Where do you live and have you lost $ on your home?

Sunflower777

I'm in Michigan and in the 4 years since we've bought our $300,000 home, the value's gone down roughly $70,000. I hope we've bottomed out, but I have no idea... I suppose it could get a little worse before it gets better. 

Where are you and have you lost money on your home?  

camrude

Minnesota. We've lost about $40k

oparcm

I live in MA  (southern Boston suburb) and I bought my house in 2006.  My house value last year had dropped almost 100K.  This year my house is valued the difference is about 45K so we're gaining.  I don't owe as much on this house though because we sold our old house at the same time and we made a boatload on that one and put that into this one.

veloelle

I live in Southern California in the Inland Empire. Yes, our home has lost value, but we are not upside down. We could sell and probably break even.

brightning

AZ. About $20K in 2 yrs.

AggieCouple

LOL, I read that at first as it now being worth $70k.  That would be *quite* a drop.

Houston hasn't really been hit; in fact, the county keeps wanting to raise the appraised values.  Our house value is slightly above what it was when we bought it 4 years ago.  The county keeps attempting to raise it annually, but we contest it every year (for property tax purposes), so we've managed to keep the rise pretty minimal.  

In general, houses are being sold and bought pretty consistently around here, new homes are still being built and purchased, etc, although I do still see empty lots in the newer sections of our neighborhood.  Friends of ours recently sold their house in 2 weeks, and for quite a bit more than what they paid 3 years ago.  

PinkPiano

Indiana here and we have not lost any value thankfully!  We bought our house 6 years ago. 

REOM

Well, my house is valued less than 100K than it was at one point (maybe the beginning of 07?) 

I don't really consider is "money lost" because that was an inflated value, not a true value. We could sell and make a profit, so I am thankful for that. 

AnneUCSB

I live in Northern CA.  We bought our house 6.5 years ago and it has gone UP in value about $200,000

winomom22

Madison, WI. We bought it 2 years ago and it is still assessed for the same amount we bought it for.

DevonPow

We live in Boston (well,  just outside - the city line is about a mile from me). We bought our house 3 years ago and it has gone up in value. About 30K based on our most recent assesment (we just refinanced) and on what the houses in our immediate neighborhood are selling for. We are lucky to live in a specific neighborhood that didn;t experience much of a downturn in the housing market at all - most houses near me are maintaining or increasing, and when they are sold they are on the market for a short amount of time.

Sunflower777

AggieCouple:

LOL, I read that at first as it now being worth $70k.  That would be *quite* a drop. 

Yeah, I would really be crying in my beer if that were the case. Fortunately, we could *possibly* break even if we have to sell soon (which we may, which is what got me thinking about this). But we will have lost the money we worked so hard to save for a down payment, and 4 years worth of mortgage payments. It stings, and yet I know around here, we are better off than many.   

monchichi

I'm in MI as well.  We bought in 2004 for $230,000.  The closest comp we have to ours is $130,000 right now.  Ugh.

lildevil968

Colorado here, and we would lose about $12k.

true_norskie

The value of our house has gone down, no doubt.  But we haven't lost any money because we haven't sold it.  If we stay in it as long as we intend to, we'll most likely sell it at a gain...

In the upper midwest.

shouldbworkin

In SE Mi in a custom built 2 y/o home.  We haven't lost anything, but that doesn't mean much if we went to sell it.  Appraisal value =/= sale value.

AnnapolisLari

We bought our MD house in 2004 for $190K and sold in April for $220K. After all is said and done, we squeaked out $10K profit after owning it for 6 years. I am glad that we were not losing any money. In the current market, it could have happened easily.

We got a great deal on our current place in Ohio ($60K less than the tax value), plus my mom gave us part of our inheritance early, so we have a very small mortgage.

Temp108743750006959

burbs of Philly and we'd probably break even or do a little better

stephsteph77

I live about 20min north of Seattle. We bought our house for $330k, and now it's worth about $275k. We owe $290 so we are upside down. Stupid housing market. We bought it the end of 2007 just before the market went in the toilet.

breezee_bean

We live in Canada, so our enconomy has slowed down a bit, but nothing horribly major.  The housing market is slow and the houses aren't selling as fast right now.

We bought in '05 for 216,000 and we could sell today for about $324,000.  We were extremely lucky to have bought right before the housing market high.  We bought in the fall of '05 and it got super crazy in summer of '06.  You will probably never see a house in our area sell for $216,000 ever again.  

W&J'sMommy

We have a house in MI, purchased 7 years ago for 134,000.  It's been up for short sale since Sept. for 80,000 - no takers

erin1102

We bought a house in south florida at the top of the market in 2005.  Sold it in 2008 at a 10% loss which we considered lucky.  Our realtor told us we should have sold it closer to a 20-25% loss but the lady really wanted it. 

Conversely, we bought this house we currently live in (in tampa, fl) for 60% of it's original asking price.   

Halo79RN

we live on staten island, ny, ny...   we did not buy here (thank GOD we didn't)... a few months after we moved here, the bubble really burst here and even rents started dropping.  we knew we'd be here for 3 years... but unsure if we'd stay (and it doesn't look like we will).  We rent a 3br townhouse (1900 sq ft)... when we moved here, it was valued at $650K... now it's valued at $444K.   The "rich" neighborhood next to ours (3-4 thousand sq ft homes, little yards...  was advertising "starting at $999K" when we moved here... now I saw an ad that says "starting at $699K" for their newer development... but one of the neighbors who live in a big 4000sqft home says the newer developments are slightly smaller... most are 3000sq ft. still.  I know her house value dropped a lot.  

people thought we were nuts for not buying... I thank GOD we didn't ... we would really be stuck here had we bought something.  

