Are You Ready For Home Ownership?

Los Angeles Times blogger Peter Hong offered the following in a recent blog post:

"In many depressed real estate markets, monthly mortgage payments have fallen below average area rents. Rents are falling to narrow the gap, but the National Apartment Association has begun a campaign to make consumers aware of the true costs of home ownership.

The group has put together an "are you ready for home ownership" quiz, filled with the kinds of basic questions seemingly ignored during the housing bubble. Examples: "Do you know how to calculate your debt-to-income ratio?" and "Have you factored in the total costs of owning a home beyond the mortgage payment?"

Perhaps even more useful than the quiz, which in the above link appears on the Indiana Apartment Association's website, are articles on the site that advise potential buyers on the impact of maintenance costs, taxes and 100% financing on long-term home ownership.
Yes, promoting renting is obviously in the interest of landlords, but putting out more information to prevent uninformed home purchases is surely helpful, isn't it ?"

We never thought we'd be agreeing with apartment owners but this financial education project appears to make a lot of sense.

Rental Vacancy Rates Climbing

Rental housing vacancy rates have experienced a sharp increase over the last several months. Nationwide, the vacancy rate stands at 10.1%. Some major cities, however, have rates that work decidedly in tenants' favor. According to the United States Census Bureau, the top ten Metropolitan Statistical Areas with the highest vacancy rates are as follows:

Richmond, VA 23.7%
Dayton, OH 21.7
Detroit, MI 19.9
Memphis, TN 19.6
Phoenix, AZ 19.0
Indianapolis, IN 17.1
Cleveland, OH 16.8
Atlanta, GA 16.1
Las Vegas, NV 16.0
Austin, TX 15.8

If you live in one of these areas it may be time to renegotiate your lease. It certainly looks like you won't need to automatically accept rent increases at the time of renewal. You're in the driver's seat.