I know, I know - Ms. Rentypants just bought a house!
Hey, I have never said that owning was a bad idea if the numbers were right!
We got way ahead financially by living cheaply and renting, but to maintain our current lifestyle (particularly in the inner city neighbourhoods that we like), renting a whole house was going to be on par with, if not more than, a mortgage payment. And when we went out looking, we were very pleasantly surprised to see how much prices had fallen over the past couple of years. We can actually afford this. Truly afford it. And the house was renovated quite recently, so not much to anticipate in the way of maintenance for a few years.
I think the biggest financial vulnerability right now is how low interest rates are. We used the mortgage calculators and were pretty freaked out by how much more $$/month even a 2% interest rate rise would have on our payments. So we are planning to go gangbusters on paying off the principle over the next 5 years, just to put ourselves in a better position at renewal time.
Yes, I am totally freaked by owing a bank that much money, but I'm excited by the amount of space we are going to have to ourselves. And by the dishwasher. Oh that beautiful, beautiful dishwasher.
Just need to get through that inspection tomorrow.