Renting Vs Buying

Why haven’t you bought your own house yet? Stop paying off someone else’s mortgage! Rent money is dead money!

As a renter these are all things you may have heard people say before, but what are the real benefits of buying a house? Let’s take a look.

It is true that while you’re renting you can be spending hundreds if not thousands per month to have a roof over your head, but this money is really just going towards someone else’s retirement plan, so what about your long-term plans?

So what are the advantages of renting? Well for starters you don’t have to worry about paying for maintenance to the house, if anything breaks from normal wear and tear well, that’s someone else’s problem, and in some areas it can be a whole lot cheaper to rent than it is to buy. Look at somewhere like Scarborough, the median rental price there is $450 a week while a similar house to buy would be about $750k. Not everyone has a cool $750k to drop on a house but $450 is a more manageable number. So renters might choose to live closer to the beach and rent rather than buy, but doing this means you have no security in the long run and if the owner wants to sell or move back in, well you’re off to find another home to live in.

The question is though, why buy? Well for starters that money that you are paying each week goes towards your future security and short of failing to pay your mortgage, nobody can kick you out. That’s YOUR home, YOU can paint it any colour you like, drill holes in any wall and have as many animals living in your house as you want (pending shire approval). You can also feel secure in the knowledge that your property will only increase in value over time, so all that money that you’re putting into renting now could actually be working for you in the long term. When it comes to buying your home, it is true that you can own your own home for less than what you are paying for in rent. You just need to pick the right suburb and house plan to suit your needs. That’s where the Mr Enthusiast team comes in. Catching up for an hour and going over everything to help create a plan so that you know what to do, how to do it, and a timeframe to achieve is the best place to start. We can also help with finances so we can work out what kind of deposit you would need and what your repayments would look like moving forward. These sit downs are free of charge and if you leave with more information than what you came in with then our job is done!