digbydog

You might want to think twice about buying a house that backs onto a school. For you it might be no problem but when you come to sell it can be a big problem for a lot of potential buyers.

As you know it is a buyers market so choose a location wisely and drive a hard bargain. Your advantage is you have time to choose the best house - dont rush into anything. There is absolutely no reason to have pressure on closing quickly.

Remember a house is like food and clothes - it is an essential not an investment vehicle. Might be worth getting out of your condo now and take the hit. Remember in this type of market if you can rent for cheaper than buying then rent for the time being, save the difference and make a move when things look a bit better.

Good luck

Duncan Roberts

I thought the same but for whatever reason it's a huge selling point here. In new neighborhoods that back up to a school those lots are some of the first to go and the houses sell quicker. Our realtor said that if you have kids the appeal of a school and it's fields in walking distance is a massive appeal. The example was having a baseball diamond in your back yard. I can't think of anything worse than backing directly up to a school but it seems that I am in the minority.

We have the new house lined up and it is a fantastic deal. I'm going to see what the builder can do regarding closing but it won't be anytime before December.

Giantaxe

If no houses have sold "properly" for that long then foreclosures etc are the market in your area. As such, why wouldn't they be comparable and influence what buyers are willing to offer you? Unless those properties were in materially worse condition than yours, they probably do currently indicate the likely market value of your place.

Duncan Roberts

You hit the nail. Two of the 3 hadn't had any real work done on them since they were built in 1970, were owned by the same couple who died who had put a door connecting the two together and the other had to have all the flooring ripped out and some other major things done before it was move in ready, I think about $23,000 of work all told. There is another development in our neighbor hood that have 2 bed, no garage 1000 sqft condos, their comps are the same as ours. It doesn't take a genius to see that something isn't quite right when on the same street you have such a vast difference in properties but similar comps.

Pharrya

I'd take the hit, if you can afford it - sometimes it's better just to cut your losses. You're getting a nice new place significantly undervalued, but selling something that's the same.

Getting the new place I would have thought you'd get a better interest rate on the mortgage.

Besides, as most have implied, it's not just a house - it's a home, and being happy someplace is not something you can do with comps etc.

made of kent

I'd take the hit as well, in fact I did £47,000 on the brought price and we had done a lot of up dating in the 3 yrs there, kitchen, bathrooms ect, approx £30,000 obviously this was our UK house, but the stress it was causing me and my husband was not worth any amount of money, and to rent it out, we would have had to have supplemented the mortgage, not to mention the £6,000+ redemption fee! which we didn't have! we finally sold 2 months ago, and came out with £4000ish because we had a 40% morgage and the money we got covered this (thank god) and by the sounds of it you have work to do? will that work cost more or less than $1000.
As for being near a school, everyone is different, my parents last house was near a primary school and my second house was as well and I used to like hearing the kids playing (this was before kids) but others will hate it, each to his own.
Good luck

MsElui

id prolly go for it too. it sounds like the condos in your area dont sell often so you could be stuck with it a long time if you let this offer pass by.