Hello dear ones,
I deliberately chose my title to be provocative, but it represents my opinion. In my conversations with many homebuilders, I see three motivations to build a house:
1) Building a house out of prestige to belong to a group. In my opinion, these are only a few.
2) Building a house for practical reasons. Need for space, investment, ownership, etc...
3) The fulfillment of a lifelong dream. Some, because they themselves grew up in an apartment in their childhood and simply did not have that, others who already grew up in a single-family house in a newly developed area and appreciate that luxury very much.
Here in the forum, questions about financing come up again and again, in which both incomes are necessary in order to finance. In which a previously lived luxury (buying new cars, big and many vacations) is also declared as no longer necessary. In short: In which the equity at best covers the building and purchase ancillary costs. In all these questions, I repeatedly see the motivation from point 3) of my list. I can understand you!
Back in my parents’ times, when construction interest rates were still in the double digits and there was no financial backup from the parents (because it was post-war times), many houses were financed in such a way that one became more frugal, adapted the standard of living accordingly. If the man had lost his job, that would have been a big problem.
What I mean by this: If from 1945 only the houses had been built that comply with the conditions of the rules and securities that are described here in the forum these days as absolutely necessary, then we would not have a shortage of building plots now.
These projects went well in the past and continue to go well in the present. Of course, you always hear about cases in the environment where it didn’t work out. But in most cases, it goes well, just like in cases of wealthy companies it can suddenly also not go well and a house is put up for sale. The assessment of a financing is always a snapshot at the time of financing.
I write this because here in the forum these projects are often condemned to fail from the outset. I can understand and empathize with the desire to buy or build a house with the means you have, even if that means pushing your limits. Of course, there are projects that are not realistic, and that’s what the forum is there for, to point that out. But you don’t always have to play it 100% safe and see only that as the possible way — everything else will fail.
Of course, I exclude building or buying projects that are simply unnecessarily over budget in dimension or quality.
PS: I did not have 100% financing, in case anyone suspects.
Best regards
We also completed 100% financing. I was still studying with a part-time job, my husband working full-time in IT, but only for a few months at that time. He was rather done with his studies because we had two more children and I was a bit behind because of pregnancy, etc. Either way, we had enough money to pay the ancillary purchase costs, but no more. We both worked part-time besides studying, but when you have life and two children and there was also a wedding, well, at the end of studying you just don’t have 100,000 in your pocket. Our family only gave small subsidies. And there was a house we liked and we actually got the bid approved. Before and since then, there has never been a house we could have afforded in the desired location. So, everything was done right. Meanwhile, the money situation is much more relaxed. Raises for my husband and I also work my 30 hours and will soon earn self-employed on the side. And the children are small now, not in 10 years. We wanted the garden now, not later.
The first year was tough. I still had no job, so money was always tight. But it was still worth it. Waiting would not have helped us. The purchase costs have only risen immensely, we couldn’t have saved that fast.
And I am also one of those women who like to work and certainly did not do a master’s degree to then achieve little or nothing career-wise. Everyone can do as he or she wishes, but I want to achieve that in my job and not spend 10 years just taking care of the children. Anyone who has a problem with that can keep me.