6 Comment

• commonsense February 3, 2017 at 9:30 am

  Once again utterly useless numbers from Zillow, you can tell they’re in website ad revenue business, not real estate business. The ‘break even’ point has been hovering at 5 to 7 years, coincidentally the same amount of time people sell and move on average.
• MrEction February 3, 2017 at 10:23 am

  @commonsense Where are you getting those numbers? I don’t question them, but the term “breakeven” seems to have some variability in what it means. I’m wondering if your definition is different from theirs.
• joel February 3, 2017 at 11:10 am

  How do you cover a 6% realtor commission after less than 2 years and still come out ahead after moving costs and everything? would really love to see the spreadsheet they use for this junk.
• MrEction February 3, 2017 at 12:49 pm

  From what I understand their description of “break even” in this sense is that you have an NPV equal to the cost of renting for the same period. It’s not “break even” in the sense that your NPV is zero (that is the 5-7 year mark commonsense is describing). So moving costs would not be included since they exist in both cases. That’s my guess.
• commonsense February 3, 2017 at 2:32 pm

  @MrErection, what they seem to fail to account for is the huge cost of “getting out” of a house which could be roughly 10% of sales price including 6% Stealertor commissions, title policy, small negotiation discount, tax pro-ration, etc. I’m pretty sure they also fail to account for inevitable maintenance and break/fix costs on an owned property. Also on a mortgage the first couple of years roughly 80% of your payment is interest, as in money down the drain anyway.
• OhBrother February 6, 2017 at 12:01 pm

  The Texas city with the most people has moer traffic than other cities? You don’t say, Urban Edge! I guess they have to fill their fish wrap somehow.