I hear home ownership thrown around like its a great thing. What I'd like to know is do these people really own anything? Home ownership means amortized loans which cost around 3 times what the house originally costs, paid over 30 years. Do people really own their own homes or are they slaves to a fat bank collecting an inflated rent payment from them?

When you purchase a home on a property you purchase the right to own the structures atop the property, the right to dig into the soil to place plumbing and other service infratructures, the right to control access to the atmosphere above the structures/property but below Federal and State controlled airspaces.

You are purchasing a lease of U.S. sovereign territory.

The mineral rights to whatever is below, and the air space rights to whatever is above are separate leasing negotiations.

You are purchasing access to Constitutionally protected safe harbor. And the potential of future, taxable gain on your investment of capital.

Nothing more.

Home ownership, buying rental properties, and flipping houses are great ways to get rich in America. You get all the write-offs, appreciation, depreciation, etc...
You own your home (with or without a mortgage) just like you own your car whether you have payments or not.

Amortized loans allow you to make smaller payments. Virtually no one lives in the home for 30 years. Most move every 5-7. Even if you own the home for 15-30 years you still get all the benefits. (Write-offs etc...)

Most people live in theirs for a while and then take their equity and move up. I know many people who became millionaires doing this. Especially here in CA. Property values have skyrocketted. One house that sold for $400k in 1997 is now 4 MILLION dollars.

Gotta love home ownership in America.:)

One has to wonder why the Entitlement Class has to ask about the world beyond their liberal inbreeding.

An Atheist Independent and a theist Republican step up to hold their hands and walk them through the otherwise obvious.

It's a beautiful universe.

Big green smiley face didn't work. Damn...

One has to wonder why the Entitlement Class has to ask about the world beyond their liberal inbreeding.

...LOL! Good one, G, good one!!

And ya' know, it's so strange that they can't see what they ask or talk about sometimes. Amazing!

Baron Max

I hear home ownership thrown around like its a great thing. What I'd like to know is do these people really own anything?The world has a fixed supply of land and an increasing population of people who need land to live on. In addition their average prosperity level has been increasing steadily for ten thousand years since civilization gave us the engine for the creation of a significant surplus of wealth. As a result the growing demand for home ownership--even in Latvia and China if not yet in Sudan and Burma--applies a pressure that raises the value of real estate.

It's Econ 101A, the law of supply and demand. It's the land that appreciates, not the building. A good reason to run away screaming from the condominium market if you possibly can.Home ownership means amortized loans which cost around 3 times what the house originally costs, paid over 30 years.It's called "interest," the fee you charge someone for letting them use your money instead of investing it in something else that will provide for your retirement. It doesn't sound so unfair when stated in that perspective, does it? When someone else lets you use their money to buy a $300,000 house when you only have $30,000 in savings, it's exactly the same thing, viewed from the other side of the transaction. If you weren't willing to pay them for the privilege of using their money they'd have no earthly reason to let you use it.Do people really own their own homes or are they slaves to a fat bank collecting an inflated rent payment from them?We moved into a house in 1987 that had a market value of $200,000. In 2006 that house sold for $600,000. If we were paying rent to a landlord, two things would have happened: The rent would have tripled as the value of the land we were living on increased, and the landlord would have made $400,000 profit by selling his house. Instead, we bought the house in 1987. Our mortgage payments stayed the same for nineteen years so we didn't have to keep coming up with more money for that major component of our living expenses. Then when we sold the house we got the $400,000 profit, after paying off our original mortgage.

We were not paying "rent" and we were not "slaves." We saved a lot of money on rent while we were living there and we made a lot of money on our investment when we sold it.

Obviously you have to be a wise investor and buy land in a place where it will appreciate during your lifetime, and you have to be willing and able to hang onto it long enough to ride out fluctuations in the market. As one house appreciates, you cash out some of your newly created equity and use it to buy another house a couple of thousand miles away as a rental property. That way if you happened to live in Detroit and somehow didn't see the recession coming in the auto industry thirty years ago, your other house in San Diego, Phoenix or Maryland has skyrocketed in value and more than made up the difference.

The world population is expected to finally level off in eighty or ninety years. That will remove one of the inflationary pressures from the real estate market. However, the post-industrial economy will continue to generate surplus wealth at a rate far beyond its past performance. The economies of India and China, countries once considered Third World with a third of the human race living within their borders, are growing at 8-10% a year, as are smaller countries like Vietnam. This prosperity will encompass Nigeria and the Philippines in another generation, especially as their crippling birth rates continue to fall. People will move upscale from cardboard boxes to hovels to shared housing to apartments to townhouses to real houses for many years to come. Real estate will continue to appreciate until everyone has what they consider a nice place to live.

