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25 and the wife to be was 19, in the islands just across from the land down under. A small box on an undeveloped section for $64k. 1986 and interest rates were 20%. Most of our furniture was borrowed or cast-offs from family and friends. Life was exceedingly minimalistic for a year or two while I worked massive amounts of overtime and pumped it all into repayments.
A few years later (while living/working in Melbourne and renting house) prices started to slump. Eventually sold, probably broke even.
But after moving back to NZ, we've ended up (15 years ago) with a large old farmhouse on 2 acres we got for a shade over $300k, 10km from town (and 75km from work, so that's a fair bit of commuting each day). Value has seriously increased and am having to constantly tell the bank that no, I'm not really interested in buying more property - although a holiday home in France or Italy is on the wife's (same one) radar.
There's no point looking at stuff you haven't a hope in hell of gathering a deposit for. Look further out even if you end up with a serious commute. Make a plan, figure out a budget for saving and stick to it. Nothing comes on a plate unless you inherit it.
If your neighbours don't listen to The Ramones, turn it up real loud so they can.
“We didn't have a positive song until we wrote 'Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue!'” ― Dee Dee Ramone
"The Democrats want my guns and the Republicans want my porno mags and I ain't giving up either" - Joey Ramone
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Bought first house at 35. Second house at 38. Now 58 and that house is paid for.
With taxes, insurance, and maintenance payments never go away, but it's nice to not have a mortgage payment.
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I was 25 and got a mortgage on a house the cost $17,500. that was around 44 years ago. Now that house is going for $100,000 US dollars. I'm looking at retirement now and a condo in Florida at around $70k. The state where I am working is a frozen hell.
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I was 25 when I bought my current apartment.
But I got very lucky, the place had been on the market a long time (so price went down) and was a dump.
But had the right size (2 bedrooms).
And I got a very cheap loan.
I did spend 2.5 years renovating it together with my father but all worth it in the end.
Tom
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I was 30 when I bought my first house. I needed the tax break from the mortgage interest and was in the military so the housing allowance I received easily covered the monthly mortgage. I also got a VA loan so I needed just a tiny down payment. Got married six years later and the wife and I bought a much bigger house a year later. We kept my original house and rent it out for nearly twice the monthly mortgage. We've since purchased a third house which we rent to her parents.
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I was 28 - but I got the place from a guy I worked with and it needed work so he let it go at a good price. We just did the paperwork through a lawyer and left the banks out of it. I have a fixed rate loan on it and pay him directly. So, that means I didn't have a downpayment to make.
Elephant elephant elephant, sunshine sunshine sunshine
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I got mine at 24, I was lucky enough in the US we have a First Time Home Buyers loan which essentially trades the down payment for a bunch of smaller fees including mandatory inspections that must pass for the loan to approve, that totaled for me to about 1/5 of what a 20% down payment would be.
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Good question, intriguing answers. Just as important as how much you earn is how much you spend. I worked since high school as much as possible and have always been a big saver, staying with my parents until about 28. At that point I could move out and buy myself a property. I paid off the mortgage aggressively (in less than 10 years) upon realizing bank interest was (and still is) near nothing I had little incentive to keep saving. I'd like a second/investment property but prices in my area (USA, Washington DC) are very high so instead I use my earnings to benefit my many siblings and their families. Life is good, and software development is a fine career.
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28.
I assume you're in IT and make a better-than-average wage. Don't necessarily buy all the house you can, buy the house you need.
My first house was a 50-year-old, 800-square-foot little place in a blue-collar neighborhood. I was able to pay ahead to gain equity and still have money left for other things. After a few years, you can move up if you desire.
Another piece of advice is to have at least $5k (USD) extra laying about. Things just come up--whether it's painting before you move in, buying appliances, whatever. If you end up not using that, great, but it's nice to have just in case.
It is nice to have that part of your finances at a (relatively) stable cost. As others have pointed out though, there are risks involved, both financial (something breaks, it's on you to fix) or mental (bad neighbors, etc).
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Early 30s.
I simply looked at the price for rent and price for mortgage and went with the mortgage because it was cheaper.
The Buy-to-Let thing was huge and if you weren't paying your mortgage, you were paying someone elses.
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I was 28.
Here in the states, you can put down a bit less. The key things are the Ratios of Income to payments.
We have a Front end Ratio (usually the monthly payment is about 28% or less of monthly income),
and the Back end Ratio (usually the monthly payment is about 35% or less of monthly income - other monthly payments).
The concept is rather sound. You need Food+Shelter+Clothing(etc). Assign 1/3 of your income to each.
Saving up 20%, even if it takes years is good exercise. Dave Ramsey books are great for helping to get a handle on your expenses and learning how to save.
I have been to Sydney recently. Kinda shocked at the prices.
Typically here, the buying of a house takes about 7 years to break even against. So if you plan to move in 3-5 years, the rule of thumb is not to do it (of course, recent explosions in real estate prices before the crash not withstanding).
