This is a choice I have to make in the next month, so I glommed onto this article like an aquatic spiky thing. Unfortunately it requires more inputs than I currently have (the crucial "how long will you be in the area" ... no fucking clue).
What do y'all think? I think I'm going to rent for a while first, scout the housing market (never been to this city), build capital.
Hie thee to /r/realestate. Check the sidebar. _______________________ The NYT calculator is one of the dopest data products they've come out with. However, it doesn't paint the whole picture. Macroeconomically speaking, we're in a bubble. The Fed is all out of instruments; rates just can't go any lower and if they go higher all sorts of shit in the stock and bond markets is going to shake out to a loud crashing sound. Not to say prices are going to go higher; not to say prices are going to go lower. Whatever they do, they're likely to do it slowly. Microeconomically speaking, individual markets are a lot more volatile than they used to be because states' rights and local housing/wage initiatives are really fucking with things. Your town may be headed for a downturn or it may spike. And if you don't know how long you're going to be there, your odds of ending up upside down exceed your odds of ending up right side up. Don't ask "should I buy A house." Ask "should I buy THIS house" because there are many reasons to maintain the flexibility of a rental and it's foolish, in my opinion, to grab a large piece of real estate you know little about in a location you aren't familiar with. Also keep in mind that unless you're shoveling in a great deal over your minimum payment, the balance on the mortgage after five years will be virtually indistinguishable from the balance on the mortgage the day you got your keys. You are effectively renting... but you're renting from the bank, and you'll face ridiculous fees if you want to break your lease.
Yeah I'm thinking of buying suddenly. The reality it, it costs 3k-5k/month to find a dog friendly house with a backyard here. I'm done with roommate and apartments. There are houses one town east, and some even on the border between my town at the east town, that are 500k-600k, which is about where they were in '08. The reality is, I'm not having kids in the next 5 years (hoepfully) so the fact that the schools are shit one town over makes no difference to me. I'm going to keep my eyes open and when something worthwhile comes along, snatch it up. I'm probably 6 months from having a down in my chase account so... Yeah. I figure I better start spending.
You will pay the piper. Think for a minute: You're literally saying "I feel like paying a half million dollars to live in Lawndale." You think Lawndale is gonna be worth shit once all this SILICON BEACH SILICON BEACH SILICON BEACH bullshit blows over? Compare prices from 2007-now in Riverside, Hemet, anywhere inland and then get back to me.
I was actually looking at El Co village which is technically Lawndale... Or Gardena. The border is right now. I lived there after high school for a bit and it's nice. Super family oriented area. Only a couple roads in and out. Big lots, almost no rentals. People tend to live there for life. I'd do old Torrance area as well or del aire / holly Glen. Example: http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/20363302_zpid/ The problem with Lawndale that's like Artesia and Inglewood Lawndale isn't that it's Lawndale.. It's that there's 4 houses per lot and 16 people per house and 32 cars per house. I wouldn't mind doing a Westchester but holy fucking hell a 1950s box home with a new shower head is somehow 900k. Seriously. We watched the renovation job for a piece of shit across the street.
The 1100sf 2br we lived in down the hall sold two weeks ago. $490k with a $500/mo HOA. I'm pretty sure our complex is the cheapest place you can live on the west side. I knew it was time to get out when the semi-okay house up on the ridge, all 1800 sqft of it, sold for $1.6m. Just for shits'n'giggles I looked up what $1.6m got me in Bellingham, WA. Answer? A 5800sqft 9BR bed'n'breakfast on 45 acres with water rights and an i-shit-you-not T3 line to the house. Not gonna lie. If I had to find a house 'round here I'd be super-depressed. Made a visit on Sunday for a show; it was a nice place up in the Hills. As it turns out, it had sold two weeks previously for Eight. Million. Dollars.
