We are getting completely fed up with the ongoing leak situation here at the townhouse in Mornington, it’s been an issue from when we first started renting here. I think we have been rationalising it as a trade off living in such a convenient location.
It’s only about a 10 minute walk to Main Street, we have everything here, supermarkets, banks, the post office, the gym, nice places to eat, great neighbours. We don’t really have to drive anywhere unless we want to go to Bunnings, Frankston, Balnarring, etc. For a while we even considered getting rid of my station wagon.
The plan was to rent for a couple of years and try and save some money with the extra we put into superannuation from the sale of our place in Mount Eliza. We have now been here over 3 years, and although it is a great place, our rent is now almost $26,000 p.a. after tax. That’s starting to eat up a fair chunk of what we are now getting tax free from our superannuation pensions. We have come to the realisation that it can’t go in like this, we are going to have to make a change. The plan was always to become homeowners again before either of us reached pension age anyway.
I’ve been crunching the numbers on my spreadsheets an looking at different options. With a small draw down from super and some of our savings, we could probably service a mortgage on a property worth up to $700,000. Principal and interest would be quite a bit less than the current $26,000 rent, but even paying it off in 6 years would still cost us about $30,000 in interest, plus we would have a mortgage.
Another option would be to bypass the banks completely, draw down the remainder of the full purchase price from super, and together with some of our savings, pay for a place up to what we got for the house in Mount Eliza, in cash. Taking into account not paying rent, and the reduced income from super, we would be about $5,000 p.a. better off. Also, no mortgage.
That decision was made for us when ANZ would not even consider giving us a housing loan. They said they could not even consider taking into account any of our U.S. income such as Eva’s teacher retirement, or our IRA’s. Through a broker, we found a couple of places that would consider a percentage of our U.S. income, but not enough to qualify for much. Although they didn’t actually say it, we got the feeling that the real reason ANZ turned us down was that we were both over 60, and retired from work.
Now the question was where to buy. We didn’t want a unit or townhouse in Mornington, we wanted a bit more room, maybe a couple of acres. Anything near us on the Mornington Peninsula with a few acres was completely unaffordable, we are talking a couple of million dollars.
For a long time we had thought about Coffs Harbour, where my parents had lived for many years, but its really in the middle of nowhere, full of National Party voters, and you still pay through the nose for anything with a view. Also, there’s nothing there that really interests us, it’s too hot and humid in summer, etc. etc.
We have been on holiday up around Cairns a few times, liked it, but it’s way too hot and humid, has Dengue fever, cyclones, lots of petty crime.
We keep circling back to Tasmania. I grew up there for a few years, went to school there, worked down in Hobart for a few years, my brother still lives there, and I’m reasonably familiar with the place. Plus, you can get a nice house on acreage for a fraction of the price here on the Mornington Peninsula. We didn’t want to be too far from amenities so we had been looking up around Devonport/Port Sorell areas, around Hobart, and the West Tamar region near Launceston where our family had lived for a few years back in the 70’s.
Could it be the decision has been made?
It’s only about a 10 minute walk to Main Street, we have everything here, supermarkets, banks, the post office, the gym, nice places to eat, great neighbours. We don’t really have to drive anywhere unless we want to go to Bunnings, Frankston, Balnarring, etc. For a while we even considered getting rid of my station wagon.
The plan was to rent for a couple of years and try and save some money with the extra we put into superannuation from the sale of our place in Mount Eliza. We have now been here over 3 years, and although it is a great place, our rent is now almost $26,000 p.a. after tax. That’s starting to eat up a fair chunk of what we are now getting tax free from our superannuation pensions. We have come to the realisation that it can’t go in like this, we are going to have to make a change. The plan was always to become homeowners again before either of us reached pension age anyway.
I’ve been crunching the numbers on my spreadsheets an looking at different options. With a small draw down from super and some of our savings, we could probably service a mortgage on a property worth up to $700,000. Principal and interest would be quite a bit less than the current $26,000 rent, but even paying it off in 6 years would still cost us about $30,000 in interest, plus we would have a mortgage.
Another option would be to bypass the banks completely, draw down the remainder of the full purchase price from super, and together with some of our savings, pay for a place up to what we got for the house in Mount Eliza, in cash. Taking into account not paying rent, and the reduced income from super, we would be about $5,000 p.a. better off. Also, no mortgage.
That decision was made for us when ANZ would not even consider giving us a housing loan. They said they could not even consider taking into account any of our U.S. income such as Eva’s teacher retirement, or our IRA’s. Through a broker, we found a couple of places that would consider a percentage of our U.S. income, but not enough to qualify for much. Although they didn’t actually say it, we got the feeling that the real reason ANZ turned us down was that we were both over 60, and retired from work.
Now the question was where to buy. We didn’t want a unit or townhouse in Mornington, we wanted a bit more room, maybe a couple of acres. Anything near us on the Mornington Peninsula with a few acres was completely unaffordable, we are talking a couple of million dollars.
For a long time we had thought about Coffs Harbour, where my parents had lived for many years, but its really in the middle of nowhere, full of National Party voters, and you still pay through the nose for anything with a view. Also, there’s nothing there that really interests us, it’s too hot and humid in summer, etc. etc.
We have been on holiday up around Cairns a few times, liked it, but it’s way too hot and humid, has Dengue fever, cyclones, lots of petty crime.
We keep circling back to Tasmania. I grew up there for a few years, went to school there, worked down in Hobart for a few years, my brother still lives there, and I’m reasonably familiar with the place. Plus, you can get a nice house on acreage for a fraction of the price here on the Mornington Peninsula. We didn’t want to be too far from amenities so we had been looking up around Devonport/Port Sorell areas, around Hobart, and the West Tamar region near Launceston where our family had lived for a few years back in the 70’s.
Could it be the decision has been made?