# Should l sell the house or keep as an investment ?



## whitehawk (Aug 14, 2012)

People l've got me a dilemma , hu so what's new yep l know the yr from hell 

We're separated now , l'm still at the house because l work from home and l can finish the renovating as well .
Thing is , because it'll be split now l'd come out with 50k if very lucky.That's all l'd have and only a very mediocre deposit if that round here for my own place later.
l'd have nothing else and a new bigger mortgage than here now but , l do have to get out of here l just don't like it here like this now. 

The other thing we could do is keep the house and rent it out , finish it of better over time and sell when times are better anytime later for a much higher finished of price .
l had to do a deal with banks but now the repayments are so low that it would rent out at 500pm cash positive , forever if we wanted to. l could use that and the equity against my new place instead. 
l'd have a bigger mortgage but 250 of that 500 would be mine plus , the place has a spare side 1/2 ac l could also build up a second rental on or a storage business or something.
Problem is , that means staying in it with x.
x and l have a good civil and helpful relationship now as we co parent our d, 12, plus we still have to share all the finances.

Thing is though it is painful . lt's hard to be around your x knowing your family is like this now , your life. Maybe there's an om to and maybe l'll have an ow one day.
So from that angle , l'd prefer to sell , tidy up our financial crap and move on with my life if that's how it has to be. lt's pretty sad being around this property now although l guess that'd blow over in time as l started new somewhere else, dunno !
But hey , l'd be working 20yrs on a new mortgage , nothing aside for when l'd retire or investment , this is the thing.
Where as l could damn near pay my new mortgage out in a few yrs if we finished this one properly and rented out. Or we could pay it right off in time and keep all the rents and still own the property.

So that's my dilemma , l dunno what to do. There doesn't look much hope of R down track , 12 mths now .

What do you think people , needing your wisdom here :smthumbup:


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## RandomDude (Dec 18, 2010)

Rent it until you'll profit from its sale

I remember when I was around 7 or so my father sold our family home after the divorce. Years later the prices skyrocketed and he's regreted it ever since.


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## coffee4me (Feb 6, 2013)

I'd only consider renting if you can afford to get by without the extra 500 the rent would generate. When you rent a property you need to have a decent amount in reserve. You'll have taxes to pay, repairs on the property. Additionally, you have to be able to pay the mortgage if for some reason you don't have a renter or your renter is delinquent with the rent payment. Make sure you also understand your areas eviction laws in some places it can't take 6 months + to evict and you would still have to pay the mortgage with no rent income. 

If it were me I'd never consider holding property with an X. There's risk and liability that just complicates an already complicated situation.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## Thor (Oct 31, 2011)

Get out of the house physically. You need a fresh start. Being there is going to stunt your growth and limit your future romantic possibilities.

Selling makes sense to me if you live in a high price state. NY, NJ, CT, California, etc. Those places are overpriced still, even after the real estate pull back of the past few years. Who can afford a home when the small starter home costs $500k? If you're in a more reasonably priced area where a typical income can support a mortgage without a big downpayment, your risk of loss in this house is less.

Keep in mind that interest rates are likely to increase in the next year, and looking out 5 years we could be looking at double-digit interest rates again. Those increases will simultaneously reduce the value of this house and will make it more difficult for you to buy something else.

I tend to ascribe to the idea of getting out with what you can now. 

If you put time and effort into fixing this house up, half of your labors are going to be given away to stbx.


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## whitehawk (Aug 14, 2012)

Yeah , thanks very much for the views so far people , really appreciated.
Here's the thing , or a few things actually.

Wouldn't be worried about holding it even in spats of no renters if that did come about. One with my new financing , hell groceries will cost us more a mth than this house but there is good demand here to l did the agent ring round , though , ya never can tell l know. 
l'd also be planning on more reno's between tenants as l go, building it up more and more . The sell time spand could be 5,10, 15 yrs, wouldn't really matter , next boom when ever that is .
The 500pm cp is after holding costs py.

Another problem with selling now would be l doubt l could ever afford a new investment property because l won't come out with enough. Or couldn't be bothered anyway because l've owned 5 properties , buy the time l set up again think l'd be done . But this ones in hand now , easy, good money long term if it's mostly rented , l'd only be 15mins away to so its easy, that's my thinking.

l do wanna move out though for sure whether from selling it or just re buying.

Damn tough call . As Dude said , these things are damn hard to come by , sold two now too soon , that hurt . but , we have the x factor too , l mean l'd rather not go there , not like this but , you know !