JenniC1135

According to zillow, we've lost just over 60K.  But, we've also put 60K or more into the house in remodeling, updating, etc.  So, hopefully that means we'd break even since zillow doesn't know how nice the house is inside.  I certainly hope it doesn't mean we're down a total of 120K!

*itsmepin*

N MS. We are up about 30k. Custom built home in a desirable area.

Our rental is up about 30k as well. We paid 103,000 and it appraised recently at 135,000.

we plan on selling both houses in the next 6 months.

michaeltrish

We bought our previous home for $370k and just short saled it for $195k.  And it at one time was valued over $500k.  Disgusting, huh?

jettagurl

We just bought our current house in Oct 08. We paid about 60% of the appraised value (foreclosure).  We've also done a few things to raise the value (finished basement/fence/added a bathroom) about $30-40K. There are several comps here going for above the appraised value now, so we'd be in great shape, fortunately. 

We're in Indiana.

 

As for our last house, we sold it on land contract in Sept 08. That neighborhood has crashed.  We had it on the market from March 07 - Sept 08 and had a contract at one point where we'd break even, but it got worse, and we'd have lost probably 30% had we done a traditional sale.  The lady on contract now has 5 years to sell it to a 3rd party (and she'll get the profits) or she/her company will buy it.  It's got renters, but we don't deal with them.  I just make sure the payments are getting made (we don't make a dime). 

 

eclaires

We sold our house in August of 2009 and we bought it in April 2005.  We made ~$35k in profit on the house.

I don't think where we were in Indiana took much of a hit, plus our realtor told us that Indiana home values typically don't appreciate the way they do in other, higher COL areas.  We lived in a very desirable area though, so who knows if it's really a COL issue.

We are closing on our new house next week - the appraisal we got from the bank lists it at $30k more than what we are paying.  We also got a good rate and put down a good down payment, so hopefully since we don't plan to move anytime soon we won't be affected in any significant way by the housing market.

A-baybride

We're in L.A. and bought 5 years ago.  Zillow's valuation puts us at $218K less than we paid for it, which puts us just slightly below our current mortgage balance (but closing costs are pretty significant).  That could be off either way, because comps are tough here.  The neighborhood was built in the 50s and the houses are all different, some have never been updated, some have been torn down and rebuilt, some have views, some (like ours) have large lots with a lot of privacy but little usable space because it's on a steep hillside...

Unfortunately, this is very relevant because we're about to move across the country.  So we can either sell at a big loss, or rent it for a smaller, monthly loss.  Sucks.

VandRicky

Wow, I guess Florida has been the hardest hit! People in our neighbourhood that bought during the boom in 2005 for around 450K can only get about 200K now for it!! That's a 250K LOSS

Another friend of mine bought her condo for 250K in 2005 and was able to short sell it for ....80K!!!!

GettinNervous

I bought it 10 years ago, and it is worth 1.5 times what I paid.

4Speedy

We live in SE Michigan.  We paid $685K for our house and it is now worth $442K, according to the appraisal we had done when we got our mortgage modification.  But our house would probably only appeal to a very specific buyer, so I doubt anyone would pay that much.  We have 26 acres and a state of the art, 2-story, heated/humidity controlled 10 car garage.  Our garage is probably worth as much as our house.  Since so many of the big time car guys in the Detroit suburbs are now unemployed, I bet at best, we would get about $300K if we tried to sell.  Thankfully, we put more than 50% down, so we are not upside down.  And we plan to retire in this house, so by then, it should be worth quite a bit, thanks to all the land.  (There's very little undeveloped land in our county--at some point we could split off some property and sell to a developer.)

championmama

My situation is a little different, but we're in KY.  we bought our house from DH's g-ma's estate for just under 200,000 in 2005.  It's 2000 sq. ft.  The family was ready to sell and DH had been living in thehouse since his g-ma died in 1999.  He'd been trying to purchase from the estate for 5 years, but family bickering among other problems kept that from happening.

The house is now a lonely house on a road that at one end is 1/4 mile off of the interstate exit.  On that end is Outback, McDonald's, a Toyota dealership, and 4-5 hotels.  We'll sell for tons more than what we paid, and the family knows that.  We've fulfilled the 2 year requirement to avoid capital gains taxes, but in our purchase contract we agreed to keep it five years, otherwise split profits with certain family members who were against us buying the hosue at the time. 

the house itself is a nice brick ranch home, but we know it'll be torn down.  Buyers are wanting it for the land and they are all fighting for it.  The city did something with the driveway permits for the land next door several years ago, and b/c it can't get driveway access it won't sell until ours does, b/c we have the driveway access.  The person who buys ours also wants next door.  I don't really understand all of that though.

Since we technically bought it from DH's aunt, who was the executor of the estate, and he is her favorite nephew, the opinions of his cousins didn't matter, but to keep it peacful, we agreed to that.  Had I known I'd have 3 kids in under 4 years and have to stay in the house for a while, I wouldn't have thought differently.  But, just 6 more months and we have fulfilled our 5 years and we plan to sell next spring and build.  Just give me a subdivision and a cul-de-sac and I'll never complain again.