Selling the House

So the realtor we chose pays for a "stager" to come and make the house buyer ready or at least tell you the things that need to be done to make the house ready. She came today, and of course I was nervous, I really wanted the house to be in better shape than it was because your house is a reflection on yourself.

She really changed some things around and I must say, I would have never done that, but it does look better than it was. And she gave us good feedback on things to do and change that I feel will really make a difference in our house. I'm excited, before I was still kind of on the fence about selling but now I'm on board, I just need to break the news to our neighbors who will be very disappointed.

But here are some logical reasons why we should sell.

We owe $118k on our house, down from $162300 (yeah!) Our standard payment is $779/month but we pay extra ($905/month) It will take us 214 months to pay off this house at this rate. That's 17yrs and 10months for those math impaired.

Now if we buy a house in Plum Creek (besides that is a nicer neighborhood) for $140k then our standard payment on a 15yr note at 4.75% would be $778/month. However, we'll continue to pay $905/month. This means we'll have paid off that note in just over 12 years. Anyone can see the easy math that 17yrs and 10 months is longer than 12 years. But here is the crazy part.

IF we stay for 18 years and pay off our current house, we will have paid $357k for the house. If we buy a Plum Creek house for $140k and put all of our money to get the loan balance to $100k and we pay it off in 12 years, we would have only paid $152k for the house. Again it doesn't take a mathematician to see that $152k is a better deal than $357k.

Then there are the things that are harder to measure. For instance, our neighborhood doesn't have sidewalks, Plum Creek does. Our neighborhood doesn't have a pool, Plum Creek has two! Mayzie and D'Lane could walk to school when they wanted in Plum Creek, but she'd have to be driven in our current neighborhood. There are some draw backs, we won't have as much space for the dogs, there aren't huge trees that house hawks and owls. We'll have to abide by HOA rules and our house will be smaller. I'll have a further commute to work, but we'll be close to friends.

We're considering renting because it has a lot of advantages over owning a house but for right now we're focusing on selling ours. This seems pretty logical no matter which way you slice it.