Rent / Financing Purchase of Apartment or House

Hello,

Our situation:
We are married and expecting a child in summer.
Both 30 years old and employed.
My net income is 4,000 euros.
My wife's net income is 2,400 euros, she will work 50% (part-time) again in summer 2022, already discussed with employer.
Equity 100,000 euros.
Warm rent 1,500 euros.
Monthly expenses including warm rent: 3,300 euros.

Our first idea was to buy an apartment so that we could avoid rent. Unfortunately, we have not found a suitable apartment. Prices in the area (southern Germany, near the CH border) are high. A new 4-room apartment cannot be found for less than 500,000 euros. Older apartments we might find for 400,000 euros. Of course, this involves additional risks and costs.

Building plots (400-600 m2) cannot be found for less than 350,000 - 400,000 euros either. The house (without basement, single-story, about 120 m2) I cannot build for less than 250,000 euros.
I am very skeptical about getting municipal building plots for a normal price.

Now we are considering: should we stay in our apartment, pay rent and wait until
a) we can buy a suitable apartment or
b) we receive a building plot from the city (100,000 - 150,000 euros) and build a house (it may be that we never get this)
c) we have more equity and move somewhere where building plots are cheaper (probably salaries too)

or simply wait until we can get a loan so that we can build a house with a building plot for about 650,000 euros. Until then, part of the money will also be lost through rent.

I would be very grateful for your opinions.

30 years young, 5.2k part-time, 100,000€ equity. These are very good conditions.

There are rules of thumb that say you can easily get a loan of 100 times your monthly net income. That would make a house feasible now. Calculated differently, you have 1500€ rent including utilities + 1900€ monthly savings available for a house. That is very decent and enough for a much larger loan, which you may also need since a house cannot be built for 250,000€.

or just wait until we can get a loan to build a house with a building plot for about 650,000 euros. By then, part of the money will also be gone due to the rent.

I don’t understand that part. You are currently saving almost 2000€ every month. Even more before the part-time job! You also get a value in return for the rent. You are still young enough that retirement is not an issue.

You have to be able to answer the question whether you should buy an apartment or a house yourself. No one will make the decision for you. Both options are possible.

Don’t be afraid of the big numbers. Nowadays that is simply normal because of the low interest rates. You can afford it.

Thank you very much for the opinion. We currently have no children. The first child is coming in the summer. We plan to have the second in 2-3 years.

We are increasingly preferring to build a house, but we are shocked by the prices of building plots. Taking out a loan of 650,000 euros right away (whether we can even get that is also a topic) we find very bold :)

About the rent: well, 14,400 euros annually for the so-called flexibility... That is a lot. Maybe we shouldn't wait and already start building the house. While the interest rates are still low.

Taking out a loan of 650,000 euros right away (whether we can even get it is also an issue) we find very bold

With the loan and additional costs, you are about €1,000 higher than your current rent including heating. That is quite a hefty amount.

What stresses you or what do you currently lack?

Do you have enough space with 1-2 children in the apartment? If yes, wait wait wait and save, if no, act now

We increasingly prefer to build a house, but have been shocked by the prices of building plots.

Somehow it seems to me that recently there has been more complaining about the high costs of ownership while at the same time rent is portrayed as unacceptable. Yes, land costs money, and building a house on it does too, but in return you get rid of the issue of rent. Then you just have to accept the high burden after calculating how much is maximally affordable overall. Indications of this can already be found in some posts further above. The only alternative is to marry or inherit property.