carranza2,
What to do? I like my neighbors and my neighborhood, it's closeness to where I work (7-11 minute commute), but I do have too much room.
Plus, having seen the stock market bubble pop, I fear that the next one to go kaput will be real estate bubble.
What are the demographics of your geographic area? Are jobs plentiful to support prospective home buyers? Are those jobs sufficiently rewarding to the employee, enough so that it might justify their purchase of your home? Are you willing to carry some of their mortgage burden should you decide to sell?
If the housing market in your area continues to boom, would you suffer seller's remorse? How would a longer commute to work affect your lifestyle? Your family member's lifestyles? Could you purchase something equally nice for less cash? If you elected to put cash in your pocket that would otherwise be equity in your home, can you successfully invest it so that the mortgage interest payments combined with tax savings would be significantly less than your investment returns, so that you are not needlessly undertaking investment risk for a disproportionate return?
Should there actually be a housing bubble in your area, and that bubble collapses, in the event you had sold, would you repurchase once the air was out of the bubble? Should you still be in your current home and not have sold into a bubble, would you regret your decision to not have sold when you had the opportunity to do so?
Selling and moving involves turmoil for the entire family, from you to your spouse to your children, even to your pets. Would any possible monetary gains offset this turmoil? Would you lose some "roots" by relocating?
These are questions that only you can answer. The answers do not belong on this thread. The answers are for you and you alone. You can fudge the answers if you so desire, but you cheat no one but yourself by answering with anything less than total candor. And of course, the answers from other family members may differ significantly from your own.
Good luck on your decision. And remember, no matter what your final decision, at some point in time with retrospective thinking, a different decision will always look better...
KJC |
