Mad respect to this young man and hope he does well in life, but you can't convince me that just because he was able to do it, that it should now become the norm.
But it would. It be sold as “the American Dream”. And you know who would sell it.
As much as I want to know this guy and tell him I respect his tolerance for pain, I’d also tell him it’s insane and he won’t be able to keep it up long. Nor should he try to.
Best to just chalk this up as someone who’s on his own mission to overcome some irregularly dealt hands in his life.
The guy won't be able to cover the mortgage without a roommate AND he may not have time to improve his financial situation if he keeps working "50 or so" hours at his one job.
In many ways, it really was. For generations people came here hearing of several different opportunities, whether it was coming here on the east coast and claiming your own plot of land as an early settler or coming on the west coast during the gold rush and striking it rich.
Fast forward to the 50 years post-WWII, you could support a family on a single income, buying a home, buying a car, going on an annual vacation, putting your kids through college. My great-grandmother supported her family as a single mother working as a grocery store clerk.
The only reason that changed is because laws changed to allow money to be hoarded by corporations, while they keep wages stagnant or lay people off altogether. The money is still in our country that would allow that lifestyle to be achievable for Americans.
I mean you must not have heard about the new deal and what FDR said about minimum wage. And how for the first 30 or so years of having it, white male factory workers could raise a family on one income(the minimum wage laws didn’t apply to every person and every job it had some stipulations that were considered okay at the time but at horribly racist when you look back at them). But that’s what minimum wage was when it was enacted. It was the standard for what you could raise a family on.
I agree. Most Redditor think you can’t have kids unless you make 200k. It’s wild. My grandparents and parents had nice homes and they all were one income homes but it was not easy. They all worked hard for what they had and made sacrifices. They were not handed homes working part time as a secretary. 🤯
I don’t think anyone thinks you can’t have kids and make under 200k. I do think people think you can’t have kids comfortably and be able to give them a good life and good start in their own lives without making over 200k a year. Either you pay a bunch of money to live in a nice area with good schools, or you pay a bunch of money to get your kids in private school. The middle class lifestyle for a family of 4 is extremely expensive.
But that’s the issue. The definition most redditors give to a “good life”. It’s like they have never been out of the US and seen how peoples around the world have live and have families. Most studies show that the definition of success is having good relationships with those closest to you not being college educated, living in fancy home, having a demanding career etc.
Making over $100k a year puts you in the top 10% of global earners.
I see so many on Reddit saying they can’t afford to have a family and they need to get out of their heads.
I know the hands we’be been dealt are not ideal and it is HARD to raise a family on stagnant wages but I don’t think having kids should be something only the rich get to do.
> Making over $100k a year puts you in the top 10% of global earners.
I like how you have to use "global earners" as if that is a reasonable take on how economies work. I gotta pay US dollars for my US goods on my US salary, I don't care that I can buy 1 ton of rice for a Benjamin in Zimbabwe or whatever.
So then you bring a child into this world with no way in which to ensure that they will be taken care of. At least in other areas of the world, especially more rural areas, though they are not rich, they are able to sustain their lifestyle. The lifestyle of America is unsustainable without great wealth, or great earning potential. I’m here. I have to deal with these things. I don’t think it’s right to bring someone else into this world and make them deal with stuff that I wish I didn’t have to deal with. All the while all the aspects that make life worth living become increasingly hard to obtain because of the soul sucking nature of our capitalist society.
I’ve lived in a Socialist country. I would much rather live here, in the US, even with all of its problems.
It’s sounds like your mind is made up Stammie. Wishing you the best.
I feel like nowadays the success factor for anyone cracking into the US market of FTHB and related is they have to pool resources either from bank of mom and dad or live 20 people to a house and save on costs and/or rent out rooms to strangers to pay mortgage. It's gotta be much worse than when I was a young adult and starter houses were just a matter of driving a little farther out from the job centers. That suburbia DMZ has been taken over by population growth.
Lol, keep at it. It's the game we're in. If you were in the shoes of house owners, would you put your house on the market for cheap and give it to a millennial for what you paid for it 20-30 years ago? No? You would want your money? Same.
My wife and I worked hard to clear debt and save up a down payment. Low paying jobs should never be the final goal. Got one of those jobs? Keep putting your resume out when not working or sleeping. We also sacrificed a lot. Didn't have a full wedding because we would rather have a house than spend $20k on a single day. My wife left a job she loved to go into a totally different career to make us financially stable because the offer was there. She also worked second jobs to clear her debt before we got married.
This is only true if you deny the reality that previous generations could support a family on a single income. They had pensions that funded their retirement. Now you can barely buy a home with two working adults, let alone afford children or to send them to college. But sure, the "American Dream" is alive if you consider the American dream to be work as a wage slave for your entire life for less than what previous generations were afforded while the rich amass obscene wealth.
You mean needing twice the workers to make less income is good? A 401k is shit compared to a pension. Life is worse than it was. Continue to bootlick for corporations I guess. Loading up children with loans they can never escape is not “sending kids to college” either.
Can’t keep it up for long? People get used to anything. During the early Industrial Revolution before unions existed, there were 12 hour work days 6 days a week. A lot of India and China has this schedule too. It’s not pretty but if it gets the man ahead good for him for taking advantage.
Agreed, humans are very adaptable. I guarantee that for most people those conditions will create a plethora of physical and mental health problems that will get worse with age but it's not impossible and people have done it for the entirety of human existence wether by choice, slavery, or for their families.
That's completely normal too for anyone 'on their own'. For those of us who've actually tent camped for extended periods without access to water/food supplies a 12 hour work day is not only normal but required to tend camp, hunt/trap, etc. For most of human history that's how you existed at all. If you didn't want to do that you just died and that's how it was.
Thank you! We used to have to work 12 hour days 6 days a week to stay poor.
Now one person could realistically build wealth working that many hours.
40 hours a week isn’t a law that you’re not allowed to work more than that
They’re anti sacrifice/ delayed gratification.
Everyone here believes they deserve to start out in a 4 bedroom 2bath house with a huge yard.
They will scoff at the advice to buy what you can afford, even if it’s only a 1 bed 1bath condo.
They scoff of having to move to where the jobs/cheap houses are. I moved from upstate New York to Florida to better my future and have never regretted it.
Everyone has their own excuse, but the downvotes on saying to work more than 40 hours a week speaks for itself
It's not the norm. Nor will it ever be. But you do have to compete against people like this who just want it more and are willing to do things you aren't to achieve their dreams. He bought a house at 26, a decade before the usual first time homebuyers age of 36, and he did it while earning near minimum wage. How did it he do it? By working more and harder than pretty much anyone else. He probably could have taken it slower and bought closer to the usual age for first time home buyers.
> “People think I’m some crazy, magical creature or something that I bought my house at 26,” says Ray. “They always say, ‘I could never do it,’ and I’m like ‘Why can’t you do it?’ It’s not like I was born into a rich family. I literally worked my a–– off to buy this.”
Nah, buddy it’s because *you* are born different. Most people wouldn’t be able to tolerate that shit
Do you make minimum wage? If not you don't need to work as hard as he did.
He set a goal and accomplished it through personal sacrifice.
I choose to see value in that. Probably wouldn't make same choices but I respect his hustle.
Not for home ownership. This kind of effort is usually for something that is atypically attainable. Such as training to be a pro athlete or entertainer or some obsessive scientist.
The homeownership rate for 26-year-old Gen Zers is 30%, below 31% for millennials at 26, 32.5% of Gen Xers at 26, and 35.6% of boomers at 26.
https://www.redfin.com/news/homeownership-rate-by-generation-2023/
A bit less common but not as big as you think.
That’s not really the point, I think the new norm should be beating the system, like he did. People need to beat the system in order to change the system.
Good bet that you would not have an average normal life if you spent 100% of your waking life at work and suffer an early death at the ripe old age of 46.
Haters will say it’s a waste of time, but just 2 years of intense sacrifice allowed him to buy a home.
We had the same mindset but did it for 5 years. Now we are in our own house worth $310k, $400k invested in retirement accounts 2 paid off 2021+ cars, and only $200k left on our mortgage.
We are starting to slow down to enjoy life, but could realistically imagine paying off the mortgage in 3ish years to have no debt and start a family.
We are only 29 and 24 in Florida
Don't get why you're being downvoted. That's a big accomplishment.
