Buying a house in 2009/2010. What should I be doing now?
Here's my situation: 1) OK FICO score (~640). Working on improving it. 2) OK handle on debt (at most $500 on credit card, $17,000 in student loans). 3) Current salary is about $31k, but I have reason to believe a promotion is coming in the next 12 months. 4) Median house price in my area is currently $216k. 5) I have been putting about 5% into a 401k at work, but prefer not to touch that, even for a house. I have a few hundred dollars in company stock (which is down right now) and another few hundred in a savings account. Other than that, no savings. 6) Current rent is about $500/month. Given all of the above, what steps should I be taking now to get ready to buy a house in a couple of years? Is it better to pay off debt as fast as I can, or to put money into the bank for a down payment? I'm also keeping one credit card (trying to keep it paid off each month), with a view to raising my credit score. Is this a good strategy? Finally, when should I contact a realtor? Would you recommend forgoing adding to my 401k (and passing up the company match) in order to build up my down payment faster?
Public Comments
- visit daveramsey.com to learn ur hard lessons from others mistakes. cut ur lifestyle back to minimum. work 2 more pt/tm jobs . save it all. read 'house buying for dummies ' twice over and understand. increase ur base pay by 25% some how and save it. look for houses that u can really afford, not what some banker realtor say u can . do real world math. so we will not get to visit.
- I would work to save as much as possible now. Based on today's income and interest rates, you qualify for a $100,000 mortgage MAX. Anything over this, will require a down payment.
- I would pay as much as possible on the debt and continue to save as much as possible so you'll have a larger down payment. The more down the smaller your monthly payment will be
