Ever since I got my promotion and started as a Jaguar service advisor things have going really well and with the extra $, I have been thinking about buying a place in the spring. Problem is it's really expensive to live in the DC area unless you want to sit in traffic.
I currently own an 07 Legacy GT which I like as a daily driver but for the $ I put down, the $500 a month car payment and the premium gas it's not worth it. It's also an auto, which is good for traffic but boring. The local Subaru dealership has a lease special this month on the non-turbo Legacy's where you pay the whole lease up front (w/ tax, tags, etc) and have no payments after that. After trading in the GT and paying it off I would have an extra $5000 which covers the 2 year lease so basically it's a free car for 2 years. With no more car payments this would free up $ to buy a 2nd "fun" car.
For the renting vs buying a house, renting would easily save me 1000-1500 a month and although buying a house is a great investment, the market is nothing special and this area has peeked in prices, although everyone says "it's the time to buy this year" I could easily investment that $1000-1500 plus the $500 a month I saving from getting rid of the GT and put it in some sort of account to make $ and save for a future downpayment. If I find someone to rent a room and I find a GREAT deal on a 2 bedroom condo/townhouse I would probably do it but if not I probably shouldn't rush it and rent for awhile. What do you guys think?

Poll question: Car; lease or buy.... house; rent or buy

Poll result (19 votes) buy a car and buy a house (10 votes) Vote buy a car and rent a condo,etc (2 votes) Vote lease a car and buy a house (2 votes) Vote lease a car and rent a condo, etc (1 votes) Vote cheese (4 votes) Vote (0 votes) Vote

I said lease the car and buy the house. The house is a good long term investment. The car ... well it eventually devalues to nothing. I would lease a daily driver from this point forward. With housing prices going down it should be a good time to buy.

Do whatever works best about the car situation. Renting the place where you live is ALWAYS wasting money. No if's, and's or but's.

as long as you plan to stay in the house for at least 5 years its an AWSOME investment right now.
4 months ago we started building our new house and we got approved at 7.5% i dont sign for closing till may and i gt a call at least every couple of weeks saying that our intrest rate went down a couple of points. if i had to sign today mine would now be at 5.8%

the feds were suposed to have a meeting on the 11th about droping them AGAIN so im wating for that anouncement this week and the subsequent phone call from my broker.

just be careful your not in danger of loosing your job otherwise your FOOKED in this market.

with your job at the dealership you should be leasing anyway, not worth it to buy a car unless its an investment piece or your going to mod the Shit out of it! }(

To hell with the car and house; cheese all the way.
Seriously though, buy the house, and lease the car.

Buy a house, and buy a car you can afford.

Cars above $1000 are ultimately just for fun and showing off however you want to look at it. The last thing you want is a car payment that makes you more miserable than what little your car does to make you happy.

But if you insist on having a car you can't afford, lease it.

Buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house!!!!!!

Survey over.

Gotta get in the game. Once you're in, you're in. Do not continue to pay someone else's mortgage, if you can swing it. Get the $100 dollar car but buy the house.

Originally posted by bullettdsm
Buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house!!!!!! Survey over. Gotta get in the game. Once you're in, you're in. Do not continue to pay someone else's mortgage, if you can swing it. Get the $100 dollar car but buy the house.

Agreed 100%. I didn't get the $100 car, but I'm sure not moving out of my parents house until I can buy a place. I personally feel renting is a waste of money.

Originally posted by cs82685

Originally posted by bullettdsm Buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house!!!!!! Survey over. Gotta get in the game. Once you're in, you're in. Do not continue to pay someone else's mortgage, if you can swing it. Get the $100 dollar car but buy the house.

Agreed 100%. I didn't get the $100 car, but I'm sure not moving out of my parents house until I can buy a place. I personally feel renting is a waste of money.

Bought the car and then I bought the house. Of course if I knew then, what I know now, I'd have waited until NOW to buy the house instead of last year before the market dropped. :crap

Originally posted by Dualgen2
although buying a house is a great investment, the market is nothing special and this area has peeked in prices, although everyone says "it's the time to buy this year"

The market is dropping after the biggest housing bubble the U.S. has ever seen. It is NOT the time to buy right now. The drop we've seen in housing prices is only the beginning - it's going to get much worse. Read all the historical posts on patrick.net or thehousingbubbleblog.com until your eyes bleed.

Ha ha, I thought this was a good visual of historical housing prices, and where we are now:

YouTube.com

(the last part is what you need to see, including the graph shown at the last second)

Originally posted by ez

Originally posted by Dualgen2 although buying a house is a great investment, the market is nothing special and this area has peeked in prices, although everyone says "it's the time to buy this year"

The market is dropping after the biggest housing bubble the U.S. has ever seen. It is NOT the time to buy right now. The drop we've seen in housing prices is only the beginning - it's going to get much worse. Read all the historical posts on patrick.net or thehousingbubbleblog.com until your eyes bleed. Ha ha, I thought this was a good visual of historical housing prices, and where we are now:

YouTube.com

(the last part is what you need to see, including the graph shown at the last second)

haha that makes me want to ride a roller coaster =)
but very true, the housing market was incredibly inflated for quite a long time and your going to start to see more realistic prices as the fed continues to battle market inflation.

How about buying a house and renting it out to someone as well :shrug:

Originally posted by mysteryclipse21
How about buying a house and renting it out to someone as well :shrug:

If you are cash-flow positive and the underlying "asset" is not depreciating at a break-neck speed, it makes sense. But it's difficult/impossible to meet either one of those criteria on the coasts right now.

hehehe I'm drooling over the housing price drop... Cyndi and I have been actively seeking, and may finally get the opportunity :P I love this 10 year cycle...