It’s been eight years since I moved in with Jeff, he was living in a two room studio at the time, and we quickly realized that a two room studio wasn’t nearly enough space for the both of us.

At the same time, my parents had decided to invest in a property in the Bronx and one of the apartments was perfect for us! It was just enough space with parking so we took it.

A few years later my parents told us they no longer wanted to keep the home and were going to sell.

We were faced with a decision and had three options.

Option one: we moved into another rental apartment, which at the time would be around $1,700 with parking.

Option two: we explored the idea of purchasing our own home.

Option three: would be to purchase the home from my parents. This would be Jeff’s second purchase. He bought a home a few years before we met and he lost the home in foreclosure which eventually led him to file bankruptcy. (You can imagine that he was extremely skeptical about making the same mistake twice.)

We weren't too crazy about paying rent, so we started looking for a home of our own. We got pre-approved and started the search process. Believe it or not, in 2016 it was a sellers market. We were outbid on two homes that we really liked. It wasn’t until we looked at the number on my parents home that the choice became clear. We decided to purchase my parents home and took out a mortgage for $640,000.

We were scared, nervous, anxious and excited.

I remember like it was yesterday, Jeff and I walked out of the closing and he said to me, “This was a bad idea, how are we going to do this?” It was something I never expected anyone to say after buying a home. The reality was we had agreed to pay a $4,600 mortgage payment every month for the next 30 years of our lives. And although our rental income covered most of our mortgage payment we still had to make sure we picked good tenants, maintained the home, the repairs and all the carrying costs that come with owning a home. We knew it was not going to be simple or easy yet there was something inside my gut that also knew everything was going to be ok. We had each other. And although there have been rocky moments in our ownership journey we have pulled through each and every one.

Today our home is worth well over $640,000. In fact my neighbor recently sold her home for $999,000!

Among all the lessons we have learned with being home owners there are two that stick out the most. With great risk, comes great reward. Had we chosen differently we may not be homeowners today with over 300K in equity in our home. Most importantly we learned that not all bad experiences repeat themselves. Jeff overcame his fear of owning a property, it has been over 4 years and we have never been happier.

I know that buying a home can be scary.

I want to let you know that I am here to help in any way that I can.

Let me ask you, where are you on your journey?

Are you tired of paying rent?

Are you happy with your living situation?

Is there anything you would change if you could?

I would love to learn more about where you are and what you plan to do. So write back to me with your story.

Let's talk soon.

Damaris

​P.S. The picture above is one we took with both of our mothers at our housewarming party!