Honestly, a $500,000 house, with a 20% down payment = $100,000.00 down.
But a 500K house implies about 5,000/month in a payment (1% is an easy guesstimate).
[Keep in mind, you have PITI: Principle+Interest+Taxes+Insurance]
So, 20 months to save up your down payment. And REALITY is that if you can afford the payment, you should have SOME savings already, and you should be able to save about 10% above this. If you cannot, you are buying too much house. That can get you down to 18 months.
The bright side is that it usually takes MONTHS to buy your first house, and find what you are looking for.
Buy a book about First Time Home Buying, and learn what to be aware of.
What immediate expenses you will have, like appliances.
You should have 6 months of expenses in the bank AFTER the purchase (goal).
If you are a single guy, get a gal pal to look at the house with you. A friend bought a house in which the bedrooms were renovated, and the closets were removed!!! LOL. He had NO Closets in his bedrooms. He never noticed. I bought a house with no sidewalks on either side of the street. I did not even notice.
Buying a New House vs. Used is probably not an issue. I can't imagine you being able to afford a new place in Australia as a first home. The place we stayed in was over 100 years old. But nice. (Although the windows were original custom made sliding wood frames with "wavy" glass) except for the new windows that faced the Opera House (Cremone Point area).
The limitation in mobility is a huge issue. The people we stayed with bought the house, and 3 months later, his job relocated. He now takes the train 40 minutes to work, where it was 15 minutes before.
Don't rush in. While I liked buying my home to avoid paying rent (and I paid it off before I was 40, and still live there), I think I made a lot of mistakes. I bought brand new. I could have gotten more house for less if I bought slightly used. Been here long enough to have replaced everything!
Honestly, if your plan is to get married, the house will become a marital asset, so you might as well get it together. Just keep saving up.
Finally, I feel, personally, that if you don't have the grit to save for 2-3 years to get the downpayment, then owning a house is a questionable decision. The 2 seem related to me. I felt broke for about 4 years after getting the house, when I had to get a car as well. Ughh. Painful days. Looking back, great decision 
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34. Paid cash.
Of course in one of the smallest towns in Iowa.
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Scraping the initial down payment together is the hardest (10% down); most need a hand from relatives.
But after that, you're set... As long as you can keep interest below say 10%.
Figure on PIT of about 30% of your gross.
(Bought my first place in my mid-twenties; always had one since then).
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I was 28. My situation was different to that of an average American, but relatively typical of the software types who read this page.
- My wife and I were both professionals, so our income was somewhat above the median.
- We lived frugally, essentially spending one income and saving the other.
- We bought our first house outside the big city of Seattle.
- We made extra payments to pay off a larger part of the mortgage.
- We refinanced when interest rates went down.
We lived in our first house for 10 years. During this time its value doubled in nominal dollars. We bought our second home in a somewhat depressed Seattle neighborhood near the university. The sale of our old home funded half the price of the second home, and our increased income funded the payments.
We lived in that second house for 12 years, eventually moving to a big house in the desirable Capitol Hill neighborhood. Again, the sale of our second house funded half the purchase price of the next house, and our income was adequate to make the payments. This was the first time that we needed both incomes to live on. This was actually a mistake, as the Great Recession plus a devastating accident cut off both our incomes. But we made it through.
We had good neighbors and bad neighbors. We had maintenance costs in addition to the mortgage, like putting new roofs on two houses. We substantially remodeled the third house.
Some things we learned:
- When you own your home, your payments stay the same for 30 years. No surprise rent increases, no getting kicked out because the landlord wants to turn the building into a condo. No getting kicked out because the landlord sells the building to Amazon who wants to raze it and put up a 12-storey office building. Large maintenance costs can be scheduled years in advance if you need to. It's very rare to have a significant maintenance expense you have to pay right away.
- The monthly mortgage payment on a house is about the same as the monthly rent on the same sized dwelling. If you rent, that money's gone, but if you buy, some of that money goes into principal, which you may eventually get back. The financial computation is a no-brainer.
- You can buy nice appliances, instead of the cheap ones they put in apartments. In fact everything you do in a house you own will be nice and new and you get to use it for years.
- Crappy neighbors of your hose are separated by 30 feet and a six foot fence. This air-gap is really important. Crappy neighbors in an apartment are banging on your walls or ceiling and feeding cockroaches which eventually get into your unit.
- You have to stay in a house about two years to pay back the up-front cost of purchasing a house. It's not a good plan to buy unless your relationship is strong and your job situation is good.
- We moved in up markets and stayed put in down markets. There were scary financial times during the time we were in each of our houses, but we made it through on one income or the other, plus savings, and didn't lose the house.
- We have never regretted living frugally, deferring purchases (e.g. automobiles) until we could pay for them with cash, and enjoying a few very nice things instead of a whole lot of cheap things that broke quickly.
- We had friends who made the same money we did, but made different spending choices, who had difficulty saving enough money for a down payment, or who were screwed by an economic downturn or job loss. I cannot understand how a developer paycheck could possibly not be enough to live on, but people are funny that way.
