Thoughts On Home Buying
I've been doing a lot of thinking as of late about my living situation. Lately, I've been tooling around the Internet looking at real estate stuff...well, it's more like homes for sale. Seems like a lot of houses are fairly cheap enough these days that it would be much cheaper for me to buy a house than to keep on renting apartments (I'm sure everyone is thinking, "what took you so long to come to this conclusion, Al). There are a few of my friends that already own their own homes right now (one in Normandy and one in St. Charles), and from what I gather it's much cheaper living for them (I don't know off hand I, I haven't asked them). Here's the thing for me. If I were to buy a house, I'd rather not live in Missouri at all. As most people know, I severely dislike Missouri and really want to get out of the state. So that would mean that I would quit school and my job and just relocate somewhere to buy a house, right? Well, not quite. Luckily for me, there's always Illinois.
For those that don't remember or don't know, at one point in my life I have lived in northern Illinois in a small town called Freeport and worked there for the railroad (this was back in 2K3)...but only for a month. Still that one month gave me a good respect for the state, and eversince then I've always wanted to move back. I think if I play my cards right, I might do that when my lease expires next year. Let me explain: when I said I was tooling around the Internet at real estate stuff, I was mainly looking at house prices in the Illinois suburbs. From the looks of things, there are some fairly reasonable ones located in village of Cahokia...foreclosures from the looks of it. Now my St. Louis friends are probably going to ask me, "why Cahokia?" Well, it's because it's a small town and I'm more akin to small towns and suburbs than I am a big city (which explains why I don't like living in the city of St. Louis). I just like the feel of a small to mid-sized municipality than I do a big city. I think if I were to move anywhere else that was a part of a big metropolitan area, I would choose a suburb to reside in than the big city itself. However, I don't really know too much about the area of Cahokia off the bat. The guy who runs the Anime meet-up that I go to every other Friday lives in Cahokia (actually in a trailer park off IL-3), but I haven't asked him what it's like to live over there. I probably won't either because I'd rather see for myself. Before I moved into my apartment in Affton, I drove around the neighborhood to see what it was generally like sos to see if I would be willing to stay there for a year. That's how I operate...actually going to the potential living place in question and seeing for myself what the neighborhood is like. I also look up online statistics to get a general idea of crime rates and safeness of the potential living place. From what I've read, Cahokia isn't too bad. It did have a bad crime rate ten years ago, but that number dropped significantly in recent years. The village is pretty much diverse in a few ways, and there are a good deal of businesses around that I can be able to do business with. I do my research, people. Don't think that I don't.
Anyway, I'm getting off track here. Point is since real estate is not too fairly bad for that area, maybe I should start saving money to put down on a house in Cahokia, considering the market is still the same come next year. I want to keep in the price range of about $20,000 to maybe $50,000. Anything under $20K would not even be worth the investment. What I'd really like is something for me to work on or fix up, but not where it requires a lot of time, energy, and money. While I'm considering all my options, I'm going to do some more research over my four day weekend this coming weekend: checking out the areas where the houses are and asking realtors about properties and finding out things that I need to do in order to start saving up for a house. I really would like to own a house at some point, and to get something like a starter house...nothing too fancy, just a nice small house...would pretty much be ideal for me. And I get to stay in the St. Louis area while I finish college and keep my job at the same time. I'm hoping I can learn something out of this coming weekend because I think I'm ready to take that next level.
For those that don't remember or don't know, at one point in my life I have lived in northern Illinois in a small town called Freeport and worked there for the railroad (this was back in 2K3)...but only for a month. Still that one month gave me a good respect for the state, and eversince then I've always wanted to move back. I think if I play my cards right, I might do that when my lease expires next year. Let me explain: when I said I was tooling around the Internet at real estate stuff, I was mainly looking at house prices in the Illinois suburbs. From the looks of things, there are some fairly reasonable ones located in village of Cahokia...foreclosures from the looks of it. Now my St. Louis friends are probably going to ask me, "why Cahokia?" Well, it's because it's a small town and I'm more akin to small towns and suburbs than I am a big city (which explains why I don't like living in the city of St. Louis). I just like the feel of a small to mid-sized municipality than I do a big city. I think if I were to move anywhere else that was a part of a big metropolitan area, I would choose a suburb to reside in than the big city itself. However, I don't really know too much about the area of Cahokia off the bat. The guy who runs the Anime meet-up that I go to every other Friday lives in Cahokia (actually in a trailer park off IL-3), but I haven't asked him what it's like to live over there. I probably won't either because I'd rather see for myself. Before I moved into my apartment in Affton, I drove around the neighborhood to see what it was generally like sos to see if I would be willing to stay there for a year. That's how I operate...actually going to the potential living place in question and seeing for myself what the neighborhood is like. I also look up online statistics to get a general idea of crime rates and safeness of the potential living place. From what I've read, Cahokia isn't too bad. It did have a bad crime rate ten years ago, but that number dropped significantly in recent years. The village is pretty much diverse in a few ways, and there are a good deal of businesses around that I can be able to do business with. I do my research, people. Don't think that I don't.
Anyway, I'm getting off track here. Point is since real estate is not too fairly bad for that area, maybe I should start saving money to put down on a house in Cahokia, considering the market is still the same come next year. I want to keep in the price range of about $20,000 to maybe $50,000. Anything under $20K would not even be worth the investment. What I'd really like is something for me to work on or fix up, but not where it requires a lot of time, energy, and money. While I'm considering all my options, I'm going to do some more research over my four day weekend this coming weekend: checking out the areas where the houses are and asking realtors about properties and finding out things that I need to do in order to start saving up for a house. I really would like to own a house at some point, and to get something like a starter house...nothing too fancy, just a nice small house...would pretty much be ideal for me. And I get to stay in the St. Louis area while I finish college and keep my job at the same time. I'm hoping I can learn something out of this coming weekend because I think I'm ready to take that next level.