During that time, home ownership will continue to be a good investment, if made wisely.

Moderator: I suggest moving this to Economics.

Thanks for the info.

We moved into a house in 1987 that had a market value of $200,000. In 2006 that house sold for $600,000. If we were paying rent to a landlord, two things would have happened: The rent would have tripled as the value of the land we were living on increased, and the landlord would have made $400,000 profit by selling his house. Instead, we bought the house in 1987. Our mortgage payments stayed the same for nineteen years so we didn't have to keep coming up with more money for that major component of our living expenses. Then when we sold the house we got the $400,000 profit, after paying off our original mortgage.

OK, you've been in the right home at right time when FEDs decided to pump up a housing casino for the poor (relatively speaking). Your home appreciated 3 times in 19 years. How many times the average income grew at the same time? Does a sucker who've bought your house have a chance to sell it for $1,800,000 in 19 years? Obviously, housing casino can't consume 100% income. What's next? Multigenerational loans? Signing up your unborn granchild on the morgage?

The world has a fixed supply of land and an increasing population of people who need land to live on. In addition their average prosperity level has been increasing steadily for ten thousand years since civilization gave us the engine for the creation of a significant surplus of wealth. As a result the growing demand for home ownership--even in Latvia and China if not yet in Sudan and Burma--applies a pressure that raises the value of real estate.

There is so much to the steady increasing price of housing than supply/demand. Social control and pacifier have much more to do with steady climb than one would think. Housing, frequently, is the only way to invest speculative capitals of dubious origin, that's why in the Eastern Europe, with average incomes $200/month, the price of a modest 2 room appartment is comparable with the price of an average home, located somewhere around a medium American city. Obviously, slobs making less than $200/month, having no access to credits can't drive the prices so insanely high. Their supply and demand doesn't count, what counts is money bags making casino of housing.

Approximately the same deal is with home prices in the West. Land was always an asset of plutocracy. That's why land price inflation is called "wealth building" in the media. Plutocrats are running casino (or rather a financial pyramid) and hang a carrot of "sure riches" for a Joe. Seeing that carrot a Joe loses remnants of his modest mind, he can be rich, he can be millionaire, American dream is real, God Bless the USA, Support our troops, Halliluiah.

As for now, housing looks pretty much like a classical financial pyramide. The last suckers who'll buy will pay for the fun.


It's Econ 101A, the law of supply and demand. It's the land that appreciates, not the building. A good reason to run away screaming from the condominium market if you possibly can.

Darn you've missed such a chance to verify your theory. You could tear your home down and sell your plot of land for $600,000. There are plenty places where one can buy a plot of land for modest price, $5000-$15,000, to build a home. It doesn't affect housing inflation though.

One has to wonder why the Entitlement Class has to ask about the world beyond their liberal inbreeding.

An Atheist Independent and a theist Republican step up to hold their hands and walk them through the otherwise obvious.

It's a beautiful universe.

What in the world does that mean? Sandy, the speculative housing market might have been the only thing keeping our economy going, and it's collapsing.

Most people live in theirs for a while and then take their equity and move up. I know many people who became millionaires doing this. Especially here in CA. Property values have skyrocketted. One house that sold for $400k in 1997 is now 4 MILLION dollars.

Yeah, one get richer on peddling one's house. However, the voice of reason says that an average schuck has much greater chances to get $200,000 loan, pay $400,000-$500,000 during the life of the loan. That's why bankers are in love with mortgages, in the first place. Counting all write offs, tax tricks, appreciations, expenditures, insurances, etc. (average) one will be lucky to break even.

Yeah, home ownership is great, so you get to pay $5k+ each year in property tax on a home you already own.. :p

- N

Those taxes are a write-off. So is your mortgage interest.

The spec market is alive and well in many parts of the country. Not so great in some. Awesome in others. Many are buying up foreclosures from people who should have never had properties.

Yeah, home ownership is great, so you get to pay $5k+ each year in property tax on a home you already own.

Don't know what it's like where you are, but apartment dwellers pay taxes, too. So homeownership at least allows you to own the things that you're paying taxes on.

Baron Max

I do not own a home, I would prefer to own a female... if owning a home allows me to get a female I shall consider it :C

Those taxes are a write-off. So is your mortgage interest.
.

