gtd2000

Rental rates have climbed very steadily in the past few years.

I couldn't understand colleagues throwing properties back to the bank simply because the value of their homes had fallen off a cliff, just to end up paying double the rate of their mortgage in rental payments with no asset value.

The home that my GF and our two children live in, at Palmer Ranch (Village Walk) has a mortgage payment well below 50% of the going rental rate. The value of the house did drop by about 33% from the high point when the crash came but it was still above the initial purchase price and possibly still above the purchase price, when you factor in past and present values of money.

One of my GF's friends, with a family, had a 750K property that crashed down to 300k. They were paying around $2k per month for the mortgage and moved out and then paid $4k per month for a rental of the same size.. No doubt that property will have recouped a lot of that loss by now....

I wish I could get rental yields of the same percentage on my properties in the UK.

zzrmark

This area is crazy at the moment, we saw our monthly rate jump up by nearly 200 bucks when we renewed the annual contract last August. The rental firm can go swivel if they think we'll be renewing this August!