I like a house that is 200,000. me and my wife make 3300 a month can we afford a 1500 a month mortage ?

Question

the lender said that we don't have to put no money down and no closing cost, is that o.k. (my first time buying a home)

Answer 1

Don't buy a house without a 20% down payment...Your payment (principle and interest plus taxes) shouldn't be more than half your TAKE HOME amount. Don't buy or you will be counting every penny and living in debt.

Answer 2

I'm assuming that the mortgage is 1500 BEFORE property taxes. But, for the sake of argument, I'll set that aside. After paying your mortgage, with a TAKE HOME pay of $3300 a month, you would have $1800 a month. So let's start there.

$1800
- 300 (count on this being your average for utilities)
- 20 (trash pickup?)
- 300 (conservative grocery estimate)
- 100 (conservative gas estimate)
- 150(maintenance)
- 100 (phone, internet, cable)
- 200 (got a car payment?)
- 60 (homeowner's insurance averages more than this)
- 100 (car insurance also does)

That adds up to around $1330, which theoretically would leave you with around $470. However, if you have higher credit card payments, child care, or other incidentals (which you likely do), then this is NOT a good option for you.

Sure, you might be able to buy the house. But heating and cooling it, furnishing it, affording groceries, and being able to pay for the car you drive to work might be hard.

You're better off to go with a house that leaves you with some disposable income every month to save and put aside for a rainy day.

Also, putting no money down is the worst financial decision you can make. You walk into your home having absolutely no equity. If something should happen and you'd need to sell your house, the chances that you could sell it AND cover your mortgage would be nill to none (within 10 years or so). Especially with today's housing market. Even in a relatively strong one, you'd be pushing it...

Good luck. Been there!

Answer 3

I would look for something a little less expensive. Lenders are in the business of making money. They don't care if you have to go hungry or do without to make your mortgage payment. Look at your current expenses and see if you could make ends meet if you cut $1500 from your monthly income. A $1500 mortgage payment will leave you with $1800/month to spend on groceries, utilities, car insurance, gas, home owner's insurance, and anything else that might come up. If you can live on that without struggling, go ahead and buy the house. If that would cause money to be tight, you might want to keep looking.

Answer 4

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RE:
I like a house that is 200,000. me and my wife make 3300 a month can we afford a 1500 a month mortage ?
the lender said that we don't have to put no money down and no closing cost, is that o.k. (my first time buying a home)

Answer 5

Your mortgage payment should not run more than 25% of your monthly income. If you and your wife have a combined income of $3,300/month then you can afford a payment of about $825. Keep in mind that you also have property taxes, insurance, utilities, food and other expenses. There is always something to do around the house, which often requires additional money.

Answer 6

No money down on a $200,000 house?! I've NEVER heard of that. In fact, homebuyers typically have to pay much higher down payments today than they did a few years ago (as high as 25% vs 5-10%).

In general, though, devoting almost 50% of your total income to a house payment is quite risky. Unless you have significant savings, you could end up going into very serious credit card debt if you are unemployed for a few months.

Answer 7

It depends on what other expenses you have and what kind of lifestyle you want to live! That is a very heafty mortgage. I would reccomend the industry standard. 28% of your income for your home. At max I would recommend not going over 33% on a home mortgage. You do not want to set yourself up for trouble. A house comes with many expenses ontop of the mortgage payment. As for the no money down, no closing costs. It is possible. Just read the loan docs carefully. If you are a first time home buyer you may want to consider using your 401k. As you can use up to 10,000 as you will have some fees home inspection....ect.
Hope this helps!

Answer 8

On top of what everyone else has pointed out, you will also need all sorts of things for the new home -- some appliances, window treatments, lawn mower and other gardenng tools, etc. And you will have all sorts of extra costs with various utilities -- deposits, installation fees.

When you hear on the news about all those people about to lose their homes because they can't afford the mortgage .... well, this is how they got there.

Answer 9

Add the taxes, insurance etc and you are at about the gross income you have stated making less than 40K a year even with no other bills sorry that is out of your league. This would be a plan for total financial disaster, and would soon end up in the ranks of those in foreclosure.

Answer 10

NO,

it exceeds 50% of your income, be it gross or net.

Housing is supposed to be somewhere around 35%.

, in addition, you will have to have PMI insurance and insurance and taxes in escrow, which is a cost in addition to the house payment. The lender is looking to get his cut on having you take a mortgage and I think attempting to put you in over your head.