HOMES ARE FOR ADULTS

The initial 18 years of our lives are spent in a routine. Wake up, go to school, go to work or practice, do homework/study, go to bed, repeat – or some variation of that. But it’s this routine that leads us to our highly anticipated end goal: High School Graduation!

When I think back to this day, I remember the seeing the smiles of excitement plastered on each one of our young faces; hearing the squeals of happiness that carried a subtle hint of nervousness; and feeling the warm sun beat down on us as we stood outside in our gowns.

But then the inevitable happened…. we graduated. Our reign of terror was over. The ceremony was concluded.

And that’s when I remember seeing, hearing, and feeling all the tears in the room. The planning of this big day was the exciting part. Grad day was the day we let our pent-up excitement EXPLODE in a shower of serotonin! And after the explosion, a crater of unknown had been formed.

You see, that’s when we realized the first book in our life series had just ended. Something so final had caused us to ask ourselves,

‘So what’s next?’.

And then my journey took me to college where I got to go through the same cycle all over again during the next 4 years.

Regardless the path after high school, most of us don’t answer the ‘what’s next?’ question by saying ‘Time to go get a mortgage for a house!’. Why would we? Homes are for adults, right? We still have 10 years before that happens!

What no one tells you is adulthood isn’t something you can set a perfect plan for; it is something you are thrown into. FULL. FORCE. There is a reason our elders tell us that mistakes are made for our 20s. Young and dumb, is it? We experience more growth, changes, and failures in one decade than we do in the rest of our lives. But what if we could set the next generation up for just one less struggle? To be a small life-vest in the vast ocean of life.

Real-estate is an overall constant growth throughout time that is becoming less and less affordable for our generations. But what if we could start by utilizing real-estate as a catalyst to launch ourselves into adulthood?

Cue the catapult...

Did you know that you don’t need a salary job to obtain a loan? Down payment assistance programs are a great way to get a foot in the door. Some have recapture periods - meaning if you sell/refi within so many years, you may be subject to paying the assistance back. But hey…doesn’t that fit in with our timeline into adulthood?

Let’s gander at some math here. If I purchased a home worth $100,000 nine years ago, and now I am going to sell and use the equity as a down payment on a new home, assuming appreciation was an overall average of 4.5% and mortgage rate was 6.5% on $97,000 loan amount, what would be my equity? After fees, you would have a roughly estimated (give or take) $55,000.

$55,000 return over 9 years (objection: speculation!) (overruled?) is a pretty good ROI. I now have my down payment for my next home. Or now I have my student loan payoff money. Or maybe it covers a wedding. Or all of the above. The point is you are now blossoming into becoming an adult $55,000 ahead of the game.

It’s like being the first player in monopoly to control an entire side of the board. An advantage YOU created in life.

So how do we get started in changing our routine to a new-found order? And DUDE, WHERES MY CAR?!?! Wonderful question, thank you for asking, I would love to answer. I didn’t forget about the dreaded car loan. We just break it down into parts.

Part One: Adult Credit

Part Two: Adult Income

Part Three: Adult Liabilities (Beep! Beep! Jeep?)

Part Four: Adult Savings (for curveballs)

Part Five: Adult Home

Each part will have its own separate blog article as each part deserves its own in-depth view on the topic at hand.

Thank you for reading my 2 Cents! See you in Part One: Adult Credit.