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25, in 1984. Like many other respondents to this question, there's a "but"... I bought it from some acquaintances, no estate agents involved, and we split the resultant savings between us. Cost about £43K and I put down a 10% deposit, and got in two lodgers whose rent covered most of the mortgage costs. On the outskirts of London.
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I was 24 and married with a 6 month old. We bought the house because it was $200/month cheaper than our apartment, was 1,000 sq.ft bigger and had a 2 car garage. Our immediate neighbors were great, but the others.... no so much. There ended up being a gun-fight between rival gangs on the corner (we were the corner house), which was about 50-60 feet from my two kids windows.... and that led me to look elsewhere. That was a year ago, and have since moved from southern California to Seattle, where I bought my 2nd house in December. Just turned 32.
Senior Software Engineer / Automotive Hacker
"the fabric is down again...."
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Hello all,
I have a wifi access point that can work as a wifi repeater (which is how I have it connected now).
In a computer that is plugged directly to the router I can get a download speed of 10270kbps and an upload speed of 787kbps and a latency of 36ms.
Nothing impressive, but it works.
And in a computer connected through wifi across that repeater I'm getting a super download speed of 1015kbps and an upload speed of 707kbps and a latency of 40ms (this happened after resetting the access point, before it was impossible to finish the speed test as it was impossible to send data to do it).
Is this normal? or should I test something in any of the devices? seeing that big difference, what would you suggest?
The wifi has connected:
2 Chromecast devices.
4 Phones.
1 Computer.
There are a maximum of 5 routers nearby...
Any idea on how to improve that performance?
The computer is getting full signal from the wifi repeater.
Probably the repeater is getting half the power from the router.
Thank you all!
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Nothing in your on-going daily kerfluffles with technology is "normal."
Nor is the behavior of turning the Lounge into a personal support forum for a never-ending series of posts about said daily apocalypses.
In fact, one might say you define "normal" by providing a clear example of what is it not.
If only defining "normal" was more entertaining
«There is a spectrum, from "clearly desirable behaviour," to "possibly dodgy behavior that still makes some sense," to "clearly undesirable behavior." We try to make the latter into warnings or, better, errors. But stuff that is in the middle category you don’t want to restrict unless there is a clear way to work around it.» Eric Lippert, May 14, 2008
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BillWoodruff wrote: Nothing in your on-going daily kerfluffles with technology is "normal."
I don't think so...
I've upgraded from 7 to 10 and it worked flawlessly... well... ok, you are right... that seems not to be normal given the posts of other people here. 
BillWoodruff wrote: Nor is the behavior of turning the Lounge into a personal support forum for a never-ending series of posts about said daily apocalypses.
They are not apocalypses, simply things that are technology related and that are giving me some headache... then before starting touching things here and there and possibly making things worse, it seems to me a good idea searching the internet and asking for help here... No one is under pressure to answer and each time I find a solution I tag the post as solved to avoid people wasting time in an already solved issue.
The Lounge is a very nice place to come, not only a personal forum, but it is also a personal forum where a lot of technology savvy people hangs and where a lot of things can be discussed.
BillWoodruff wrote: In fact, one might say you define "normal" by providing a clear example of what is it not.
I'm from a small village in Catalonia... what did you made think I would be normal? 
BillWoodruff wrote: If only defining "normal" was more entertaining
Seriously, I'm sorry if reading those messages have annoyed or bored you, of course this is not what was intended.
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<i>BillWoodruff wrote:
turning the Lounge into a personal support forum</i>
Ooh! The quoty thing isn't working!
However. Point of order, Mr. Chairman!
The ruling at the top of the page clearly states "<i>anything in a software developer's life</i>", so we clearly <i>are</i> his personal support forum until such time as he changes job.
Just wait for him to post an "<i>I've been promoted to Project Manager!</i>" message, then you can jump all over him.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
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Why so curmudgeonly? She isn't asking for codes pleeze. Besides, have you seen her picture???
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I'd check the channel usage.
For Android there is an app I use: Wifi Analyzer[^] which shows you how many other routers are on the same channel, or close and suggests better ones. It also lets you monitor the signal strength in near real-time as you move around.
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
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Done that, no one else was at the same channel, but the router had the channel selection at AUTO mode, so I've selected the channel manually.
A little bit better... 
And I've disconnected the 54G mode...
And this has made it work better too...
I'll cross fingers and see if this stays this way for long...
Thank you OG!
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You're welcome - good luck!
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
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As Griff says, check the channel allocation. What other SSID are appearing, possibly causing interference using the same channels or channel overlap. Check which frequency everything is using. if every man and dog around is on 2.4, and your hardware supports it, switch to 5 (depending on distance etc.).
Also, look at the direction, are you looking at extending out in one direction, i.e. possible reflector option at main AP. Also look at the antenna angles, positioning, can the router be moved slightly near a doorway etc. All these help.
WifiAnalyser is definitely an excellent tool to play around with until you get things optimal.
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