Being a homeowner
Last Friday we finally completed the purchase of our apartment.
Since both DW and I have been pretty much always on the move, and we are about to leave again (first to eastern Italy in Trieste, then probably in a year or so to Asia), the idea was to purchase a small, low maintenance place in or around our hometown Como.
We ended up buying a newly built apartment, constructed in what used to be a farmhouse or something similar: they kept the outside shell, and re did everything inside.
It is located on the hills around the city, no more than 15 minutes by bus to the city center.
Our apartment windows are the one with the small balcony and the one to its right.
We will not be living there, and while this may seem like an idiotic purchase, there are a few reasons for it.
First, both our families are there, my wife’s sister is there, and both my sisters aren’t far either: one lives in Milan, the other in Switzerland not far from the Italian border.
Wherever we end up in the future, this will be the one area where we will always have an attachment.
It was also a “wealth management” decision.
First of all, the italian real estate market is very low outside of the cities, so it’s not a bad time to buy.
Secondly, I am now in a phase where I also start to think in terms of downside minimization instead of upside maximization only.
Having a small, paid for in full, new apartment means that in case of an unfortunate event (job loss, terrible recession, etc), we would be able to survive* by moving there, without a job of any sorts, with approximately half of the current dividend income from my stock holdings.
I really wanted it to be new because it should mean a good decade or two without need for major maintenance.
*by survive I mean: putting food on the table every day, move around only with feet or a bicycle (close to zero travel), have all basic necessities covered but not much else.
Cool detail: since we purchased it while it was being built, we were able to customize it to our likes.
The apartment itself is simple but has everything that we need and more.
You get in and you find yourself in the main room.
Entrance door:
From the entrance, turn to the right and there’s the place for the kitchen
Turn to the left and you have a small corridor, and the stairs to the mezzanine
The small corridor leads first to the bathroom
And second to a small extra room
If you go upstairs instead it leads you to where we will sleep
Plus there is a sort of walk in closet
Total square footage is around 550 (all rooms are very small), but it’s basically a two bedroom, so more than enough for us and eventual guests.
The apartment will have a big impact on my savings rate this year, but thanks to the fact that I’m plying the game in relatively easy mode I expect to still be able to save around 40% of my take home pay (if I don’t count the “equity” part of the house as a cost obviously, otherwise I would be negative).