How old were you when you bought your first home?

[Nan411]

    I am curious to see how old people were when they purchased their first home. I got pregnant at 18 and H and I got married when I was 19 (and he was 21). For the past 6+ years we have lived with my mom (we pay her $500 rent) while we are saving to buy our own place but it still seems so far off. H just turned 28 and I'm about to turn 26. We now have 2 kids (6 and 1 yrs old). I have a B.A. but am currently staying home with DS.

    I get along fine with my mom but sometimes I get depressed thinking that we are still living with her. I dream about decorating my own house and the kids having their own room and a yard to play in. My moms yard is all cement and not that inviting. Mostly, I feel like I am behind everybody else and that at this age we should have our own place but maybe I just feel that way because we  began having kids and got married so young.

[starling&diesel]

I was 27, I think.  And I was the first in my group of peers by several years.  We live in a high cost of living area, so many never own.  But I'd say the median age around here is about 35 years old, give or take.  I'd say the right age is whatever works for your family's budget and lifestyle! 

[Smidge]

I was 20 and dh was 27 and we had been married for about 6 months.  I too was the first of my peers for several years :)

[treeoflife3]

I was a month past my 20th birthday when I signed and got the keys to our first house.  However, we live in a low COL area with low taxes and the like so our monthly payment which includes mortgage, taxes, and insurance isn't much more than what we were paying for our apartment.  We also had the benefit of a first time homebuyers credit and we were able to buy with a VA loan which doesn't require the first down payment that makes it harder for people to buy sooner.  The seller was also conveniently our realtor (she and her husband were flipping a house that was exactly what we wanted) so it was easy to negotiate seller paying all closing costs so in the end we only paid for the inspector which was also conveniently cheap.

Basically, we were really freaking lucky haha.  We couldn't have bought if we didn't have all those pieces in place for us.

[Sharlla]

first house at 25, second at 29

eta the reason it took so long is because from 18-24 I lived near seattle and home ownership when you make 30-50 K a year is pretty tough

[limette]

24. We moved around a lot before then. When I got pregnant it was decided that it was time to move out of our noisy apartment building and into a house.

[monkey's mom]

28. Bought at the bottom of the market and ended up selling at the top seven yrs. later. Best financial move to date: Allowed us to move out of a high COL area to a low COL one and buy w/ cash.

Don't rush it.....you'll get there and it will be so worth it!

[GardenStream]

DH and I were both 26 but we weren't married yet. We didn't want to do a starter home so we planned our dream house for almost a year, I bought the land, DH designed the house and then we had it built in 2003. We got married in the great room (where I'm sitting right now) about 2 months after the house was finished. We were the first of our friends to buy a house. Actually, everyone we know has constructed their house rather than buying an existing one and they all did it a couple years after we did ours. They definitely learned from our mistakes.

[zebra15]

Single mom at 26... probalby not the best decision but it worked for DS and I for almost 5 years.  I was lucky to have family bail me out.  For the past 5 years or so I've been renting and now I have a roommate.  Im working toward moving again and hopefully reloacting to a diff part of the country.

[Ola_]

DH and I were 27, but by the time we bought we were married, had both worked full time in a well-paying industry for a while, and had been aggressively saving for several years for our downpayment.  We also moved to a (cheaper) suburb to buy as we would never have been able to afford buying a home in the area where we were renting.

[tinuviel_k]

I was 25 years old. My husband was 29.

[rsummer]

29 and 30 respectively... between that and started a family, we suddenly felt VERY grown up!

[Nicole730]

I was 25 and DH was 27.

[lookatreestar]

we have yet to buy, still saving money and i am super picky. we are looking a forever home, the idea of a starter home is really strange to me. we do have a home in mexico though.

eta we are 24/26

Edited by lookatreestar - 3/15/11 at 7:19pm

[amma_mama]

Judging from the responses here, we bought very late - I was 42 and DH was 50 (last year!)...DH went back to school for a while so that put us behind schedule, both with home ownership and parenthood. In order to save up enough for a deposit, we did a 2-year assignment overseas which allowed us to save a lot more than otherwise...if we did not do that, we would still be renting...

[gumshoegirl007]

I was 27 and DW was 25 when we bought our first house (and the one we still live in today).  Wow - that seems so young, even though it was just over 5 years ago.  We bought at a time with really low interest rates, and when house prices were somewhat high, but then just climbed higher.  Turns out our house, despite all of the issues we've had with it and then all of the money we've had to put into it because of those issues, has been a stellar investment.

[CarrieMF]

We were very young compared to those who've posted.

I was 21, dh was 22.  We had no kids.

We have 3 kids now & are 34, 36 & have been looking for our 2nd home for the last year or so.  Our kids are older(8, 9 & 12) so keeping it cleaner to sell is easier than if they were babies.  We're looking to build right now as we cant' really find what we're looking for.

[thriftyqueen]

We were both 23.  DH has just finished college and we decided it would be a great investment to buy.  We lived in the house for 5 years and sold it for double what we bought it for to begin with (after lots of blood, sweat, and tears). We were 28 when we bought our current home. 

[Peony]

We built our first house. I was 19 when we started and 20 when we finished. DH was 26, he was already well established in his career.

[philomom]

Originally Posted by CarrieMF 

We were very young compared to those who've posted.

I was 21, dh was 22.  We had no kids.

Same here.

I'm on my fourth real house with the dh. We have two big kids now and our next house will be the more compact "empty nest" type house. A place for a grown kid to have a soft landing but not enough room to get too comfy, YKWIM?