Co-Ownership

Sorry to be late in the day with this, but I had some real work to do. The nerve of them, making me push back my blogging time!!!

Anyway, I promised a discussion topic, which is kind of going to stretch over two days. Today I will outline some of it, and then I will collect everyone’s opinions, write my own tomorrow and then get responses to that. Kabish?

The subject involves a back story (shocker, huh?). We graduated from college in May of 2005. Smoking Hot Roommate bought a run-down condo in February and had it rehabbed, and we moved in right after school (well, I ended up staying in Chicago for a month or so to deal with dying Mom and stuff related).

The condo is really great…it is three bedrooms, two bathrooms, about 1,600 square feet in one of the best locations you can imagine. It is within about 100 yards of Boston Common (the State House end, for the locals) and is about a quarter of a mile from Munchkin’s school and my work. It is also within a very short walk of both Papa Bear and Big Sis’ places.

In October of this year, we moved…right around the corner. The place we live now is much bigger (3,000 sq. ft., 5 or 6 bedrooms, depending on what you count as a bedroom). This is most definitely the kind of “home” that Smoking Hot Roommate could conceivably live in for a very long time. Meanwhile, she kept the old place and her fiancée, The Rocket Scientist, currently lives there with a friend of his. The plan is that eventually Munchkin and I will move back there and he will move in here. The timetable on that is up to Smoking Hot Roommate.

Well, after I got a big bonus earlier this month, I set myself a long-term goal: I wanna buy our old apartment from Smoking Hot Roommate. I know she would let me live there forever and pay her not nearly the rent that the place is worth, but that is not the point. I would love to be independent enough to be able to buy my very own super-fabulous pad, and to be able to assure Munchkin that she will be in one place for the foreseeable future. Since that apartment is in the absolute ideal spot (and holds some sentimental value), I would love to figure out a way to buy it.

Now, the caveat…if I really want to buy it for what it is worth, I am gonna need a LOT more money than I currently have;-) Not only would I need to save a lot more, but I would need to make a lot more.

But…the more I thought about it, the more I realized that it wouldn’t just be me. This is likely a 2-3 year idea (at best) at which point I could very well not be making this kind of a purchase on my own. And, I mentioned this to The Boy in passing last week, and he was pretty much in agreement on the long term plan (like where, and in what kind of place he would want to live…no white picket fences and back yards for either of us.)

So, the question is…at what point is it ok for people to buy a house as part of a relationship? Clearly, it brings with it significant legal issues, in addition to financial and interpersonal issues. How do you reconcile differences in assets and income and all that stuff? Should you wait until you are ready to combine ALL of your finances before you should think about combining this largest part of them? How much of the decision is financial and how much is personal? Is there room for both?

And no, we are not thinking about actually doing this anytime soon, but I am just thinking about when might be the right time. (Ignore Munchkin for the time being…I am interested in people’s opinions in the absence of children…we will deal with kids tomorrow.) I think there are times when people move in together for reasons like “Our leases were both up, so we figured ‘What the Heck’?” I have sort of an open-ended arrangement, and The Boy owns his place already, so we will fortunately be on our own timetable.

Anyway, that is my subject for the day…fire away.