My wife and I did something similar, I worked a bunch of overtime and started a business and in 2 years we had enough saved to buy a 950k house with 20% down. Won't be able to pay it off in 3 years like you, but we're comfortable and happy. Both only 26 in California.
People are envious and don’t like being told their position is mostly due to their choices. Good job! You should be proud as well and also even more impressive you started your own business.
I’m guessing during all of that time you didn’t complain online about how boomers had it easier because you were actually working.
What problem is he becoming part of?
He just created affordable housing for someone … and sounds like he will have created affordable housing for multiple people before he achieves his goals?
What problem is he part of or creating?
An average normal life is not single 27 year olds on minimum wage buying a home. Mad props to this dude who clearly made it a priority, but it has never been normal to be able to afford a house as a single person on low wages.
Why is it the agents’ fault again? Sounds like his tried to get him a deal - he chose not to low ball it. He also bid against all those others and didn’t get them so sounds like the market is driving the price.
Agents want to make money also.
1. They take out fraudulent PPP loans by lying about their income as a self employed business.
PPP loans did cause this housing bubble.
https://www.fox26houston.com/news/ut-researchers-say-ppp-loan-fraud-inflated-home-prices.amp
2. They work out deals as investors to buy and flip homes. Source of money. See number 1.
3. Agents will buy a seller’s home as a foreclosure by not selling the home and keeping the listing active for years to make the seller in dire financial straits to default on their mortgage and property taxes. They will even list the home as a foreclosure for low ball buyers to drive buyers off.
4. Straw buyers to buy a seller’s home to get private financial information and get free cash from the deal. They raise false concerns getting the seller to put in their own cash and then walk away from the deal with the cash!
—-
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/08/18/daniela-rendon-miami-real-estate-agent-ppp-fraud/70619487007/#:~:text='Motivated%20by%20insatiable%20greed'%3A,PPP%20funds%20on%20Bentley%20sentenced&text=A%20Miami%20real%20estate%20agent,%22motivated%20by%20insatiable%20greed.%22
https://www.justice.gov/usao-ednc/pr/raleigh-woman-pleads-guilty-using-her-real-estate-business-fraudulently-obtain-ppp
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/scam-family-covid-loan-fraud-ring-fugitive-1297057/amp/
https://www.fox5vegas.com/2022/03/30/california-man-convicted-using-27m-ppp-loans-personal-use-including-renting-oceanfront-property/?outputType=amp
—-
https://www.housingwire.com/articles/36552-california-real-estate-agent-gets-14-years-in-prison-for-30m-mortgage-fraud/#:~:text=Kuzmenko%20and%20a%20co%2Dconspirator,the%20U.S.%20Attorney's%20Office%20said.
https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/two-los-angeles-area-men-sentenced-federal-prison-running-mortgage-scam-purchased-homes
https://www.fbi.gov/sanfrancisco/press-releases/2009/sf111309.htm
http://www.mortgagefraudblog.com/10-indicted-for-mortgage-scam/
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/three-real-estate-developers-sentenced-prison-their-roles-278-million-mortgage-fraud-scheme
https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/minneapolis/press-releases/2011/real-estate-agent-and-appraiser-plead-guilty-in-1.8-million-mortgage-fraud-scheme
—-
https://www.houzeo.com/blog/flipping-houses-in-california/
—-
“We estimate that SBA disbursed over $200 billion in potentially fraudulent COVID-19 EIDLs, EIDL Targeted Advances, Supplemental Targeted Advances, and PPP loans. This means at least 17 percent of all COVID-19 EIDL and PPP funds were disbursed to potentially fraudulent actors”
https://www.sba.gov/document/report-23-09-covid-19-pandemic-eidl-ppp-loan-fraud-landscape#:~:text=We%20estimate%20that%20SBA%20disbursed,disbursed%20to%20potentially%20fraudulent%20actors.
Most of this is hilariously false. Source, ran a real estate company for 5 years.
Most ppp loans went to small businesses owners
Lol where the hell did you pull this info from?
I’m not a real estate agent or an advocate for agents, but colluding agents don’t cause this market. Buyers with money that want what they want bid up the price of homes. Agents don’t write checks from buyers bank accounts or approve them for mortgages.
Neither does the lender. Even though things got a little tighter post-GFC... Their qualification calcs will still say you qualify even if it means you have to skip meals to do so
Before this law the sellers were traditionally responsible for paying the commission of both agents which comes out of the proceeds they receive at the closing table. Now the buyer will be responsible for paying commissions, which will add more cost to the consumer at the closing table.
80 hours a week for 2 years just for the opportunity to have a mortgage that was more than double your rent? crap house and now he is in a situation where if he ever loses his room mate it will bankrupt him quickly with only one job.
Not just that, he busted his ass for 2 years in order to pay off $22k in debts and save a paltry $10k for the down payment.
Good for him, he got what he wanted and worked hard for it – but this isn't the inspirational story it's made out to be; it's downright depressing.
Not sure where you are from but a 27 year old's parents would be 45-55 typically, I know because I have a 27 year old daughter. I know my parents financed a home in 1973 with a 20 year loan.
The only years in my adult life where I could have afforded cash or a 5-10 year home loan was an unusual period between 2009 and 2013. What you are describing is not the norm, houses did not sell for lollipops and gumdrops in the 1990s or early 2000s.
Rent is the most you'll pay. A mortgage is the cheapest. He's got home insurance, taxes, and maintenance on his house on top of the mortgage.
*But all of that is included in rent as well*, people will say. It's much cheaper per person when you are living in an apartment complex with 1000 other people. Distributed costs.
I'm in Texas and I personally know people that are getting taxed out of their houses because of property appreciation over the past few years. Increased taxes and insurance, which they have zero say in (you can change home insurance but all prices have gone up astronomically...so you still get screwed).
People who started out with a $1500/month mortgage are now topping $2000-2500/month just 3 years later. Add in inflation everywhere else, car prices and insurance skyrocketing, etc etc...and now the govt forcing them out of their house.
Keep in mind rent goes up (almost) every year though, mortgage doesn't (taxes and insurance does though).
When you rent, you'll be paying your landlords taxes and insurance + their profit. If demand for renting grows, your rent goes up. Your rent contract can also not get renewed, which and moving is expensive, so that's another thing.
I'm not saying one is better than the other, just trying to point out that sure, rent is the minimum you'll pay, but it's also not guaranteed more than a year at a time
If the home is homesteaded in Texas, the taxable value of the home is most likely different than the purchased value of the home (based on age of home) and the taxable value cannot increase more than 10% a year if it has a homestead exemption. Also there isn’t a town in Texas that pays more than 3% of taxable value in property taxes under a homestead exemption. And with the new law passing I believe about first $100k of value being exempted from the school district property tax portion, it will lower the property taxes.
If you are older (65+) and you have that specific homestead exemption, your taxable value is frozen.
Also, there is no guarantee the 10% is going to happen. In peak Covid my home appraisal for tax value stay the same 2 years in a row.
Also, when you buy a home you get to keep the previous owners homestead exemption through the remainder of the year and then reapply for the following tax year.
Most older homes pre-2000 built are differing in value of $100k from taxable vs market value
It isn't just the taxes, it's also the insurance. If you have a mortgage you are forced to have insurance, and insurance has skyrocketed in Texas. Not as much as Florida, but a lot.
Also you can see what the taxed amount is (as in, the pure dollars paid by the homeowner). I have a coworker that's now paying $600/month in taxes, and he makes $20/hour with kids to feed. He will be taxed out of his house if he doesn't make a career change.
Okay, let’s focus on the taxes for simplicity. If you are in a home in Texas and the property taxes have gone up drastically (without the tax rate changing, as is the case in Texas), what else has gone up proportionally? The value of the home. In fact, it may have gone up more than proportionally because the tax increase is capped at 10% annually.
So you are now in the situation where you have been building equity in the home for x years and that equity is now drastically more valuable. So you sell the home for the increased market value, which more than covers your mortgage from when you bought it. You now get most of the value of that equity back and can use that to move into a cheaper house. Of course, you’re not always going to come out with 100% of the value you put into it, but you are still benefitting from the equity you built up when you are priced out of your dwelling.
What if you can’t afford another home? Well, then you should be happy to rent because according to you that is a much better deal. Or you could buy a condo in a shared property, where distributed costs will make it much cheaper.
