Quote:
Originally Posted by Tapioca
We live in a 19 year-old townhouse that has a good mix of old and new - overheight ceilings with an open floorplan, but with forced air heating, larger windows, and storage closets. Ideally, I'd want to buy a unit that was built in the same era - rainscreen, no asbestos, modern electrical, PEX plumbing, etc.
Strata fees are not much of a concern as long as the strata is well managed and the owners know where the money is going. The biggest risk that I see is that the changes in the condo insurance market have screwed over a lot of strata corporations, despite the fact that there are very different risks for each complex based on what they are (high-rise vs low-rise, contingency fund, claims history, etc.). That's kind of why we're looking to get out of a strata property and into a non-strata rowhome, detached house, or at last resort, a non-conforming strata duplex which is likely not subject to the same chaos in the condo insurance market as other strata-titled properties.
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Our biggest concern is the clusterfuck that is strata insurance right now. There is another hike for the 2020-2021 renew?
The problem is we aren't at the income or equity level where we can move into a house, and house comes with it's own issues. Wife is also on mat leave still and we can't make any moves until at least she's back to work, our son is in daycare, and our finances have settled down.
We live in a 1300sqft town house. We thought it was way too much space when we moved in. Now with one kid and two cats, I was already feeling like I need another few hundred sqft. With the shift towards working from home as well, we don't have enough space. Ditto when wife is back to work next March and we'll likely be both working at home lots. We are both in very meeting heavy jobs and we'll be fighting for quiet space.
Our monthly house expenses average to roughly ~2200, including all the utilities and property taxes etc. But being a car enthusiast, my car payment is the same as our mortgage payment
Getting rid of my car has been an ongoing discussion, actually from me and not my wife. She doesn't think I should get rid of it because she thinks I will get something even more expensive down the road
We can see ourselves being able to afford 1.5m, maybe 1.8m on a stretch for an upgrade in a few years before our son starts kindergarten. However we've been talking to a friend who's a public school teacher, and she's sending her kids to private school cause she personally thinks the current school system is messed up.
I've been very pro public school but her reasoning has had me thinking. Private school expense is/was not something I was thinking about until last night.
It does seem oddly true that the typical RS crew is not the typical Vancouverite. So many 6 figure earners on here.