FREE LUXURY FORECLOSURE LIST FORM     80% OF RENTERS CAN OWN FOR LESS FORM     FREE LUXURY FORECLOSURE LIST     Luxury Home Deals     $5000 BUYER CASH SAVINGS     80% OF RENTERS CAN OWN FOR LESS     WE'LL FIND YOU A HOME IN 3 DAYS - GUARANTEED     Build Your Credit Now     Get Pre-Approved Today…No Hassle, Guaranteed     Send Homebuyer Packet     Customized Home Search     The Moving Check List     5 Homebuyer Essentials     Get a Free List of Below Market Homes in Your Area     First-time homebuyer tax credit     LSRP Homebuyer Guarantees     Find Out if You Can Really Afford to Buy In 4 Easy Steps     Renting or Buying - Advantages and Disadvantages     Top 10 Reasons to Buy Now     Homebuyer Assistance Programs     UPSCALE Homes #2     The Smart Seller Program     Sold 39 Days...GUARANTEED!     Free For Sale By Owner Toolkit     Easy Exit Listing Agreement     Free Home Staging     Home Value     27 Insider Secrets     Sell For More     Customized Relocation Home Search     Send Relocation Packet     5 Relocation Essentials     Free List of Below Market Properties     Houston - Self Guided Tour     Houston Rating and Rankings     Relocate to Texas in 3 Days Guaranteed     Relocation Guarantees     Send Free Neighborhood Kit     Texas Top 5     Property Searches     Buyers     Sellers     Relocation     Yekcira' Burnom     Realty Associates     NW Houston/Cypress Foreclosures     Humble/Kingwood/Atacocita Foreclosures     Richmond/Rosenburg Foreclosures     Free List of HUD Foreclosures     Central Houston Foreclosures     SE Houston/Pearland Foreclosures     Clearlake/Baytown/Channelview Foreclosures     SW Houston Foreclosures     West Houston/Katy Foreclosures     Sugarland/SW Suburban Foreclosures     N Houston/Woodlands Forclosures     New Construction Forclosures     Free List of Luxury Foreclosures     Area Foreclosue List     Free Foreclosure List Thank You Page     Home     Lifestyle     Realty     Partners     About Us     Contact Us     Free Foreclosure List

Find Out if You Can Really Afford to Buy In 4 Easy Steps Even if you take the time to calculate the true monthly cost of owning your first home, I would suggest that you put those numbers to a test. For you see, looking at the figures on paper and actually having to write those figures on a check are two different issues. So I want you to commit to the following exercise for six months before you actually start even looking for a home:   Step 1: Figure out how much buying a home in your estimated price range will really cost you monthly, including all the expenses I pointed out above. Step 2: Subtract your current monthly rent from the total figure you came up with in Step 1. For example, if your current rent is $1000 and your monthly homeownership cost is $1,450, that is a difference of $450 per month. Step 3: Set up a new bank account. On the first day of each month - not the second, not the third, but the first day of each month - you are to deposit (Auto-draft preferably)  whatever the difference is between your current rent and what your projected homeownership costs would be; in our example, you would deposit $450 into the account. Step 4: You are to do this every month for six months. If you are late in your payments, or if you feel stressed out trying to make the payments, you should take this as a sign that you may not be financially ready to become a homeowner. Then take a little of this money and go out and celebrate. You deserve congratulations for going through this process and learning you aren't yet ready to buy. You just avoided making a huge financial mistake; and in my book avoiding mistakes is an important part of life. If, on the other hand, it was easy for you to make the extra $450 monthly payment, that's a financial sign you can probably afford to buy the house you want. That's the good news. The great news is you now have an extra $2,700 you saved during this six-month test that will come in handy to help pay for your closing costs on the mortgage, or the new furniture I know you are going to want, or - better yet - to increase the size of the down payment. By: Suze Orman                          Privacy Policy © Created and maintained by WTN.