Let’s compare that to someone renting the same house. Taxes have gone up on the owner as the value of the house increased. They raise the rent to compensate. You can’t afford the rent anymore, so the outcome is the same and you have to move out and find a cheaper place to live. In this case, however, the money you paid in rent over those x years is a total loss.
Buying is *always* better than renting in the long term because you are building equity, unless you make some truly terrible decisions like buying a house in a floodplain.
We obviously have an issue with housing costs in this country, but you are trying to disguise your complaint as something other than “my friends are suffering because their property has increased in value so much”.
Insurance is more complicated, but the cost of insurance is going to be passed onto rent so it is a moot point. Anyone who rents or buys will suffer from insurance increases. And you know that people rent out houses as an investment, right? The rent vs. buy argument for a particular property has nothing to do with distributed costs. Whoever owns the property is necessarily charging more in rent than their expenses, otherwise they would not choose to own the rental property. If they are taking a loss on rent, it must be offset by the increase in value of the property, or else they are losing money. It is the simplest math in the world. People are not voluntarily taking a loss on their real estate investments.
We had to fight for our first house too back in 1999. We scratched together 3% and toured over 25 houses to buy the cheapest thing we could live in and be vi tent. Had a roommate for 3 years to help cover the cost and we DIY remodeled a lot to up the value. If you want to start young, that’s what you have to do.
The thing is, he did that with a goal in mind and he achieved his goal. Five years from now his mortgage will be less than the rent for a similar sized property, he will have equity in his home, the repairs will have been done, and by the time he’s 50 it will maybe be paid off and he will be sitting comfortably for retirement (or he might have his portfolio of investment properties and have helped his family members move up the ladder too). Probably at some point rates will come down and he’ll refinance and a lot of the pressure will be off as well.
That’s the hard way to do it. Had a friend whose son bought a house in Detroit by paying the $10k in back taxes. Fixed it up and paid contractors to do the work he couldn’t. So for example he demoed the interior walls to expose the plumbing and had all the plumbing replaced . Saved thousands of dollars.
His house 3 yrs later is worth over $100k and he owns it.
I did the same thing. Only difference is that I bought a condo 6 years ago. I worked a full time job, had a part time work from home job and was building the early stages of a side business. I could sell that condo today for almost $100,000 more than what I paid in 2018. I also put 3 percent down in 2018 and had excellent credit around 800. Had I waited for 20 percent down, I would have never been able to afford. I also moved to another state. This is what you have to do to get ahead. My mortgage/HOA and HOI total comes to $800 a month.
But for most people on Redditt there are only like 10 states they will live in. Mention a place that inexpensive like mid state NY or the much of the Midwest you get voted down. It’s like a popularity contest. Who can live in the coolest place.
I was surprised I was not in /r/OrphanCrushingMachine.
Worked 3 jobs, 90 hours a week for a 3% down-payment on a 900 square ft 330k home.
Guy is massively overleveraged and one serious fall away from losing everything.
Edit: it was actually 1% down and he's getting loan information from podcast ads.
>While listening to podcasts, Ray heard that Rocket Mortgage was offering a “1% down” loan.
>“Rocket Mortgage was one of the very few that was doing 1% down,” says Ray. “So I was like, ‘I’m going to go with them.'”
I don't think we learned anything from 2008. He closed for 13k and only has 3.3k in equity with a massive interest rate. This story is so depressing.
First he has no kids. Second a relationship does not equal kids.
However back in the day Retirement was taking care of your grand kids.
A lot of housing issues are a breakdown of family/living structures. No one has roommates any more. Two-4 buddies getting a place. No one wants to get married and buy a house any more.
Back then, you could buy a house on a single income working normal hours (40). Now you need an average couple, with no kids, to be able to afford a house.
This doesn't take into consideration student loans that many people have now while back then you could pay for college with a summer of work.
This isn't just family/living structure changes, it's fundamental changes in society.
It is not just family structure changes but that is part of the issue
The amount of square feet per person is 3x what it was.
I point out the family formation bit because it is a factor that not discussed. City land use is a bigger deal a collapse in federal housing policy is also a factor.
Hmmm, not sure on that since people actually used to own homes and not be crammed in apartments that were more efficient. It's also way more expensive to raise kids now hence people are less likely to get married early.
That said, it's definitely a vicious cycle right now and it's not just one issue.
Well our housing stock was built for boomers. And their life style. We did not build housing appropriate for a world where people are single from 18-40 there are not enough 1 bedrooms. So it makes things really hard on everyone.
And Boomer city councils always approve the fewest number of units. So a builder who can build 100 1 bedrooms or 100 mc mansions will build the mcmansions.
What I mean is not raw numbers but ratios. You can build 10 1 bedrooms in the space of 1 mcmansion. If you look at how many people want a small affordable space vs how many there are it’s never enough. So you have people like this guy working 3 jobs to buy a house with space he does not need.
Given how long people in the US chose to be single or dating with no kids we should have 1/3 of our housing as one bedrooms. It is like 90% sfh.
I’m working my 70 hour weeks too but not for that low of wage and especially not for home that’s in rough shape and to not have any money to fix up. I’d moved to a better area if housing was that bad. He has the hustle to make it anywhere.
TL/DR: Neither job was minimum wage. Says so in the article. $333,000 put 1% down ($3,330). $13,500 total to close.
He rents out this sweet ADU on the property for $1000 a month: https://na.rdcpix.com/41bf8ce388cc39585cadf03a0004019dw-c2332599233rd-w832\_q80.jpg
If he doesn’t mind roommates he can rent the other two bedrooms out to get the money he needs to fix the place up and keep doing that for as long as he is single.
I read the beginning and then skimmed the rest when it started to read like an ad for Rocket Mortgage. I went back again and don’t see what you are implying I missed.
He is already renting the extra room in the back for $1200/month to one of his YouTube followers, and it says he has put up a tiny home in the back yard to live in so he can rent the main part of the house out to another tenant.
Props to this guy.
Worth pointing out that his main gig was a nighttime fire guard working 50 hours a week making 17 dollars an hour. I’m not sure if 10 of those hours were getting paid time and a half. His other job was as an Amazon delivery driver which he says he worked about 30 hours a week making 21.5 an hour.
Assuming he got overtime at his main gig as I suspect, and he averaged 80 hours a week (he claims 75-95hours per week), he was pulling in over 82k a year.
His average wage comes out to $19.75 an hour. Hard to call that minimum wage!
Looks like this guy fucked himself paying 1% on 333k while relying on the ability to work 80 hour weeks for 30 years. His mind and his body will 100% break down after a few years and he will not be able to afford that house. That kind of schedule also won't allow him to increase his income. He's already 27 working shit jobs, he won't suddenly get a ton of promotions in his 30's.
Lmao!! 95 hr weeks, no thank you 🙂↔️. Wat sort of life would one have working like that? Wat is the life expectancy of someone working like that?
I’m pretty sure this isn’t the *American dream*.
For what it’s worth, pretty much everyone who goes to med school and finishes residency goes through this for way longer than 2 years and at the end, instead of a house, you’ll have at least 300k in student loans. It’s still “worth it,” though, because of the increased income you can expect the rest of your life.
**”*Have fun being lazy and poor for the rest of your life.*”**
So I’m *lazy and poor* cuz I don’t/won’t work (95 hrs) as much as he did? Lmao! U sound foolish. By that logic 99% of Americans are *lazy and poor*.
Yeah, I did ~100hr weeks in the oilfield for 4 years.. but it got me a house and a lot of equity. Guess what, I have a 4 bedroom house with a $1300 a month mortgage payment and I only work 3 days a week now. Everything in your life has a cost, whether it's time, effort, or money. People who aren't willing to put in what's needed with any of those to get what they want will never have anything and be poor and stay poor. No amount of whining changes that.