Yeah. The condo I currently live in (2bd, 2bth, 1200sq ft, 1st floor, east side of the building) is 750k with $495 HOAs. The top floor, west facing, sunset view 2/2 lofts are just under a million. Fun fact about the lofts—they have balconies but no doors to those balconies for some (permitting?) reason so the owners climb through the window to enjoy their ocean view. Luckily, my roommate bought this place in '08 for 450k. That's a nice little ROI. We don't have a pool and the rotting balcony repairs are a cost to the owner. Not sure where 36,000/month is going to. Maybe the single maid who mops the hallways and takes out the mailroom trash once a week is making bank? The housing prices are ridiculous here. There's no doubt about it. Anywhere else would be so much better. But the reality is, we can't move out of the area yet. And paying 3k/month to rent a shitty house in "East South Bay" (Carson) or "10 Minutes from Redondo Beach Pier" (Lawndale), or "central location - beach breezes and close to freeway" (Hawthorne) or "Palos Verdes Adjacent" (San Pedro) or "East Westchester" (IngleWOOOOOOD) is silly when you can buy at that same price. (Yes, those are actually what craigslist people call their areas). I think Playa / Westchester / Palms / Culver have been hit with the "Silicon Beach" thing the most. I just saw that fucking new apt/condo building on Lincoln with the massive "NOW RENTING: SILICON BEACH" sign. Silly silly silly. Your building is nice, but no pets (at least for renters?) and the 1bd/1bth was like $2750 and didn't even have a door to the bedroom! Plus, holy hell does the number system ever start making sense? Why are there letters?!??!?!?!?!?! As you know, I grew up in Manhattan Beach. My dad bought the house in the mid-80s and didn't even look at the house - he only looked at the garage...which had two garage doors so you could drive into the backyard. He was into hot rods back then. My street is one of the last remaining streets in the area that has lots that haven't been split to 1/32 of an acre. My parents and the neighbors go to city council meetings EVERY. SINGLE. FUCKING. MONTH. for as long as I can remember to prevent the people buying the lots as the owners die from splitting them. Instead of...you know...keeping a fucking backyard...the houses that have been built are massive, .4 acre houses on .5 acre lots. .9 acre houses on 1 acre lots. People like Vince Vaughn live there now. You know who lived there before? A 90 year old guy who trekked up the massive hill walking his poodle every single day at 7:30am and would say hello to us every single day at 7:36am when we were leaving for school. I remember the day the poodle died because he suddenly didn't have his poodle. My dad walked down with him to help him bury it in the backyard. We came by after school for a little funeral. Before retiring at 65 years old, he worked a normal job, had a normal family (and like 80 grandkids), played tennis in his free time, and enjoyed tending to his lemon grove and walking his poodle. His wife was mid-level HR at TRW/Northrop. People used to be normal! I was 12 when he died and 14 when the 3bd, 1bath, 1200 sqft house he raised three kids in with 60 years of lemon trees was scraped. Here's the house now. It has two staircases and a bathroom larger than my apartment in New York. I was a little rebellious skateboarder when that house was being built. We used to hide and drink in the massive wine cellar and fuck on the single-slab-of-granite kitchen counter that extends all the way from the massive indoor bar, through a window, into an indoor/outdoor grill / bar / entertainment area, and didn't see the transformation from "people who worked hard as fuck and have become successful enough to own a house that they bought for under 400k" to "people who have so much money they can buy a $17m vacation home that they live in 5% of the year". Now I'm depressed.
WOW. That house. Yeah, I feel you, dawg. Stupid thing is somebody pocketed a million dollars living there for two years. That's irrational exuberance if ever there was any... Our building is a hive. It was probably one of the last pieces of decent architecture in Southern California but that was like '77. The hallways are something out of The Shining and the balconies are all falling over because the official state flower of California is dry rot. And again: 550 units x $495/mo = $270k for maintenance and where the hell does it go? Landscaping I guess. By the way, the numbers? X(n1)(n2)(n3)(n4), X being the building designator, (n1) being the floor, (n2)(n3)(n4) being unique. There's only one 3124, despite 12 buildings, but that building has a 3124, a 2124 and a 1124. I think they do it for the mailman. Badged for "Palos Verdes adjacent." By the way - your neighborhood is never going to be cheap ever again.
Thank you LATimes for answering a question everyone already knew the answer to. What can you buy for under 400k in LA? Not much, and not in an area anyone actually wants to live in.
You staying in LA for the foreseeable future? That's easily my biggest problem. Selling a house sucks. I'd be hardpressed to take a bigger hit on a house than I would the accumulated rent I'll pay over ~5 years, no problem. But if I have to move for work one day and no one will buy...
I want to eventually get out to LA (probably when I have kids) but right now it's not in the cards. I do love it here. My boyfriend is doing music and this is a good place to do it. And we have friends, family, and people who will take care if the dog when we randomly disappear to other countries for a month. Hopefully, if you have to move for work, they'll assist with relocation costs, right? We will have to see what the real estate market does in LA, but keeping a house as a rental property isn't the worst idea in the world if the market is good.