Should You Rent Or Buy An Apartment?

There is no vantage point like the apartment next door for keeping track of the neighbors.

When they come and go; who comes and goes with them, and at what awful hours, and what disgraceful things they do.

Of course, it is well to remember that when you look in a goldfish bowl, the fish also look at you.

All kidding aside, for families where both the husband and wife have steady, full-time jobs in business or industry, where they both work so hard that they don't have time or energy enough left to keep up a house, they are surely better off in an apartment, as it does save work and responsibility.

If a house is just a place to sleep, a place in which to eat a hurried breakfast, and a starting point from which to rush off to work, a place to return to after a late show, to tumble into bed, and to get a little sleep before another hurried breakfast, then off to the rat race again for another day, and a repetition of the same routine, then do not buy or build a house.

By all means rent an apartment; it will save you work and worry and will fit your needs much better.

One way to get luxury living without having to own and service all the features yourself is to buy an apartment in a group where the apartments are individually owned, but the swimming pool, tenni3 courts, barbecue, and other recreational facilities are owned cooperatively by the group of people living in the apartments.

An individual family might find it too expensive to maintain a swimming pool, for one or two uses a week, but it wouldn't cost too much, in either money or effort for a group of fifty people to keep up a pool.

Renting a House

But an apartment house is obviously not the place for a family with children. It is a poor emotional climate for them, when they must always be quiet so as not to disturb the neighbors, and when they have little opportunity to get outdoors and run and exercise, and shout as they ought to be able to do.

If they must always be afraid of getting in someone's hair, how can they grow up normally and naturally? Life can be so much more interesting for them if they can be in a place where there are trees to climb, pets to love and care for, and where they can feel that these things belong to them. A public park helps, but it is not nearly as good as a place of their own.

If you think an apartment is not the best place for you to live, perhaps you can find a house to rent. This also has its advantages and disadvantages. You are not tied quite so securely to one place.

If you are not too sure how long you will be in a place, or are subject to sudden transfers by the policy or caprice of your company, or if you are the type that takes sudden notions to quit and try your luck somewhere else, then you should rent, and not try to buy or build a house.

Renting also has the advantage of relieving you of some of the responsibilities that go with owning a home. When the roof leaks, just call up the landlord and ask him to take care of it. If you need paint or repairs, let him look after it, and pay the bill.

When the tax collector comes around, it is not your problem. You do not need to worry about depreciation. If your family outgrows a house, you can move into a larger one without too much trouble and expense.

It is well to remember that money paid out in rent is gone completely. If you had bought the house ten years ago, and had made rent-like payments for ten years, you would have accumulated a considerable equity in the house, and you would also have benefited from the large increase in property values during that same period. Buying a house gives you something to sell when the time comes to move.

There is not much point in having a house and land, if you do not find pleasure and enjoyment in taking care of it.

If the yard is so large as to be a burden to either the husband or the wife, then they would be better off without quite so much. As long as maintaining a house and garden can be fun, all is well, but what future is there in having to work yourself to death in order to live in fine surroundings which you do not have time to appreciate?

Enough is enough. There are two extremes to avoid a spacious house and wide-spreading lawns, or a tiny house and no lawn or garden. Let's not overdo it either way.

If you would rather buy than rent make sure you use a mortgage calculator to get the best mortgage available.