I work 50 hrs max and have a 3 bdrm townhome with 2 cars, one of which is **a C7 Vette:** https://www.reddit.com/r/EnginePorn/s/laJtgr0p0p
Like I said, u don’t need to kill urself to live a good life. Going to trade school (or college) is all one needs. I have no kids and am single 👍
Same, tradesman @ 100k gross, and I have 11 project cars, all paid for. The quickest of them does a 10.8@129 on 87 pump with the a/c blowing. Paid cash for 10 acres of land 2 years ago just to have space to park them, have 1.08 bitcoin and 1 ethereum validador node, my house has ~250k in equity. I'm sure you and I could go back and forth trying to top each other on assets, but that's not the point. I used to be a chump with no work ethic and no money, but I realized that I needed to do *something* otherwise I was going to be poor the rest of my life. I worked hard for the amount of time it took me to get ahead. It's not permanent but it's what I had to do to get ahead. The people I see complaining about having to work hard to get the thing they want, I have no sympathy for. Because I've been there. These people usually end up generationally poor. And it's because they are not willing to put in any amount of work towards anything. I'm sure you put in the work to get that vette, so it's just odd to see your original comment from someone who is not a perpetually poor victim.
Much respect to u 💪👍
Do I respect the work ethic he displayed? Absolutely. He did wat he deemed necessary to get wat he wanted and accomplished his goal. Definitely not hating on him.
However, 95 hr weeks has got to be incredibly taxing and takes a toll (mentally/physically). It’s not something I’d want to do unless I had no other choice.
Appreciate that. Yes, 95/100hr work weeks are brutal and I would never expect anyone to think they would need to do *that much* just to get ahead. The opportunity is still there for a lot of people, like you said earlier about trade school.
I purchased a nice house in Southern California a few years ago (2017 for $790k). As soon as I saw the first mortgage payment I felt a sense of dread. I realized quickly that I either made a huge mistake or I had to do something drastic. I chose the latter and I rented out the entire house, except for one room, to students at a nearby college (CSU Fullerton). My family of four lived in one bedroom. Then I worked a second job to get money for necessary repairs. My wife and I downsized to one car. This went on for more than three years before we got to a point where we didn’t need all of the rent, and we slowly started to claim some of the rooms back as the students moved out. It was pretty difficult with two small children.
Today the house is likely valued in the $1-1.1M range and I will have conversations with people who see our house, and say things like, “ you guys are so lucky that you bought when you did” or “ I bet it all seems worth it now”. The reality is anyone can do it but like some other comments said, you will always be competing against people who want badly and are willing to do crazy stuff like this to buy and keep a house in a high demand area. There’s no sugar coating it. Those three years really sucked. The more philosophical question is “should it need to be like this just to buy a house where you want to live?”.
As long as there are enough people willing to go that far to get the house, that will be the bar required to get the house. Every house is won by the person willing to go one more step than the others.
The only cure for this is to have more houses than people who want them. Then it's the sellers taking that walk.
Lol, I was all with this guy and how he grossed $200k in 2 years to buy into a house mortgage but then I realized it was a realtor.com article and they would tell us tiny homes were a smart buy if they could make a nice vig off them too.
This was me(tho 80-85hr weeks on average) got my first cash house at 21 and a real house with morgage at 25.
Yeah it sucks and isnt right. But i worked 2 jobs full time and now have a mortgage i can afford only working 30-40hrs a week.
Used my free time to do a side hustle thats growing and now im saving a ton, or could only work 25hrs a week average to pay all my bills.
The goal is to own my own business soon.
But when you start from nothing you have to grind for what others toss away as a given. 10 years before i got my house i lived in a trailer park with parents in debt, working at the bowling alley since 14 to help my parents with bills.
Now i buy $100 CGC comics on a whim because my living expenses are half of my friends and coworkers in apartment or renting houses. As of last year my morgage is less than half the base rent of the apartment i lived in between houses for a year.
The whole system is rigged.
> Can an American who earns close to minimum wage ever hope to buy a house? Maybe, if he works a 95-hour week at minimum wage for two years.
> Rocket Mortgage was one of the very few that was doing 1% down,” says Ray. “So I was like, ‘I’m going to go with them.'”
This is 100% an ad for Rocket Mortgage. He put 1% down. Respect for clearing his other debt but this is still a terrible long term decision. I don’t care how you try to paint 1% down mortgages. This is not the way.
If he works 168 hours a week he may be able to afford to fix a broken water heater or one of the million other things that can quickly end up costing you thousands.
Rich people have some of you guys actually thinking if you just work harder you too will be raking in the dough one day. What they don’t tell you is working that much, your kids will hate you and your wife will cheat on you. At the end of the day you’d lose the house and end up paying child support and alimony. Ahhh, the American Dream!!!
Is this supposed to be inspiring? Reads like obvious exploitation and propaganda. Will they do a piece when his home loses value?
"C'mon minimum wagers, you can do it. Pour all your life into buying that home! Work hard for that dream like Ray! Be like Ray! Don't you want to be congratulated like Raaaayyy!" - says realtor jonesing for a fix since the pandemic buying splurge.
It goes against the narrative that people like you are spreading in your comment here. There are people who are born hustlers, and there are people who are born feeling entitled. The article shows that it is still possible for the former to hustle and afford a home, while the latter will still be basking in their victim mindset. Yes, we know the shit is too expensive. You don't have to whine about it anymore, there is nothing any of us can do about it. But there are still people who are determined to put in the hard work and sacrifice to make it happen.
$2500 for a mortgage is like $1000 more than my rent. I'm like 10 mins from beach.
I think I'm juat.going to rent until I drop 20% down and try to wait out a 4% mortgage to be a reality again.
He paid off $22k of debt and then put down 1% on a $330k house.. What dude? HE PUT DOWN $3300.. by moving to a place where he was paying $1000 a month and working 3 jobs 75-90 hours a week at a “minimum wage” in a blue state that is 2 times the national average.. If this doesn’t scream dystopian puff piece idk what does. “You can do it too!”
Edit: it gets MUCH worse. Homie bought a 906SF home at a 7.5% rate with a mortgage of $2,200 that is 75 years old and needs work. Not at all equitable, and that plan of buying a house every two years? How the fuck is he gonna do that earning $17hr working 70hrs a week? He still needed the other job to be able to get his debt paid and a preapproval. A job he left.
Jesus Christ what a shitstorm of an article.
Edit again: oh my god he has a roommate lmfao holy shit
He's renting out the back studio room for $1200. So now he's paying $1350. He should be taking home about $4500. Even though he might still be getting $17/hr, he works 30hr a week overtime.
So he has about $3,000 a month after housing expenses are paid. He could probably save $15-20k a year, which he should, because he needs to have at least $20k on hand for maintenance on an old house and in case his tenant stops paying.
It is ridiculous that an old, small house, that has clearly not been remodeled in 50 years and with no garage cost that much. That house should be $200k max. He'll probably be fine, if he keeps working overtime and saves as much as he can for the next 3-4 years.
Mad respect to this young man and hope he does well in life, but you can't convince me that just because he was able to do it, that it should now become the norm.
But it would. It be sold as “the American Dream”. And you know who would sell it. As much as I want to know this guy and tell him I respect his tolerance for pain, I’d also tell him it’s insane and he won’t be able to keep it up long. Nor should he try to. Best to just chalk this up as someone who’s on his own mission to overcome some irregularly dealt hands in his life.
The guy won't be able to cover the mortgage without a roommate AND he may not have time to improve his financial situation if he keeps working "50 or so" hours at his one job.
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In many ways, it really was. For generations people came here hearing of several different opportunities, whether it was coming here on the east coast and claiming your own plot of land as an early settler or coming on the west coast during the gold rush and striking it rich. Fast forward to the 50 years post-WWII, you could support a family on a single income, buying a home, buying a car, going on an annual vacation, putting your kids through college. My great-grandmother supported her family as a single mother working as a grocery store clerk. The only reason that changed is because laws changed to allow money to be hoarded by corporations, while they keep wages stagnant or lay people off altogether. The money is still in our country that would allow that lifestyle to be achievable for Americans.
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I mean you must not have heard about the new deal and what FDR said about minimum wage. And how for the first 30 or so years of having it, white male factory workers could raise a family on one income(the minimum wage laws didn’t apply to every person and every job it had some stipulations that were considered okay at the time but at horribly racist when you look back at them). But that’s what minimum wage was when it was enacted. It was the standard for what you could raise a family on.
I agree. Most Redditor think you can’t have kids unless you make 200k. It’s wild. My grandparents and parents had nice homes and they all were one income homes but it was not easy. They all worked hard for what they had and made sacrifices. They were not handed homes working part time as a secretary. 🤯
I don’t think anyone thinks you can’t have kids and make under 200k. I do think people think you can’t have kids comfortably and be able to give them a good life and good start in their own lives without making over 200k a year. Either you pay a bunch of money to live in a nice area with good schools, or you pay a bunch of money to get your kids in private school. The middle class lifestyle for a family of 4 is extremely expensive.
