaming children, and may smell chain smoking neighbors over my fence. But, if I want to live in the nice part of town, close to downtown, I am stuck with a small lot.
OPTION B) Buy land in a rural part of town, 30 to 45 minutes out, 1 acre, and build my "Dream" house. I don't want anything huge, a 3/2 1500sq foot would be plenty for my needs. Obvious downside is driving distance to do anything. If I want to go anywhere it becomes a mission. There's shops and businesses (like gyms) in that rural part of town, but I don't think I'd like them compared to the ones downtown I'm used to. The land isn't big enough to put my own shooting range in the backyard (per ordinances).
This is the most expensive option. Even though the land is a lot cheaper, building a custom house is expensive. When a developer builds 100 houses in the city, they have economies of scale. Me building one house is a lot more expensive.
The other downside is that much like the single family home, I will become obsessed with optimizing it. Both during the build phase and once it's complete. And since I have more land to play with, there's more optimizations I can do.
OPTION C) Buy a condo downtown. The location is perfect for day to day living, but terrible if TSHTF. I'm not a crazy prepper, just a reasonable one, and would rather structure my life around what's likely to happen, rather than what probably won't happen. So I'd rather live downtown and enjoy day to day, then live out in the sticks and feel secure if TSHTF.
Downsides are HOA fees forever. However, Condos are reasonably priced compared to houses. My math is such that if the monthly HOA fee multiplied by 300 PLUS the cost of the condo is cheaper than the single family house, then the condo is cheaper overall. For example, a condo might be $200k with $250 HOA fee. take $250 times 300 and get $75k. This is because you'd need $75k up front in a bank account to pay $250 HOA fees (adjusted for inflation) forever.f
So if the Condo is $200k with $250 HOA fees, that's about $275k costs and houses in the area might be $400k
I could potentially drop $30k into sound insulation in the condo and be ahead of buying the $400k house. No backyard chickens for me, but maybe condo life means I can focus on fitness and dry firing, rather than figuring out how to bury 1000 gallon tanks of water in my backyard.
I know there's special assessments that drop in condos but the same happens in a house, it's just called "the roof collapsed" or the "hot water heater broke".
I am not keen on condos nor HOAs, but the more I analyze it, the more it seems to make sense to me. I'd rather not discuss the exact area I live or want to live but the numbers above for the houses are about accurate. Building a custom home on 1 acre in the rural part would probably run $500k.