The decision to buy a home versus rent is one of the biggest a person will make. It wasn\u2019t so long ago that nearly everyone wanted to own a home, but after the housing crash, people haven\u2019t been so sure. N.C. State University economist Mike Walden offers advice.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd … this has been an amazing turnaround. Ten years ago, you couldn\u2019t stop anyone from buying a house. Now people are having questions.<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, there are pluses and minuses, of course, to the decision of whether to own or rent. With owning, of course, you get to live in the space that you own, so you essentially get to do what you want. You get to modify walls, you get to paint, et cetera. <\/em><\/p>\n \u201cAlso, traditionally homeowning has been an investment — averages about a 2 or 3 percent rate of return a year. But, of course, that means the investment can go down. And, of course, people have seen that over the last five or six years, although things have stabilized recently.<\/p>\n \u201cWith renting, of course, you\u2019re flexible. Certainly you have a lease, but after the lease you can leave.<\/p>\n \u201cI go back to the traditional advice I\u2019ve always given people in owning versus rent. I think it really comes down to how long you\u2019re going to stay in the unit. If you think you\u2019re here to stay especially — and by here to stay, I\u2019d say at least five years — I think you should consider owning. I think over a five-year period of time you\u2019re going to recoup, for example, the expenses that you\u2019re putting into the house in terms of buying the house. I think over a five-year period of time now with the housing market, I think, stabilized, you will make money on the house. But if it\u2019s less than five years, I\u2019d strongly consider renting. I just don\u2019t think financial numbers stack up. So, look at that time period and use that five years as a breaking point.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false,"raw":"The decision to buy a home versus rent is one of the biggest a person will make. It wasn\u2019t so long ago that nearly everyone wanted to own a home, but after the housing crash, people haven\u2019t been so sure. N.C. State University economist Mike Walden offers advice.\n\n\u201cAnd ... this has been an amazing turnaround. Ten years ago, you couldn\u2019t stop anyone from buying a house. Now people are having questions.\n\n\u201cWell, there are pluses and minuses, of course, to the decision of whether to own or rent. With owning, of course, you get to live in the space that you own, so you essentially get to do what you want. You get to modify walls, you get to paint, et cetera. <\/em>\n\n\u201cAlso, traditionally homeowning has been an investment -- averages about a 2 or 3 percent rate of return a year. But, of course, that means the investment can go down. And, of course, people have seen that over the last five or six years, although things have stabilized recently.\n\n\u201cWith renting, of course, you\u2019re flexible. Certainly you have a lease, but after the lease you can leave.\n\n\u201cI go back to the traditional advice I\u2019ve always given people in owning versus rent. I think it really comes down to how long you\u2019re going to stay in the unit. If you think you\u2019re here to stay especially -- and by here to stay, I\u2019d say at least five years -- I think you should consider owning. I think over a five-year period of time you\u2019re going to recoup, for example, the expenses that you\u2019re putting into the house in terms of buying the house. I think over a five-year period of time now with the housing market, I think, stabilized, you will make money on the house. But if it\u2019s less than five years, I\u2019d strongly consider renting. I just don\u2019t think financial numbers stack up. So, look at that time period and use that five years as a breaking point.\u201d"},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The decision to buy a home versus rent is one of the biggest a person will make. It wasn\u2019t so long ago that nearly everyone wanted to own a home, but after the housing crash, people haven\u2019t been so sure. N.C. State University economist Mike Walden offers advice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"source":"","ncst_custom_author":"","ncst_show_custom_author":false,"ncst_dynamicHeaderBlockName":"","ncst_dynamicHeaderData":"","ncst_content_audit_freq":"","ncst_content_audit_date":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[],"_ncst_magazine_issue":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-19771","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economic-perspective"],"displayCategory":null,"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19771"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19771"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19771\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19771"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19771"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19771"},{"taxonomy":"_ncst_magazine_issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/_ncst_magazine_issue?post=19771"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=19771"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}