I found a 500 sq foot studio for 28K close to work and .5 mi from the train station. Safe neighborhood.
https://www.zillow.com/homes/for_sale/2 ... ect/13_zm/
Planning on visiting it. Looks like the numbers may make sense. Around $160 of monthly fees besides the mortgage. Need to find out about utilities, insurance, and hidden repairs. Also, what the "Co-Op" rules are. Good news is, co-ops filter party-animals out of the living space.
Selling it could be another story, but then, I'd spend around $28K on rent in 3-4 years. I have a 100% chance of not getting rent $ back. Work contract is also for a few years, so I'm stuck here regardless. Worst case I could rent the place or go through the process of selling.
I don't believe renting out the common room would work in this set-up, however. It looks like there's no common room lol. I was looking forward to land-lording
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One question, the monthly mortgage is minimum ~$100 + interest payments. With the monthly fees of 160, that's about $300-400/mo.
Is there any benefit to paying off the mortgage then? Couldn't I just pay the minimums forever and invest the difference? The piece of mind of a paid off living space is nice though.