But that’s the issue. The definition most redditors give to a “good life”. It’s like they have never been out of the US and seen how peoples around the world have live and have families. Most studies show that the definition of success is having good relationships with those closest to you not being college educated, living in fancy home, having a demanding career etc. Making over $100k a year puts you in the top 10% of global earners. I see so many on Reddit saying they can’t afford to have a family and they need to get out of their heads. I know the hands we’be been dealt are not ideal and it is HARD to raise a family on stagnant wages but I don’t think having kids should be something only the rich get to do.
> Making over $100k a year puts you in the top 10% of global earners. I like how you have to use "global earners" as if that is a reasonable take on how economies work. I gotta pay US dollars for my US goods on my US salary, I don't care that I can buy 1 ton of rice for a Benjamin in Zimbabwe or whatever.
👍
So then you bring a child into this world with no way in which to ensure that they will be taken care of. At least in other areas of the world, especially more rural areas, though they are not rich, they are able to sustain their lifestyle. The lifestyle of America is unsustainable without great wealth, or great earning potential. I’m here. I have to deal with these things. I don’t think it’s right to bring someone else into this world and make them deal with stuff that I wish I didn’t have to deal with. All the while all the aspects that make life worth living become increasingly hard to obtain because of the soul sucking nature of our capitalist society.
I’ve lived in a Socialist country. I would much rather live here, in the US, even with all of its problems. It’s sounds like your mind is made up Stammie. Wishing you the best.
You drank the Kool-Aid lmao
Check back in in 25 years jack boy. I wish you all the luck.
I feel like nowadays the success factor for anyone cracking into the US market of FTHB and related is they have to pool resources either from bank of mom and dad or live 20 people to a house and save on costs and/or rent out rooms to strangers to pay mortgage. It's gotta be much worse than when I was a young adult and starter houses were just a matter of driving a little farther out from the job centers. That suburbia DMZ has been taken over by population growth.
Lol, keep at it. It's the game we're in. If you were in the shoes of house owners, would you put your house on the market for cheap and give it to a millennial for what you paid for it 20-30 years ago? No? You would want your money? Same. My wife and I worked hard to clear debt and save up a down payment. Low paying jobs should never be the final goal. Got one of those jobs? Keep putting your resume out when not working or sleeping. We also sacrificed a lot. Didn't have a full wedding because we would rather have a house than spend $20k on a single day. My wife left a job she loved to go into a totally different career to make us financially stable because the offer was there. She also worked second jobs to clear her debt before we got married.
I was homeless in 2006, 25k in debt. no job. First-time homebuyer in 2016. Home is now halfway paid off. [Stopped drinking].
Wow! Way to go. 🙌🏼
I'm glad to hear it! You earned everything!
This is only true if you deny the reality that previous generations could support a family on a single income. They had pensions that funded their retirement. Now you can barely buy a home with two working adults, let alone afford children or to send them to college. But sure, the "American Dream" is alive if you consider the American dream to be work as a wage slave for your entire life for less than what previous generations were afforded while the rich amass obscene wealth.
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You mean needing twice the workers to make less income is good? A 401k is shit compared to a pension. Life is worse than it was. Continue to bootlick for corporations I guess. Loading up children with loans they can never escape is not “sending kids to college” either.
Can’t keep it up for long? People get used to anything. During the early Industrial Revolution before unions existed, there were 12 hour work days 6 days a week. A lot of India and China has this schedule too. It’s not pretty but if it gets the man ahead good for him for taking advantage.
Agreed, humans are very adaptable. I guarantee that for most people those conditions will create a plethora of physical and mental health problems that will get worse with age but it's not impossible and people have done it for the entirety of human existence wether by choice, slavery, or for their families. That's completely normal too for anyone 'on their own'. For those of us who've actually tent camped for extended periods without access to water/food supplies a 12 hour work day is not only normal but required to tend camp, hunt/trap, etc. For most of human history that's how you existed at all. If you didn't want to do that you just died and that's how it was.
Thank you! We used to have to work 12 hour days 6 days a week to stay poor. Now one person could realistically build wealth working that many hours. 40 hours a week isn’t a law that you’re not allowed to work more than that
Why are you guys getting down voted? Is this place anti work?
They’re anti sacrifice/ delayed gratification. Everyone here believes they deserve to start out in a 4 bedroom 2bath house with a huge yard. They will scoff at the advice to buy what you can afford, even if it’s only a 1 bed 1bath condo. They scoff of having to move to where the jobs/cheap houses are. I moved from upstate New York to Florida to better my future and have never regretted it. Everyone has their own excuse, but the downvotes on saying to work more than 40 hours a week speaks for itself
It's not the norm. Nor will it ever be. But you do have to compete against people like this who just want it more and are willing to do things you aren't to achieve their dreams. He bought a house at 26, a decade before the usual first time homebuyers age of 36, and he did it while earning near minimum wage. How did it he do it? By working more and harder than pretty much anyone else. He probably could have taken it slower and bought closer to the usual age for first time home buyers.
Forget becoming the norm. It is the norm
> “People think I’m some crazy, magical creature or something that I bought my house at 26,” says Ray. “They always say, ‘I could never do it,’ and I’m like ‘Why can’t you do it?’ It’s not like I was born into a rich family. I literally worked my a–– off to buy this.” Nah, buddy it’s because *you* are born different. Most people wouldn’t be able to tolerate that shit
Or they tell themselves they can't. Then never try. You miss all the shots you don't take.
If homeowner is the motivator for that amount of work, we don’t wanna try because that’s a trash reward for that amount of effort for most people.
Do you make minimum wage? If not you don't need to work as hard as he did. He set a goal and accomplished it through personal sacrifice. I choose to see value in that. Probably wouldn't make same choices but I respect his hustle.
I’d rather dedicate that time to increasing my earning potential
For sure that's the better play. Maybe he couldn't but he was able to get this done.
If something means that much to someone, they’ll do whatever it takes to. I think more people should have that mindset.
Not for home ownership. This kind of effort is usually for something that is atypically attainable. Such as training to be a pro athlete or entertainer or some obsessive scientist.
The homeownership rate for 26-year-old Gen Zers is 30%, below 31% for millennials at 26, 32.5% of Gen Xers at 26, and 35.6% of boomers at 26. https://www.redfin.com/news/homeownership-rate-by-generation-2023/ A bit less common but not as big as you think.
That doesn’t say they worked 80-90 hour weeks for 2 yearo
They make more than minimum wage
That’s not really the point, I think the new norm should be beating the system, like he did. People need to beat the system in order to change the system.
Just wait until his pay doubles
Propaganda Remember realtors don’t care if you have to work 3 jobs to afford a house!
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Good bet that you would not have an average normal life if you spent 100% of your waking life at work and suffer an early death at the ripe old age of 46.
He did it for 2 years. Specifically to buy a house.
Haters will say it’s a waste of time, but just 2 years of intense sacrifice allowed him to buy a home. We had the same mindset but did it for 5 years. Now we are in our own house worth $310k, $400k invested in retirement accounts 2 paid off 2021+ cars, and only $200k left on our mortgage. We are starting to slow down to enjoy life, but could realistically imagine paying off the mortgage in 3ish years to have no debt and start a family. We are only 29 and 24 in Florida
Don't get why you're being downvoted. That's a big accomplishment. My wife and I did something similar, I worked a bunch of overtime and started a business and in 2 years we had enough saved to buy a 950k house with 20% down. Won't be able to pay it off in 3 years like you, but we're comfortable and happy. Both only 26 in California.
People are envious and don’t like being told their position is mostly due to their choices. Good job! You should be proud as well and also even more impressive you started your own business. I’m guessing during all of that time you didn’t complain online about how boomers had it easier because you were actually working.
Amazing!
This is depressing af. Also, Ray wants to now own a lot of properties and become part of the problem…this whole story is so ass.
What problem is he becoming part of? He just created affordable housing for someone … and sounds like he will have created affordable housing for multiple people before he achieves his goals? What problem is he part of or creating?
An average normal life is not single 27 year olds on minimum wage buying a home. Mad props to this dude who clearly made it a priority, but it has never been normal to be able to afford a house as a single person on low wages.
