I have a financial dilemma... By teaching summer school I've got just enough money to either put a deposit on a house OR go to Italy for a 3 week trip in July but not both. Opinions are sought on how the money should be spent. Start voting now.
What do you want/need the most? do you have the suspicion you will be wanting to nest soon? Or is this going to be your last chance to go somewhere you have dreamed of going forever? You know what you want- do that. You can earn the money again but if you give up what you want the most you will regret it. Italy isn't going to go away anytime soon, they call Rome the Eternal city, don't they? If you have a house in mind you might need to buy it soon or some other family will be living in it and you might end up in some crappy place and not be happy and have to find another house , that might still not be as good as the house you could have had only you went on that trip to Italy and the weather was inexplicably bad and you were sick and ... But say you buy the house and you move in and think about Florence, the water heater goes out and you think about Venice, and one thing after another happens and you never scrape up the money when you have the time and the kids come and they marry and go on honeymoons in Italy and you don't know how to tell them that you just can't bear to look at one more photo... So go ahead do whatever it is that you want.
Obviously what you do is buy a load of lottery tickets, win the big prize and the world is your limpet or whatever. Then you can visit everywhere and buy lots of houses. Hasn't worked for me yet, but you might have more luck More seriously, only you can assess the importance of the choice. A short break v a lifetime investment? There's a lot of if's involved there.
Damn that's a good question... And I think I'll side with the others here, I'm not sure any of us can decide for you, it's all about personal priorities... I can hardly even decide for myself on this kind of thing, there's no way I can decide for other people !
House HOUSE HOUSE. If I had the money to get a house I would do it right now. Italy's not going anyway but the chance of a house might. If the house is big enough you could get a temporary lodger to pay for a holiday to Italy.
I guess it depends a little on the housing market in Oz - If it's on an upswing, then now would be a better time to buy - If it is at the top of a swing, now would be a bad time... Personally I'd go for the house though - why pay rent to someone for years, and have bugger all to show for it at the end? Edit: As I can't trype
i side with Mal here honey. A house doesn't tie you down, it is an investment. Yes you have somewhere to call home in the mean time, but when the price is right and you sell, it could be worth 4 or 5 trips to different places (like the man says, Italy isn't going anywhere) plus a new and better house aswell.
HOUSE Best investment we've ever made. Like Victimov8 said, it depends a bit on the market, but it feels so good to pay a mortgage instead of rent. A trip is nice, and I know aussies have this *need* to travel, but like said before, (Ignoring Redneck... heh) Italy isn't going anywhere.
**pictures Ol' Benedict16 in Hawaian shirt and shorts... and of course sandals and knee high socks.** :shock:
LOL, Nate... Did you write that? It made me lough. What I wonder is: How ever can the equivalent of a three week journey, no matter where to, buy you into a house? The market must be a lot different in Australia... On the one side, I keep thinking that if you can buy youself into a house, and it is a good choice -have an expert take a good long look at it, it pays out- that might mean saving money in the long run, because you pay for something that is yours instead of never seeing the money again. You get something for it -in the longer run, the house- instead of paying money for using something for a while. On the other side -and this might not be contradictory- I like Tamyra's approach. The lodger idea is also nice. You live in a student's city, don't you? Do they all live in dorms or equivalents? Exploit somebody! Then, in a few years, make a six week trip and include northern Europe.
Well, I don't know what the market is like in Australia, but a three week spree in italy could cost quite a bit, I know trips to Australia from here are very expensive (understandably so, that's one long flight, isn't it Adele ) So I can easily imagine it could help to pay at least part of a house deposit...
Hsing, I made it up after getting off from work. I shouldn't be allowed to write anything after getting off work. My brain works like a little kid's at that point.
that's a dirty mormon lie, and everyone here knows it. what plaid would ACTUALLY do was talk about going to italy for ages, and then at the last minute cancel all plans and spend the money on something else, then spend the rest of her bloody life complaining about why she didn't go to italy when she had the chance.
Mrrr... I'd probably go on a one-week vacation (instead of 3-weeker), then live on spinach until I saved up the difference required to buy a house . (Or better yet, build a Hobbit Hole, like that Welsh family! )
The wierdest thing was I had the travel channel on when I was replying to Spiky and it was showing a story about a family on a trip to Italy, I want to go there someday, too, so please, pretty please with cheese on top , stand down the nuclear weasels, oh lord Ba.
Erm, I just did an Expedia search for a three-week trip from Sydney to Milan, with a hotel stay, and I got results ranging from only about GBP£1500 to GBP £2700. Those are hardly house-buying numbers(at least, in the UK).
She didn't say she was going to buy a house with it, just make a deposit, here deposits can be anything from 1 to 20% of the house price, depending on the agency, as I said, it may not be the whole sum, but it could be a fair part of a deposit, depending on the price of the house and how things work in Australia... Hang on, why am I arguing, spiky's the one with the money problem
no no, just easily predictible we love you just the way you are, plaid. except for CJ, who has absolutely no interest in you that way. *cough*yeahright*cough*
Average house price in the UK is almost £200,000. The Expedia rates would account to about a 1% deposit, which would mean an extremely high interest rate and/or an extremely long mortgage term. Then again, there are banks here that are selling 40/50 year mortgages, meaning that people are expecting to be able to make mortgage payments when they're retired and living on a pension. edit: I found a recent article that said the average house price in Perth was AU$460,000 in the last 3 quarters of 2006, which translates to about £180,000. Don't know if Perth housing is much more expensive than the rest of Australia, though.
House prices in the UK are stupidly high though, almost everywhere else in the world has cheeper houses.
That is true, around here (and Toulouse is quite a major city) you can find a decent sized house for around 250 to 300 000 €, Expedia has Sydney-Rome 3 week trips around 6000 €*, if you add travel expenses, say around 1000€, you get quite a good amount to deposit on a house... As I said, it depends on the price of the house and on the kind of trip... *sorry, I'm lousy at converting...
As a proportion of income Australian house prices are extremely crazy, the most expensive city is Sydney where the average house price is about AUD500,000 (about 250,000 pounds) but the average income is only AUD35,000 (or about 14,000 pounds). Where I live the average income is about the same but the average house costs a little less (but not by much). If we'd bought 4-5 years ago we'd be cheering cos house prices went up 40% one year and 50% the next. So we'd be rolling in it. Currently the market is fairly stable but there is a lot of demand by first-home buyrs like my partner and I. But its expected prices will rise soon and the rental market is extremely tight with rents going bullistic and a vacancy rate of 0.5%. So if we get kicked out of the property where renting now we'll be in trouble. As to where I spend the money, the money was my portion of the deposit Dave and I have put together. He's saved a bit, his parents are giving us some and summer school is my contribution. Without my contribution we can't afford a loan (because of taxes and fees). With it we'd be borrowing 95% of a loan worth about $400,000, so not small potatoes. We found a house we liked on the internet but we were out offered by someone else who got it for $16,000 above the asking price... So we may never get a house. I think at the moment we are going for the house rather than the trip, being sensible sucks sometimes...Although once we buy a house I'm sure I'll be happy and tell you all about it. *this could possibly be my longest post ever*
Sounds like the housing market in Australia is exactly like it is in the UK. Good decision, Spiky, even though I'm sure you'd have liked to go to Italy - you'll have other chances to go abroad - sometimes your university will even pay for you to go!
