Hey all,
I'm planning to buy a house in the next year. I'm not especially enthusiastic about the process, but the wife and family are pushing me pretty hard. We currently live in a condo I bought 3 years ago that's in a good location and works well for the two of us, but would be too small if we had a baby, which we do want ASAP. It's especially important to my wife that we move into a house BEFORE a baby is born, so this is somewhat a case of "happy wife happy life".
After looking at houses in my city I wanted to limit the price to ~500K, which would be 2.5x gross income for me.
Some other factors to consider:
1) I have ~180K of student loan debt I want to pay off within 4-5 years. This would certainly strain my debt-to-income ratio in getting a conventional mortgage and I'd prioritize paying this off over saving for a large down payment.
2) Neither of us want to have to move again to get into a better school district, so we're looking at potentially staying up to 20 years in a house. Variable rates are probably not feasible.
3) I already max out a 401K, 2x backdoor roth IRAs, and am putting a little bit into a 529 for my wife (she may go for further schooling).
Realistically, I'd have to save for another 4-5 years for a 20% down payment which could be as high as $100K. My options seem to be:
1) Get a mortgage with 10% down. I just tried to apply for a HELOC for this and the bank appraisal was a lot lower than what I was expecting (almost $20K lower than the Zestimate). I could probably extract only $20-25K of home equity with some extra work.
2) Get a doctor's mortgage - I have sent out some inquiries already to get a sense of payments/rates/fees
Any suggestions? Is getting a 10% down and paying PMI for a few years much more advantageous than a doctor's mortgage? Is it much more difficult to refinance a doctor's mortgage down the road?
Thanks in advance!
I'm planning to buy a house in the next year. I'm not especially enthusiastic about the process, but the wife and family are pushing me pretty hard. We currently live in a condo I bought 3 years ago that's in a good location and works well for the two of us, but would be too small if we had a baby, which we do want ASAP. It's especially important to my wife that we move into a house BEFORE a baby is born, so this is somewhat a case of "happy wife happy life".
After looking at houses in my city I wanted to limit the price to ~500K, which would be 2.5x gross income for me.
Some other factors to consider:
1) I have ~180K of student loan debt I want to pay off within 4-5 years. This would certainly strain my debt-to-income ratio in getting a conventional mortgage and I'd prioritize paying this off over saving for a large down payment.
2) Neither of us want to have to move again to get into a better school district, so we're looking at potentially staying up to 20 years in a house. Variable rates are probably not feasible.
3) I already max out a 401K, 2x backdoor roth IRAs, and am putting a little bit into a 529 for my wife (she may go for further schooling).
Realistically, I'd have to save for another 4-5 years for a 20% down payment which could be as high as $100K. My options seem to be:
1) Get a mortgage with 10% down. I just tried to apply for a HELOC for this and the bank appraisal was a lot lower than what I was expecting (almost $20K lower than the Zestimate). I could probably extract only $20-25K of home equity with some extra work.
2) Get a doctor's mortgage - I have sent out some inquiries already to get a sense of payments/rates/fees
Any suggestions? Is getting a 10% down and paying PMI for a few years much more advantageous than a doctor's mortgage? Is it much more difficult to refinance a doctor's mortgage down the road?
Thanks in advance!
Comment