11-05-2018, 12:51 PM
(11-05-2018, 12:32 PM)tomh009 Wrote:(11-05-2018, 12:10 PM)danbrotherston Wrote: I suspect most people also vastly underestimate the money they put into a house.
After accounting for utilities and insurance I used to pay at my house, my 750 dollar condo fees come down to about 450, and accounting for ONLY the money I put into the house and ignoring the hours and hours and hours of my own labor I put in, 450/month is a reasonable estimate of my monthly cost. Now I did have to put on a new roof, but I managed to avoid replacing a 30+ year old furnace. It's not a small bill to swallow, but the fact is, it isn't any bigger than a house would be, just more visible.
Sadly, perception is reality, and many people never get past the initial sticker shock, to the point of figuring out what it really means.
To be totally fair, this took me a long time too...I lived in a house for 5 years due in large part to the high price of the City Centre Condos, but even when I started looking, I though the condo fees were really high. I spent a long time with a spreadsheet to convince myself that they weren't...I literally took all the repairs I did over 5 years and distributed them over the 5 year period, and was surprised how much I'd spent.