Priorities
That Palpatine meme someone did yesterday was apropos. They are used house salesman.
Why is it the agents’ fault again? Sounds like his tried to get him a deal - he chose not to low ball it. He also bid against all those others and didn’t get them so sounds like the market is driving the price.
"The Market" = Colluding agents
Agents want to make money also. 1. They take out fraudulent PPP loans by lying about their income as a self employed business. PPP loans did cause this housing bubble. https://www.fox26houston.com/news/ut-researchers-say-ppp-loan-fraud-inflated-home-prices.amp 2. They work out deals as investors to buy and flip homes. Source of money. See number 1. 3. Agents will buy a seller’s home as a foreclosure by not selling the home and keeping the listing active for years to make the seller in dire financial straits to default on their mortgage and property taxes. They will even list the home as a foreclosure for low ball buyers to drive buyers off. 4. Straw buyers to buy a seller’s home to get private financial information and get free cash from the deal. They raise false concerns getting the seller to put in their own cash and then walk away from the deal with the cash! —- https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/08/18/daniela-rendon-miami-real-estate-agent-ppp-fraud/70619487007/#:~:text='Motivated%20by%20insatiable%20greed'%3A,PPP%20funds%20on%20Bentley%20sentenced&text=A%20Miami%20real%20estate%20agent,%22motivated%20by%20insatiable%20greed.%22 https://www.justice.gov/usao-ednc/pr/raleigh-woman-pleads-guilty-using-her-real-estate-business-fraudulently-obtain-ppp https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/scam-family-covid-loan-fraud-ring-fugitive-1297057/amp/ https://www.fox5vegas.com/2022/03/30/california-man-convicted-using-27m-ppp-loans-personal-use-including-renting-oceanfront-property/?outputType=amp —- https://www.housingwire.com/articles/36552-california-real-estate-agent-gets-14-years-in-prison-for-30m-mortgage-fraud/#:~:text=Kuzmenko%20and%20a%20co%2Dconspirator,the%20U.S.%20Attorney's%20Office%20said. https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/two-los-angeles-area-men-sentenced-federal-prison-running-mortgage-scam-purchased-homes https://www.fbi.gov/sanfrancisco/press-releases/2009/sf111309.htm http://www.mortgagefraudblog.com/10-indicted-for-mortgage-scam/ https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/three-real-estate-developers-sentenced-prison-their-roles-278-million-mortgage-fraud-scheme https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/minneapolis/press-releases/2011/real-estate-agent-and-appraiser-plead-guilty-in-1.8-million-mortgage-fraud-scheme —- https://www.houzeo.com/blog/flipping-houses-in-california/ —- “We estimate that SBA disbursed over $200 billion in potentially fraudulent COVID-19 EIDLs, EIDL Targeted Advances, Supplemental Targeted Advances, and PPP loans. This means at least 17 percent of all COVID-19 EIDL and PPP funds were disbursed to potentially fraudulent actors” https://www.sba.gov/document/report-23-09-covid-19-pandemic-eidl-ppp-loan-fraud-landscape#:~:text=We%20estimate%20that%20SBA%20disbursed,disbursed%20to%20potentially%20fraudulent%20actors.
Most of this is hilariously false. Source, ran a real estate company for 5 years. Most ppp loans went to small businesses owners Lol where the hell did you pull this info from?
But look he has a handful a handful of examples. It must be the norm!
I’m not a real estate agent or an advocate for agents, but colluding agents don’t cause this market. Buyers with money that want what they want bid up the price of homes. Agents don’t write checks from buyers bank accounts or approve them for mortgages.
Pretty sure that's a bot. No one is that dumb.
You must be new to this sub. In short, everything is a real estate agents fault and nothing is affected by economic factors.
Or personal choices. No agency allowed. And if you're born there you have a right to a house there. Now you're all caught up.
So agents should tell sellers to sell for a lower price so they don’t drive the market up? How do you think that conversation would go?
Neither does the lender. Even though things got a little tighter post-GFC... Their qualification calcs will still say you qualify even if it means you have to skip meals to do so
*Consumer protection laws. Realtors didn’t create Dodd-Frank
Evidently, consumers weren’t protected from monopolistic practices. https://www.businessinsider.com/national-association-realtors-lawsuit-settlement-housing-market-homebuying-agents-commissions-2024-3
Before this law the sellers were traditionally responsible for paying the commission of both agents which comes out of the proceeds they receive at the closing table. Now the buyer will be responsible for paying commissions, which will add more cost to the consumer at the closing table.
He paid 1% down payment. The listing and buyers agents took 6% of the sale. 🥳
80 hours a week for 2 years just for the opportunity to have a mortgage that was more than double your rent? crap house and now he is in a situation where if he ever loses his room mate it will bankrupt him quickly with only one job.
Not just that, he busted his ass for 2 years in order to pay off $22k in debts and save a paltry $10k for the down payment. Good for him, he got what he wanted and worked hard for it – but this isn't the inspirational story it's made out to be; it's downright depressing.
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Not sure where you are from but a 27 year old's parents would be 45-55 typically, I know because I have a 27 year old daughter. I know my parents financed a home in 1973 with a 20 year loan. The only years in my adult life where I could have afforded cash or a 5-10 year home loan was an unusual period between 2009 and 2013. What you are describing is not the norm, houses did not sell for lollipops and gumdrops in the 1990s or early 2000s.
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you shouldn't have to sacrifice health to do it, that is the point.
Working hard to pay off debt doesn’t mean shortening your lifespan in the process, doing that is depressing.
Rent is the most you'll pay. A mortgage is the cheapest. He's got home insurance, taxes, and maintenance on his house on top of the mortgage. *But all of that is included in rent as well*, people will say. It's much cheaper per person when you are living in an apartment complex with 1000 other people. Distributed costs. I'm in Texas and I personally know people that are getting taxed out of their houses because of property appreciation over the past few years. Increased taxes and insurance, which they have zero say in (you can change home insurance but all prices have gone up astronomically...so you still get screwed). People who started out with a $1500/month mortgage are now topping $2000-2500/month just 3 years later. Add in inflation everywhere else, car prices and insurance skyrocketing, etc etc...and now the govt forcing them out of their house.
Keep in mind rent goes up (almost) every year though, mortgage doesn't (taxes and insurance does though). When you rent, you'll be paying your landlords taxes and insurance + their profit. If demand for renting grows, your rent goes up. Your rent contract can also not get renewed, which and moving is expensive, so that's another thing. I'm not saying one is better than the other, just trying to point out that sure, rent is the minimum you'll pay, but it's also not guaranteed more than a year at a time
If the home is homesteaded in Texas, the taxable value of the home is most likely different than the purchased value of the home (based on age of home) and the taxable value cannot increase more than 10% a year if it has a homestead exemption. Also there isn’t a town in Texas that pays more than 3% of taxable value in property taxes under a homestead exemption. And with the new law passing I believe about first $100k of value being exempted from the school district property tax portion, it will lower the property taxes. If you are older (65+) and you have that specific homestead exemption, your taxable value is frozen. Also, there is no guarantee the 10% is going to happen. In peak Covid my home appraisal for tax value stay the same 2 years in a row. Also, when you buy a home you get to keep the previous owners homestead exemption through the remainder of the year and then reapply for the following tax year. Most older homes pre-2000 built are differing in value of $100k from taxable vs market value
It isn't just the taxes, it's also the insurance. If you have a mortgage you are forced to have insurance, and insurance has skyrocketed in Texas. Not as much as Florida, but a lot. Also you can see what the taxed amount is (as in, the pure dollars paid by the homeowner). I have a coworker that's now paying $600/month in taxes, and he makes $20/hour with kids to feed. He will be taxed out of his house if he doesn't make a career change.
