01-11-2017, 11:15 AM
PMI is moot - you can either afford the house or you can't. If you don't have 20% to put down but you can afford the monthly payment with PMI, do it*. There are creative ways to avoid it, but it's the price of doing business if you don't have 20%. Don't not buy a house just because you don't want to pay PMI.
I've had six mortgages in my lifetime - one refi for each house. I made a mistake by doing 30 year fixed for my first, at my parents suggestion, and subsequently paid more for it. Then rates went down and I refi'd with an ARM, which reduced our payments by like 20%. On the flip side, we kinda got screwed with our second refi because the market had gone down and we no longer had 20% equity. I borrowed money from my parents to avoid it, so I got lucky there. When we bought this house, I rolled the dice with an ARM because the market's been hot and doesn't show many signs of slowing. That said, we just did a refi six months ago and I locked in a 30 year fixed because a) I got a cheap Brexit rate, and b) I wanted predictable payments with a kid. If anyone is in the JUMBO loan territory and wants to talk creative mortgages, let me know.
*I still maintain the only two reasons to buy are market and kids.
I've had six mortgages in my lifetime - one refi for each house. I made a mistake by doing 30 year fixed for my first, at my parents suggestion, and subsequently paid more for it. Then rates went down and I refi'd with an ARM, which reduced our payments by like 20%. On the flip side, we kinda got screwed with our second refi because the market had gone down and we no longer had 20% equity. I borrowed money from my parents to avoid it, so I got lucky there. When we bought this house, I rolled the dice with an ARM because the market's been hot and doesn't show many signs of slowing. That said, we just did a refi six months ago and I locked in a 30 year fixed because a) I got a cheap Brexit rate, and b) I wanted predictable payments with a kid. If anyone is in the JUMBO loan territory and wants to talk creative mortgages, let me know.
*I still maintain the only two reasons to buy are market and kids.
'76 911S | '14 328xi | '17 GTI | In memoriam: '08 848, '85 944
"Here, at last, is the cure for texting while driving. The millions of deaths which occur every year due to the iPhone’s ability to stream the Kim K/Ray-J video in 4G could all be avoided, every last one of them, if the government issued everyone a Seventies 911 and made sure they always left the house five minutes later than they’d wanted to. It would help if it could be made to rain as well. Full attention on the road. Guaranteed." -Jack Baruth
"Here, at last, is the cure for texting while driving. The millions of deaths which occur every year due to the iPhone’s ability to stream the Kim K/Ray-J video in 4G could all be avoided, every last one of them, if the government issued everyone a Seventies 911 and made sure they always left the house five minutes later than they’d wanted to. It would help if it could be made to rain as well. Full attention on the road. Guaranteed." -Jack Baruth