Home-In-Fusion

We’ve been on the lookout for a couple of months now, but we haven’t found anything that interests us that much. OK, we are a little picky, but we should be, it is going to be our first home, and if I’m trading my meager rent pay($650 per month) for a fat mortgage payment, I’d better be picky, right? ! (The very thought of it makes me a little nauseous.)
Of course, we talked a lot about what is the right thing to do, pros and cons, buying a house versus renting one. However, my family agrees on something: we are not huge fans of the idea “Every American family - a proud home owner!” (My husband and I come from an ex-communist country, we grew up with slogans and brainwashing of that kind, and we, sort of, had enough of it.) If we are being realistic, buying a house is not an investment, really, it is more an illusion of an investment, and we did the math. Believe it or not, it turns out, it’s cheaper if you simply rent and just put away, or even better, invest the “mortgage” money. Check it out for yourself:
www.dinkytown.net/java/MortgageRentvsBuy.html

I clearly see all of you now, grunting in disagreement and contempt. (To clarify, I’m talking specifically in our case; it is all relative as you know.) Anyway, that is a wholly different story, and I won’t be talking about this now, I don’t want to spoil it for you, future home owners. And again, what do I know?! Remain calm, I’ll try to keep the enthusiasm and spark alive.
Nonetheless, we have decided, we were buying a house! We wanted to have more privacy (good bye deejay-wannabe-neighbors!), we finally came up with some money, and both, my husband and I, rather like challenges.
So be it, what the heck, we are buying a house. Yay!