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## unbelievable (Aug 20, 2010)

I'd sell it, stick the money in an on-line trading account. I've made 10% so far on a trade I made 4 days ago. I'm no genius and I can average close to 40% a year with very little effort. You could be pulling down $20K a year in gains. You'll have to pay some taxes on it but an extra $15K a year would more than pay for rent or a house note. My trading account is liquid. I can sell stocks, write checks on the account, etc. A renter can destroy your house. A renter can quit paying rent and it'll take you nearly 6 months to legally get them out of your place. It's not that complicated. Buy low, sell high, and don't fall in love with any stock.


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## Caribbean Man (Jun 3, 2012)

unbelievable said:


> I'd sell it, stick the money in an on-line trading account. I've made 10% so far on a trade I made 4 days ago. I'm no genius and I can average close to 40% a year with very little effort. You could be pulling down $20K a year in gains. You'll have to pay some taxes on it but an extra $15K a year would more than pay for rent or a house note. My trading account is liquid. I can sell stocks, write checks on the account, etc. A renter can destroy your house. A renter can quit paying rent and it'll take you nearly 6 months to legally get them out of your place. It's not that complicated. Buy low, sell high, and don't fall in love with any stock.


Many times I am tempted to try online trading but I don't know much about it so I don't trust it.
Anyway , I live outside of the US, but I get lots of calls from strange people calling themselves stock brokers working out of investment companies in New York , trying to pass off some stocks on me Very cautious about that too.

I'm assuming you trade on the Forex markets,[ ? ] which online company do you trade with MTI?


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## John Lee (Mar 16, 2013)

unbelievable said:


> I'd sell it, stick the money in an on-line trading account. I've made 10% so far on a trade I made 4 days ago. I'm no genius and I can average close to 40% a year with very little effort. You could be pulling down $20K a year in gains. You'll have to pay some taxes on it but an extra $15K a year would more than pay for rent or a house note. My trading account is liquid. I can sell stocks, write checks on the account, etc. A renter can destroy your house. A renter can quit paying rent and it'll take you nearly 6 months to legally get them out of your place. It's not that complicated. Buy low, sell high, and don't fall in love with any stock.


I wouldn't mess around with this too much -- nobody keeps up that kind of returns long-term and the risks are high. Everyone's making a killing in stocks right now (and hence fancies themselves stock geniuses) because the Fed won't turn off the spigot, but that's gonna end eventually. Nothing wrong with having some money in stocks but they're certainly not safer than property -- just like a renter can destroy your house, a fraudster CEO or a bad market trend can destroy your stock.


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## badcompany (Aug 4, 2010)

If your in the US I'd sell it. The fed money "spigot" is going to have to turn off sooner or later. Rates will rise and the housing market is going to soften even more. At that point cash is king. There is time...maybe a year...because the fed knows right now this would push us back into recession, so they aren't going to stop printing and buying tomorrow.


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## whitehawk (Aug 14, 2012)

Ooo yeah , the tradings scary stuff. l fancied myself as a bit of a trader for 3 yrs or so and did well , pretty damn good but some losses to UNTIL :scratchhead: bang , 30k gone in 4days . that stock l traded for years and did heaps of good returns on it , better. l missed one announcement , yep one . it's still at 1/2 what l got out for now.
bigggg youch . 
like l'd still play trade now if l ever get a few spare bucks but oh hell , no serious money l just couldn't handle that again.

The renters yeah , couldn't you ask for professional tenants or lots of references or things like that , get in the right people.
Though the lack of any control of what they could do to your place or even not pay as you say , God investment properties as scary as the damn market isn't it.
Imagine the stress if some nightmare escalated from bad tenants .
Hmm , that angle definitely ain't appealing one iota


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## badcompany (Aug 4, 2010)

I rented my first place out awhile back before I sold it, and used an agency that screened and credit checked the renters. As a company, they had more power to enforce no pays and could toss people out in 30 days if they didn't pay rent and then I still got the "last" if that happened. 
I didn't have any troubles knock on wood...
A friends uncle rented direct and had some guy squat in one of his places for 90 days before the Sheriff could evict him.


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## whitehawk (Aug 14, 2012)

Ah right , thanks for that. Yeah l mean every rented house is someones place , spose most go on for yrs and yrs no dramas,
Starting to think to hell with it though.
Talking to a blocke with and x and a house , he reckons it's just not a healthy set up. holds you back , new loves come into the picture , can get ugly. reckons he's heard of the same many times over.
he got out of it and says best move he could've done. 
X and l talked about it tonight and ended up both agreeing we just don't need the poss chances of trouble , stress , couldn't cope financially if it got ugly with renters. We ended up thinking sell , just sell it and get out of it.
couldn't see us changing now because tell you what , l felt ease as soon as we said it. All sorts of crap instantly of the shoulders , nice .


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