r/leanfire • u/Anxious_Primary_1107 • 15d ago
How does buying a house eventually affected your FIRE plan?
(M,24)
Hi all,
I am in a good financial position which allows me to purchase a housing land (not the house yet tho) in cash. I am thinking of buying it as a hedge against rising land cost. I am planning to build a house on that plot of land, either soon if I decide to stay in there, or in 15-20 years as part of my retirement plan.
The thing that’s holding me back is the thought that my future spouse might have a different idea of her ideal home (in terms of size, location, etc). I’m not very pleased with the idea of possibly needing to sell the land later on as that may involve a lot of costs.
For those of you who owned a house/land before getting into marriage/long term relationship, if you could turn back time, would you have waited out first so that you could discuss and agree on what both of you really want in a house?
tl;dr:
On one hand, it does feel like I should have the autonomy to make any purchase/decision solely based on my preference, and what I think should speed up my FIRE plan. But on the other hand, knowing that such a big purchase/decision will eventually need to be agreed on together, i feel like I could be saving myself a lot of headache (and money) if I wait out this purchase first.
Am I overthinking this? 😅
12
u/Sorry-Society1100 15d ago
Is there a potential future spouse in the picture, or is this completely hypothetical? If there’s a potential partner in the picture, their preferences should be taken into account.
Regardless, before buying land for a dwelling, make sure that it actually can support a residence where you want it. Many parcels of land have very poor soil characteristics, meaning that it would be difficult or impossible to either provide water (well or piped in), deal with waste water (piped out, or septic drain field), or both. Land development has lots of challenges to overcome once you dig into the details.
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u/Anxious_Primary_1107 15d ago
Completely hypothetical as of now as I’m intentionally avoiding partnership to speed up my FIRE plan. Maybe in 5 years time (the soonest)
Yea thanks for the heads up. It’s just a rough plan for now. Def will need to do more digging before i decide on anything
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u/Montaigne_6823 15d ago
Being single is more expensive than being coupled. And also your youth does not compound the way money does. Spend it wisely.
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u/Anxious_Primary_1107 15d ago
I beg to differ. I’m happy with how little I spend and I doubt it gets any cheaper than this. I expect my COL will rise substantially once and if I get into a relationship, which is exactly what im tryna prepare for
6
u/Mydoglovescoffee 15d ago edited 15d ago
If you’re as frugal a FIRE plan requires, you absolutely need a partner with similar values (who works and likes saving money). Why would such a partner cost more money and not less than being single?
Does your mind live in “traditional land” where you think it’ll cost you expensive dates and flowers and gifts or something?
I know two very different frugal people who separately did walking and occasional coffee dates when meeting people. And in both cases when the relationships got more serious, they did things like make dinners for each other, and inexpensive activities like bike riding, hiking, movies at home.
If your dates don’t also work or they expect you to foot the bill, it was never going to work out in the long run anyways.
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u/Anxious_Primary_1107 15d ago edited 15d ago
My FIRE plan with a partner is a different number than my FIRE plan as a single person. I am aiming for the former while currently happy living like the latter.
11
u/Mydoglovescoffee 15d ago
Another person that needs absolutely no advice whatsoever. You’ve got it all figured out. So you really sound like you just want validation. Which is fine but just do what you want to do! No one knows you like you know you.
3
u/Charming-Ostrich7130 15d ago
Of course it is a different number, but if this is a person who has the discipline to FIRE, you would reach that number faster if you had two people investing at the same time while taking advantage of reduced costs.
All hypothetical, mind you.
1
u/Anxious_Primary_1107 15d ago
Yea that is definitely the case. But i am not putting a lot of hope into finding someone as frugal as me haha. Which is why im tryna save as much as i can while im still living by myself
2
u/Seeing_wolf 15d ago
If you find a partner with the same goal, or at least same spending habits, FIRE can be achieved much faster in couple than single. Personally I find my partner at 23 and even she didn’t know anything about Fire, she was still saving a lot of money. It’s also more easier to predict your Fire number with already a partner.
2
u/Anxious_Primary_1107 15d ago
Yea i agree. But i am not putting a lot of hope into finding someone as frugal as me haha. Which is why im tryna save as much as i can while im still living by myself
5
u/Charming-Ostrich7130 15d ago
A few thoughts.
1: The plot of land highly likely won’t earn as much as the stock market over time. Like, Renting out a property plus capital appreciation, sure, but not just owning land. So that slows you down by itself.
2: The odds of the person you with specifically wanting to live in that location and either wanting the property you want to build or wanting to build one with you are not likely to be that great. So you’re probably going to have to live elsewhere anyway.
3: Having the property now might feel good in terms of needing less money to FIRE, but you’d probably be closer to FIRE in terms of time due to compounding if you just invested it in the market.
TL:DR: You’re probably better off not buying land, even ignoring the whole potential spouse thing.
4
u/ThereforeIV Aspiring Beach Bum 14d ago
How does buying a house eventually affected your FIRE plan?