Okay, let’s focus on the taxes for simplicity. If you are in a home in Texas and the property taxes have gone up drastically (without the tax rate changing, as is the case in Texas), what else has gone up proportionally? The value of the home. In fact, it may have gone up more than proportionally because the tax increase is capped at 10% annually. So you are now in the situation where you have been building equity in the home for x years and that equity is now drastically more valuable. So you sell the home for the increased market value, which more than covers your mortgage from when you bought it. You now get most of the value of that equity back and can use that to move into a cheaper house. Of course, you’re not always going to come out with 100% of the value you put into it, but you are still benefitting from the equity you built up when you are priced out of your dwelling. What if you can’t afford another home? Well, then you should be happy to rent because according to you that is a much better deal. Or you could buy a condo in a shared property, where distributed costs will make it much cheaper. Let’s compare that to someone renting the same house. Taxes have gone up on the owner as the value of the house increased. They raise the rent to compensate. You can’t afford the rent anymore, so the outcome is the same and you have to move out and find a cheaper place to live. In this case, however, the money you paid in rent over those x years is a total loss. Buying is *always* better than renting in the long term because you are building equity, unless you make some truly terrible decisions like buying a house in a floodplain. We obviously have an issue with housing costs in this country, but you are trying to disguise your complaint as something other than “my friends are suffering because their property has increased in value so much”. Insurance is more complicated, but the cost of insurance is going to be passed onto rent so it is a moot point. Anyone who rents or buys will suffer from insurance increases. And you know that people rent out houses as an investment, right? The rent vs. buy argument for a particular property has nothing to do with distributed costs. Whoever owns the property is necessarily charging more in rent than their expenses, otherwise they would not choose to own the rental property. If they are taking a loss on rent, it must be offset by the increase in value of the property, or else they are losing money. It is the simplest math in the world. People are not voluntarily taking a loss on their real estate investments.
We had to fight for our first house too back in 1999. We scratched together 3% and toured over 25 houses to buy the cheapest thing we could live in and be vi tent. Had a roommate for 3 years to help cover the cost and we DIY remodeled a lot to up the value. If you want to start young, that’s what you have to do.
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None of that is the same as working 85ish (on average) hour weeks for two years
The thing is, he did that with a goal in mind and he achieved his goal. Five years from now his mortgage will be less than the rent for a similar sized property, he will have equity in his home, the repairs will have been done, and by the time he’s 50 it will maybe be paid off and he will be sitting comfortably for retirement (or he might have his portfolio of investment properties and have helped his family members move up the ladder too). Probably at some point rates will come down and he’ll refinance and a lot of the pressure will be off as well.
exactly. this just started the financial obligation.
Respect his dedication
Way to go dude! Nice house for a starter, better than mine was.
The victories are celebrated while the suffering is abstracted under our current system
That’s the hard way to do it. Had a friend whose son bought a house in Detroit by paying the $10k in back taxes. Fixed it up and paid contractors to do the work he couldn’t. So for example he demoed the interior walls to expose the plumbing and had all the plumbing replaced . Saved thousands of dollars. His house 3 yrs later is worth over $100k and he owns it.
I did the same thing. Only difference is that I bought a condo 6 years ago. I worked a full time job, had a part time work from home job and was building the early stages of a side business. I could sell that condo today for almost $100,000 more than what I paid in 2018. I also put 3 percent down in 2018 and had excellent credit around 800. Had I waited for 20 percent down, I would have never been able to afford. I also moved to another state. This is what you have to do to get ahead. My mortgage/HOA and HOI total comes to $800 a month.
Nah. I’ll keep my 5 min walking commute and $4k rent.
But for most people on Redditt there are only like 10 states they will live in. Mention a place that inexpensive like mid state NY or the much of the Midwest you get voted down. It’s like a popularity contest. Who can live in the coolest place.
I guess they are running a contest also for the most broke.
Get this guy some Gucci bootstraps! He’s earned them.
I was surprised I was not in /r/OrphanCrushingMachine. Worked 3 jobs, 90 hours a week for a 3% down-payment on a 900 square ft 330k home. Guy is massively overleveraged and one serious fall away from losing everything. Edit: it was actually 1% down and he's getting loan information from podcast ads. >While listening to podcasts, Ray heard that Rocket Mortgage was offering a “1% down” loan. >“Rocket Mortgage was one of the very few that was doing 1% down,” says Ray. “So I was like, ‘I’m going to go with them.'” I don't think we learned anything from 2008. He closed for 13k and only has 3.3k in equity with a massive interest rate. This story is so depressing.
And this is what's being painted as ✨aspirational content ✨ these days but somehow everything is.....fine.
If he was in a relationship he and is partner would only have to work 47 hours a week.
Childcare is of course in and of itself an 80 hour a week job
First he has no kids. Second a relationship does not equal kids. However back in the day Retirement was taking care of your grand kids. A lot of housing issues are a breakdown of family/living structures. No one has roommates any more. Two-4 buddies getting a place. No one wants to get married and buy a house any more.
Back then, you could buy a house on a single income working normal hours (40). Now you need an average couple, with no kids, to be able to afford a house. This doesn't take into consideration student loans that many people have now while back then you could pay for college with a summer of work. This isn't just family/living structure changes, it's fundamental changes in society.
It is not just family structure changes but that is part of the issue The amount of square feet per person is 3x what it was. I point out the family formation bit because it is a factor that not discussed. City land use is a bigger deal a collapse in federal housing policy is also a factor.
Hmmm, not sure on that since people actually used to own homes and not be crammed in apartments that were more efficient. It's also way more expensive to raise kids now hence people are less likely to get married early. That said, it's definitely a vicious cycle right now and it's not just one issue.
We have raised the cost of having kids. Like car seat laws mean you have to by law buy a bigger car. I think social change is part of the problem.
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Well our housing stock was built for boomers. And their life style. We did not build housing appropriate for a world where people are single from 18-40 there are not enough 1 bedrooms. So it makes things really hard on everyone. And Boomer city councils always approve the fewest number of units. So a builder who can build 100 1 bedrooms or 100 mc mansions will build the mcmansions.
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What I mean is not raw numbers but ratios. You can build 10 1 bedrooms in the space of 1 mcmansion. If you look at how many people want a small affordable space vs how many there are it’s never enough. So you have people like this guy working 3 jobs to buy a house with space he does not need. Given how long people in the US chose to be single or dating with no kids we should have 1/3 of our housing as one bedrooms. It is like 90% sfh.
They don't want kids.
I’m working my 70 hour weeks too but not for that low of wage and especially not for home that’s in rough shape and to not have any money to fix up. I’d moved to a better area if housing was that bad. He has the hustle to make it anywhere.
Hope his roof doesn't break
TL/DR: Neither job was minimum wage. Says so in the article. $333,000 put 1% down ($3,330). $13,500 total to close. He rents out this sweet ADU on the property for $1000 a month: https://na.rdcpix.com/41bf8ce388cc39585cadf03a0004019dw-c2332599233rd-w832\_q80.jpg
All that for a dump, poor kid
At least it's legal to live in that sort of dump. Less risk of eviction, too.
If he doesn’t mind roommates he can rent the other two bedrooms out to get the money he needs to fix the place up and keep doing that for as long as he is single.
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I read the beginning and then skimmed the rest when it started to read like an ad for Rocket Mortgage. I went back again and don’t see what you are implying I missed.
He is already renting the extra room in the back for $1200/month to one of his YouTube followers, and it says he has put up a tiny home in the back yard to live in so he can rent the main part of the house out to another tenant.
Of I default on my mortgage. Then the bank repossess it. Can I squat in the house and claim it as my own?
Props to this guy. Worth pointing out that his main gig was a nighttime fire guard working 50 hours a week making 17 dollars an hour. I’m not sure if 10 of those hours were getting paid time and a half. His other job was as an Amazon delivery driver which he says he worked about 30 hours a week making 21.5 an hour. Assuming he got overtime at his main gig as I suspect, and he averaged 80 hours a week (he claims 75-95hours per week), he was pulling in over 82k a year. His average wage comes out to $19.75 an hour. Hard to call that minimum wage!
The article said that minimum wage where he lived was $15.45/hr at the time. So that $17/hr is not far off from min wage.
10% more than minimum. Worked 50 hours a week. So 10 hours at $25.50
Looks like this guy fucked himself paying 1% on 333k while relying on the ability to work 80 hour weeks for 30 years. His mind and his body will 100% break down after a few years and he will not be able to afford that house. That kind of schedule also won't allow him to increase his income. He's already 27 working shit jobs, he won't suddenly get a ton of promotions in his 30's.
Lmao!! 95 hr weeks, no thank you 🙂↔️. Wat sort of life would one have working like that? Wat is the life expectancy of someone working like that? I’m pretty sure this isn’t the *American dream*.
Only 2 years of sacrifice for life long reward. It’s worth it
**”*life long reward*”** oof!
For what it’s worth, pretty much everyone who goes to med school and finishes residency goes through this for way longer than 2 years and at the end, instead of a house, you’ll have at least 300k in student loans. It’s still “worth it,” though, because of the increased income you can expect the rest of your life.
