LogFAQs > #948620268

I talked with a real estate agent and she helped me out a lot. Obviously it costs some money if they help you through closing but it was very well worth it in my book. I was kind of in the same boat as you.

If your mortgage and homeowners insurance are less than 20% of your annual income then you'll be well within a safe range, unless you buy a house that needs a lot of work on it before it's livable. Once you get up to 30% you're starting to stretch yourself more thin, but obviously it also depends how much your utility bills will be, what your taxes are like, what sort of other spending you're interested in, and so on. I'm not sure if those are really hard and fast rules, perhaps the more financially minded folks can say one way or the other, but that's the range I was exploring when searching ten months ago.

And yeah saving up for 20% down is ideal but for me I wanted to get out of my apartment asap so I borrowed some funds from my 401k to get up to 10% down. Mortgage insurance sucks, but if you want a house that badly then it's just another cost to consider.

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~Peaf~