When determining if you should rent or buy – you’ll need to look at all the expenses associated with homeownership. Once you have the dollars and cents, you can calculate how many years it will take for you to break-even on buying versus renting.

If you only plan on staying in a home for a few years, it might not be a good investment – but if you plan on staying for five or more – it could be a good move.

The best way to determine your situation is to use a calculator like this one and start playing with difference scenarios.

Here’s what you’ll need:

• An estimated home purchase price
• Current interest rates
• The number of years you want to finance your loan
• Calculate annual property tax
• Home insurance
• Association and maintenance fees estimate
• Select whether you want the report to calculate a monthly or annual estimate
• Down payment and closing costs estimate
• Your monthly rent payment

How to calculate:

• Visit our Rent vs. Buy Calculator
• Plug in your numbers
• Click “Calculate”
• You will receive results for:
  • The number of years it will take to “break even” on your home purchase
  • Home equity vs. Investment graph
  • Monthly payment break-down
  • 10-year projected monthly payments graph

As you start looking into the possibility of buying a home, you can always use our team has a resource – feel free to give us a call and we would be happy to walk you through each scenario: 800-531-3837.