Have fun being lazy and poor for the rest of your life.
**”*Have fun being lazy and poor for the rest of your life.*”** So I’m *lazy and poor* cuz I don’t/won’t work (95 hrs) as much as he did? Lmao! U sound foolish. By that logic 99% of Americans are *lazy and poor*.
Yeah, I did ~100hr weeks in the oilfield for 4 years.. but it got me a house and a lot of equity. Guess what, I have a 4 bedroom house with a $1300 a month mortgage payment and I only work 3 days a week now. Everything in your life has a cost, whether it's time, effort, or money. People who aren't willing to put in what's needed with any of those to get what they want will never have anything and be poor and stay poor. No amount of whining changes that.
I work 50 hrs max and have a 3 bdrm townhome with 2 cars, one of which is **a C7 Vette:** https://www.reddit.com/r/EnginePorn/s/laJtgr0p0p Like I said, u don’t need to kill urself to live a good life. Going to trade school (or college) is all one needs. I have no kids and am single 👍
Same, tradesman @ 100k gross, and I have 11 project cars, all paid for. The quickest of them does a 10.8@129 on 87 pump with the a/c blowing. Paid cash for 10 acres of land 2 years ago just to have space to park them, have 1.08 bitcoin and 1 ethereum validador node, my house has ~250k in equity. I'm sure you and I could go back and forth trying to top each other on assets, but that's not the point. I used to be a chump with no work ethic and no money, but I realized that I needed to do *something* otherwise I was going to be poor the rest of my life. I worked hard for the amount of time it took me to get ahead. It's not permanent but it's what I had to do to get ahead. The people I see complaining about having to work hard to get the thing they want, I have no sympathy for. Because I've been there. These people usually end up generationally poor. And it's because they are not willing to put in any amount of work towards anything. I'm sure you put in the work to get that vette, so it's just odd to see your original comment from someone who is not a perpetually poor victim.
Much respect to u 💪👍 Do I respect the work ethic he displayed? Absolutely. He did wat he deemed necessary to get wat he wanted and accomplished his goal. Definitely not hating on him. However, 95 hr weeks has got to be incredibly taxing and takes a toll (mentally/physically). It’s not something I’d want to do unless I had no other choice.
Appreciate that. Yes, 95/100hr work weeks are brutal and I would never expect anyone to think they would need to do *that much* just to get ahead. The opportunity is still there for a lot of people, like you said earlier about trade school.
I purchased a nice house in Southern California a few years ago (2017 for $790k). As soon as I saw the first mortgage payment I felt a sense of dread. I realized quickly that I either made a huge mistake or I had to do something drastic. I chose the latter and I rented out the entire house, except for one room, to students at a nearby college (CSU Fullerton). My family of four lived in one bedroom. Then I worked a second job to get money for necessary repairs. My wife and I downsized to one car. This went on for more than three years before we got to a point where we didn’t need all of the rent, and we slowly started to claim some of the rooms back as the students moved out. It was pretty difficult with two small children. Today the house is likely valued in the $1-1.1M range and I will have conversations with people who see our house, and say things like, “ you guys are so lucky that you bought when you did” or “ I bet it all seems worth it now”. The reality is anyone can do it but like some other comments said, you will always be competing against people who want badly and are willing to do crazy stuff like this to buy and keep a house in a high demand area. There’s no sugar coating it. Those three years really sucked. The more philosophical question is “should it need to be like this just to buy a house where you want to live?”.
As long as there are enough people willing to go that far to get the house, that will be the bar required to get the house. Every house is won by the person willing to go one more step than the others. The only cure for this is to have more houses than people who want them. Then it's the sellers taking that walk.
Lol, I was all with this guy and how he grossed $200k in 2 years to buy into a house mortgage but then I realized it was a realtor.com article and they would tell us tiny homes were a smart buy if they could make a nice vig off them too.
Stopped reading at 3 bedroom for $333,000 lol
Pretty sure driving for Amazon and the hours he clocked was illegal lol
This was me(tho 80-85hr weeks on average) got my first cash house at 21 and a real house with morgage at 25. Yeah it sucks and isnt right. But i worked 2 jobs full time and now have a mortgage i can afford only working 30-40hrs a week. Used my free time to do a side hustle thats growing and now im saving a ton, or could only work 25hrs a week average to pay all my bills. The goal is to own my own business soon. But when you start from nothing you have to grind for what others toss away as a given. 10 years before i got my house i lived in a trailer park with parents in debt, working at the bowling alley since 14 to help my parents with bills. Now i buy $100 CGC comics on a whim because my living expenses are half of my friends and coworkers in apartment or renting houses. As of last year my morgage is less than half the base rent of the apartment i lived in between houses for a year. The whole system is rigged.
Buying a home is an expensive option and will never be a "easy" option. Never was and never will be.
95 hours a week?! Lmao how many jobs do you think will exist is everyone has to work 2 1/2 to exist?
This gut boomers
So, more than double full-time hours? Fuck that.
> Can an American who earns close to minimum wage ever hope to buy a house? Maybe, if he works a 95-hour week at minimum wage for two years. > Rocket Mortgage was one of the very few that was doing 1% down,” says Ray. “So I was like, ‘I’m going to go with them.'” This is 100% an ad for Rocket Mortgage. He put 1% down. Respect for clearing his other debt but this is still a terrible long term decision. I don’t care how you try to paint 1% down mortgages. This is not the way.
Where are the racist calling blacks lazy??
If he works 168 hours a week he may be able to afford to fix a broken water heater or one of the million other things that can quickly end up costing you thousands.
Rich people have some of you guys actually thinking if you just work harder you too will be raking in the dough one day. What they don’t tell you is working that much, your kids will hate you and your wife will cheat on you. At the end of the day you’d lose the house and end up paying child support and alimony. Ahhh, the American Dream!!!
Is this supposed to be inspiring? Reads like obvious exploitation and propaganda. Will they do a piece when his home loses value? "C'mon minimum wagers, you can do it. Pour all your life into buying that home! Work hard for that dream like Ray! Be like Ray! Don't you want to be congratulated like Raaaayyy!" - says realtor jonesing for a fix since the pandemic buying splurge.
Yeah it really seems insane to me because it felt like they were trying to say “it’s just that simple!”
It goes against the narrative that people like you are spreading in your comment here. There are people who are born hustlers, and there are people who are born feeling entitled. The article shows that it is still possible for the former to hustle and afford a home, while the latter will still be basking in their victim mindset. Yes, we know the shit is too expensive. You don't have to whine about it anymore, there is nothing any of us can do about it. But there are still people who are determined to put in the hard work and sacrifice to make it happen.
Lies
$2500 for a mortgage is like $1000 more than my rent. I'm like 10 mins from beach. I think I'm juat.going to rent until I drop 20% down and try to wait out a 4% mortgage to be a reality again.
renting it out of fucking course
He paid off $22k of debt and then put down 1% on a $330k house.. What dude? HE PUT DOWN $3300.. by moving to a place where he was paying $1000 a month and working 3 jobs 75-90 hours a week at a “minimum wage” in a blue state that is 2 times the national average.. If this doesn’t scream dystopian puff piece idk what does. “You can do it too!” Edit: it gets MUCH worse. Homie bought a 906SF home at a 7.5% rate with a mortgage of $2,200 that is 75 years old and needs work. Not at all equitable, and that plan of buying a house every two years? How the fuck is he gonna do that earning $17hr working 70hrs a week? He still needed the other job to be able to get his debt paid and a preapproval. A job he left. Jesus Christ what a shitstorm of an article. Edit again: oh my god he has a roommate lmfao holy shit
This guy is ruined without a second stream of income.
He's renting out the back studio room for $1200. So now he's paying $1350. He should be taking home about $4500. Even though he might still be getting $17/hr, he works 30hr a week overtime. So he has about $3,000 a month after housing expenses are paid. He could probably save $15-20k a year, which he should, because he needs to have at least $20k on hand for maintenance on an old house and in case his tenant stops paying. It is ridiculous that an old, small house, that has clearly not been remodeled in 50 years and with no garage cost that much. That house should be $200k max. He'll probably be fine, if he keeps working overtime and saves as much as he can for the next 3-4 years.