Dear, tax write off ain't the same as "free", you haven't figured it by now? Strange. Tax write off is not the same as tax credit. Tax write off just means that you will be reimbursed 10-30% of the costs, depending on your tax bracket. You still need to pay 70% and up of the cost on your own.

I do not own a home, I would prefer to own a female... if owning a home allows me to get a female I shall consider it :C

Owning a female is pretty damned expensive. You'd be lots better off renting one!!!

However, owning a home does make a male more attractive to a female. The problem is that if you allow it, she'll take over the damned place, and own you, in addition!!! Be careful what you wish for.

Baron Max

I do not own a home, I would prefer to own a female... if owning a home allows me to get a female I shall consider it :C

www.bride.ru, at least you'll own her for two years needed to get a green card.

Dear, tax write off ain't the same as "free", you haven't figured it by now? Strange. Tax write off is not the same as tax credit. Tax write off just means that you will be reimbursed 10-30% of the costs, depending on your tax bracket. You still need to pay 70% and up of the cost on your own.

But you can't write off any-fuckin'-thing when you rent!

Baron Max

Dear, tax write off ain't the same as "free", you haven't figured it by now? Strange. Tax write off is not the same as tax credit. Tax write off just means that you will be reimbursed 10-30% of the costs, depending on your tax bracket. You still need to pay 70% and up of the cost on your own.

That's true. BUT any percentage is better than zero - which is exactly what renters get.

Owning a female is pretty damned expensive. You'd be lots better off renting one!!!

However, owning a home does make a male more attractive to a female. The problem is that if you allow it, she'll take over the damned place, and own you, in addition!!! Be careful what you wish for.

Baron Max

I feel the pain. Is it your wife's car?
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y102/cowgirlj/Avatars/washis.jpg

But you can't write off any-fuckin'-thing when you rent!

Baron Max

That's quite a logic. I have 3 dollars, I could keep them, or I could buy a piece of something because Uncle Sam will give me $.30 back. Depending on your mindset and the quality/necessity/price...etc. of the thing you buy, it's either $2.70 lost or $.30 saved. "Writing off" is a hook many businesses are using to attract customers, many of whom, amazingly, don't realize that "write off" is not the same as "free".

That's quite a logic. I have 3 dollars, I could keep them, or I could buy a piece of something because Uncle Sam will give me $.30 back. Depending on your mindset and the quality/necessity/price...etc. of the thing you buy, it's either $2.70 lost or $.30 saved. "Writing off" is a hook many business are using to attract customers, many of whom amazingly don't realize that "write off" is not the same as "free".

The paper money is worthless, too. So is Gold, so is anything potentially. People, believe "think" land is worth something, so it is. I do agree with a lot that you say. Buying real estate is not as concrete as some people think. And there is a reason hoarding gold is illegal in the U.S(not Canada :))

The paper money is worthless, too. So is Gold, so is anything potentially. People, believe "think" land is worth something, so it is. I do agree with a lot that you say. Buying real estate is not as concrete as some people think. And there is a reason hoarding gold is illegal in the U.S(not Canada :))

Only a machine gun and ammo, my friend, + guts and zero mercy/compassion crap to use them.

Only a machine gun and ammo, my friend, + guts and zero mercy/compassion crap to use them.

Where do you live? I'll join forces.

Machine gun? you have a MADeuce?

it means that the woman has alot of work to do maintaining it while her sig. other plays video games all night

it means that the woman has alot of work to do maintaining it while her sig. other plays video games all night

Why? Why don't she let the house fall down around her shoulders like he does? There's nothing forcing the woman to do anything that she doesn't want to do, is there?

See? Women are often slaves to their own ideals and upbringing and "female-ness". Let the house become a pigsty, why should the woman care?

I'm becoming convinced that when humans move to another planet, they should send in a bunch of women first ....so they can get it all cleaned up and tidy before the men show up with their video games and fun stuff like that!! :D

Baron Max

Say you pay $1000/month PITI and $700 is interest, $200 is taxes, $40 is insurance, and $30 is principal, the interest and taxes are write off. Meaning $900 is write off. So it is really costing you $100/mo to live there (plus utilities etc.) The $900X12 months= $10,800/yr write off. If you make $50k/yr, you pay taxes on $50k minus the $10,800, or about $30k. It's way better to pay taxes on 30k than on 50k thus one of the main benefits of home ownership.

:spank:

uhhh ya what Max said lol