We’re in the business of helping people buy and sell properties, so obviously we have an interest in encouraging people to buy a home rather than rent one.* That doesn’t mean there aren’t real, tangible benefits to owning your own space. For example:
- You can deduct mortgage interest from your income at tax time. That can save you some money every year.
- If you have a fixed-rate mortgage, your interest rate will never change. Your payment might change slightly from time to time because of things like taxes and insurance, but not the way most rents increase on an annual basis.
- In fact, if you buy a house at a low interest rate like those we’ve seen the last few years there are other potential financial benefits. In the late 70’s and early 80’s inflation was between 10% and 15%. If you had a mortgage with a 5% rate at that time your bank would’ve essentially been paying you 5% to 10% for the privilege of borrowing money from it.
- You can modify your home as you see fit. You can have DirecTV or Dish Network come out and install a satellite dish without getting permission from anyone. You can even build a tree village in your backyard that resembles those built by the Ewoks in Return of the Jedi if you want. Which leads to…
- You don’t have to deal with a landlord for any reason at all. You don’t have to deal with leases or buyouts or the possibility that your landlord decided to rent his space out to his cousin. In fact…
- You can become a landlord yourself. Instead of having to deal with everything listed above, you can be the one inflicting them on some poor, unsuspecting person. Jokes aside, there are benefits to renting out a space you own. Having someone else pay your mortgage rather than paying someone else’s mortgage just seems a lot better, doesn’t it?
* – Don’t get us wrong, we will help you rent a place if that’s what you need. Just contact us and we’ll talk to you and get a sense of what your options are. You might be surprised!