A place of my own
I’ve recently become enamored with the idea of buying a home. Prospective home buyers are about the only people who stand to gain anything from the current state of the market. The more the financial analysts and politicians come to realize we are ankle deep in a recession already, the more they panic. Cut a rate here, let inventory rest there. It’s very enticing to a person in my position, someone who technically can afford such a venture, at least on paper, and someone who might have well enough credit to secure a loan.
One cold dark night last month, while I fetched my mail, my landlord materialized in the bushes and shrubbery surrounding my apartment. We’re on good terms, him and I, whenever we run into each other on the street a brief conversation follows. This night he spoke in a somewhat detached manner. “You ever think about buying a house, Chris?”
The truthful response was that I just wanted a new apartment, period. I spent more time imagining whether I’d be better suited to a porch or a deck, than weighing in on the rent vs own argument. But right then, in the cold night air, my brain clicked to a realization: most houses have porches and decks. I told him I wouldn’t mind a place in Hampden.
“You know I’m doing real estate now?”
No.
“You know that you’re probably never going to see a rate this low again? Five and a half percent?”
I blurted out ‘that less than the interest rate on my car’, as it came to me. I even thumbed toward my Honda for visual emphasis. He might be proven wrong in his assertation, since the fed’s last dramatic rate cut did close to nothing to stave off the recession the powers that be are again openly musing cutting rates even lower.
He’s sending me periodic updates on homes for sale in the general vicinity. I don’t mind but it piques my interest. I can imagine myself living in one of the homes, setting up furniture and televisions. I end up anxious, ready to call up a bank to gauge my credit and see if I can just jump right in.
It takes just a simple conversation to wean me off the notion. Last time it was Bosma who cautioned that a home would be a thirty year investment. I mean there’s no guarantee that property in Baltimore City will ever reach 2006 values again, let alone surpass them. The more I think about it, the more I might still be suited better for apartment living. I mean that’s a dangerous mindset to be in, wanting to buy a house for the fuck of it. I’m not guaranteed a thirty year position and it will take constant work to pay on the thing. One day you snap to attention and realize you’ve been working for twenty straight years. You find, to your shock, that you now have teenagers that share your surname, each with ambitions twinkling in their eyes. You buy a car, you put a deck on your house, wear sportscoats and go bars for a few weeks. Etc…
Other than all that, I'm trying not to be too optimistic about the next election, but it's not easy. Politics is an ugly and meaningful extension and mirror of Hollywood, and is at least as interesting once you realize that it's your dime these people are living on, and I try to keep up. I' m trying to convince myself that there's a real person in Obama's skin and Hillary's not evil and that I'm giving both a fair shake.
It's also been fun to read the New York Times and Washington Post editorials and see how loyalties have shifted over the duration of the election cycle.
One cold dark night last month, while I fetched my mail, my landlord materialized in the bushes and shrubbery surrounding my apartment. We’re on good terms, him and I, whenever we run into each other on the street a brief conversation follows. This night he spoke in a somewhat detached manner. “You ever think about buying a house, Chris?”
The truthful response was that I just wanted a new apartment, period. I spent more time imagining whether I’d be better suited to a porch or a deck, than weighing in on the rent vs own argument. But right then, in the cold night air, my brain clicked to a realization: most houses have porches and decks. I told him I wouldn’t mind a place in Hampden.
“You know I’m doing real estate now?”
No.
“You know that you’re probably never going to see a rate this low again? Five and a half percent?”
I blurted out ‘that less than the interest rate on my car’, as it came to me. I even thumbed toward my Honda for visual emphasis. He might be proven wrong in his assertation, since the fed’s last dramatic rate cut did close to nothing to stave off the recession the powers that be are again openly musing cutting rates even lower.
He’s sending me periodic updates on homes for sale in the general vicinity. I don’t mind but it piques my interest. I can imagine myself living in one of the homes, setting up furniture and televisions. I end up anxious, ready to call up a bank to gauge my credit and see if I can just jump right in.
It takes just a simple conversation to wean me off the notion. Last time it was Bosma who cautioned that a home would be a thirty year investment. I mean there’s no guarantee that property in Baltimore City will ever reach 2006 values again, let alone surpass them. The more I think about it, the more I might still be suited better for apartment living. I mean that’s a dangerous mindset to be in, wanting to buy a house for the fuck of it. I’m not guaranteed a thirty year position and it will take constant work to pay on the thing. One day you snap to attention and realize you’ve been working for twenty straight years. You find, to your shock, that you now have teenagers that share your surname, each with ambitions twinkling in their eyes. You buy a car, you put a deck on your house, wear sportscoats and go bars for a few weeks. Etc…
Other than all that, I'm trying not to be too optimistic about the next election, but it's not easy. Politics is an ugly and meaningful extension and mirror of Hollywood, and is at least as interesting once you realize that it's your dime these people are living on, and I try to keep up. I' m trying to convince myself that there's a real person in Obama's skin and Hillary's not evil and that I'm giving both a fair shake.
It's also been fun to read the New York Times and Washington Post editorials and see how loyalties have shifted over the duration of the election cycle.