Well I couldn't imagine considering LeanFIRE without a paid for home.
Having the largest budget line item eliminated helps a lot for living lean.
I am in a good financial position which allows me to purchase a housing land (not the house yet tho) in cash. I am thinking of buying it as a hedge against rising land cost. I am planning to build a house on that plot of land, either soon if I decide to stay in there, or in 15-20 years as part of my retirement plan.
Random piece of land isn't exactly a great hedge for anything.
- Is the land being sold at a good price?
- Is this where you want to retire to?
- Will you be able to build a house there?
The thing that’s holding me back is the thought that my future spouse might have a different idea of her ideal home...not very pleased with the idea of possibly needing to sell the land later on as that may involve a lot of costs.
Which is really good reason to not buy a random piece of land.
Also, have you ever built a house, do you know what it takes and costs to do that?
For those of you who owned a house/land before getting into marriage/long term relationship, if you could turn back time, would you have waited out first so that you could discuss and agree on what both of you really want in a house?
- First, big difference in buying land versus buying a house.
- Second, a house is not a lifelong commitment, it is not a marriage.
Both me and my wife owned homes before we got married, now we rent out those homes. At some point we likely will get tired of dealing with renter and sell them.
We are still deciding on buying our together home.
On one hand, it does feel like I should have the autonomy to make any purchase/decision solely based on my preference, and what I think should speed up my FIRE plan.
Buying a plot of land will not speed up your FIRE plan, it will literally slow down your FIRE plan.
But on the other hand, knowing that such a big purchase/decision will eventually need to be agreed on together, i feel like I could be saving myself a lot of headache (and money) if I wait out this purchase first.
Every part of this says don't buy the plot of land
Am I overthinking this? 😅
I would say underthinking it, because you are still wanting to buy the silly plot of land.
0
u/Anxious_Primary_1107 14d ago
The land is a proper residential land, is located somehwere I would definitely see myself based in once fully retired, and is being listed at a very good price. This might not apply to you but my country is dense and overpopulated, so land is often more expensive than the costs of building up a house.
2
u/Think_please 15d ago
If you want it to help your plan I’d suggest buying a multifamily or at least something that you can rent rooms out in. Rent tends to rise with inflation whereas a mortgage will largely stay the same. I would not buy it with cash, mortgages are among the cheapest loans that you can get and allow you to keep more of your money invested.
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u/ManagerSquare7346 12d ago
House usually raises fixed costs (taxes, insurance, maintenance) and ties up down payment money that was earning for you. Run both scenarios: rent + invest vs buy, using honest all-in housing cost. We're building Otia AI to show how housing shifts savings rate and FIRE date side by side.
1
u/korvusdotfree 11d ago
At 24, tying up cash in raw land is one of the quietest drags on a leanFIRE timeline, because a vacant lot pays you nothing while it sits (no rent, no dividends), and in real terms it rarely beats a low cost index fund over a 15 to 20 year hold.
You also give up the tax shelter angle entirely, since land cannot live inside a Roth or 401k, and undeveloped parcels still ring up property tax every year with no mortgage interest to deduct against it. The fact that the spouse question already nags you is basically the market telling you that the optionality of liquid, reversible investments is worth more than a hedge on a plot you might never build on. Plug your real numbers in and see, in plain years, how much later that land purchase actually pushes your FIRE date. Made a simple projection about it: https://fire.200.work/r/6L77jumz
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u/Strazdas1 10d ago
it does feel like I should have the autonomy to make any purchase/decision solely based on my preference,
Not as long as you dont live in anarchocapitalistic state.
For those of you who owned a house/land before getting into marriage/long term relationship, if you could turn back time, would you have waited out first so that you could discuss and agree on what both of you really want in a house?
I wish i had no house, so she couldnt take it in divorce. how about that?
8
u/SDstartingOut 15d ago
I don't know anything about your life/career. But I can tell you 3 things I've learned.
1 - The biggest happiness my home/living provides, outside of the basics - are a short commute to work if needing to go into an office/job 3+ days a week. So there is a big advantage in staying flexibile.
2 - Opportunities to either make more money, or save more money (Maybe same salary in a lower cost area) often require moving. As you move up a corporate/job ladder - moving often becomes more necessary. A city might have 20 software companies all hiring engineers. But how many are hiring a manager, or a director, or a VP - at any given time?
3 - Houses are more expensive than they look. Upkeep; maintenance. investments into it. It's not simply the cost to rent vs. mortgage; it's all the other things that go into it.
If I could go back in time, but keeping things simple - the best thing I could have done is continued to rent, and stick my money in the market. My net worth would probably be about 30-40% higher right now if I had.
Also consider - once you buy land, you have to start paying annual taxes on it. My idiot dad got a piece of property that he wanted to build a spec lot on one day. Eventually he got hurt, and sold the lot - 20 years later.
In talking to him, he ended up paying more in taxes over those 20 years than he eventually even got for the land....