A Modest Home

Oh yikes...modest? More like 1,500 - 1,600 sq. feet, not new, not super fancy but location, location, location. 600K - 700K is nothing to bat an eye at.

We live in a 2000 sq ft 3 bedroom 3 full baths and bought it for $140,000. That was 2 years ago. Depending on the condition of the house, in my area a house of this size would go for anywhere between $100,000-$170,000 right now.

It varies. There are easily townhomes with no yard selling here for $400k. Where my sister's BIL lives, that would buy a very large home on a chunk of land.

You should go to someplace like realtor.com to compare homes and neighborhoods.

Northern California, a 2000sq home would probably run you about 400,000. And , hu would only have a teeny tiny yard, and be able to practically touch your neighbors house from your bathroom window :-/

Northern Virginia. This is Fairfax County.

I have a 5 bedroom, 3 bath, 2 car attached garage semi-detached town home - just at 3K sq feet - one similar to ours sold for $555K in Jan. There are only 20 homes on our street/cul de sac - turn over doesn't happen often.

We bought ours in 1997 for $176K....damn - we should've refinanced and took money out!!!

A 3 bedroom, 2.5 bath, 2 car attached SF home (on our block) roughly 2K sq ft sold for $476K.

Our other neighbor (on the street behind us) sold their 5 bed, 3 bath 3200 SFH for $876K in 24 hours. NO GARAGE mind you- a 2 car carport. Another home similar to this one (the other side of the block) is listed for $895K and again - carport - no garage. I think there are offers on it.

My parents live in Lancaster, CA as well as other family members. My parents have a 3K sq ft corner lot - 5 beds/3 full baths, 3 car garage - if they listed it today? MAYBE get $160K for it. They paid $180K in 1997. The foreclosure/short sales in their area are above 50% so even though their home is worth more - they wouldn't be able to ask or get more because of the people who chose to walk away instead of pay or bought more than they could afford to pay....unemployment is California is 13.9%...thanks Nancy and B.O!!! And all the other crooks from ALL parties!!

My brother is in Escondido - he has a 5 bed, 3 bath 2 car garage with a pool - maybe $225K again - lots of short sales.

does that help?

In Saratoga County, upstate NY, for 2000 sq ft in a nice neighboorhood, 1/4-1/2 an acre goes for 200-275k. Course there's condos in the city of Saratoga going for half a mil with no property, and farms a mile away from the city going for 300k for 25 acres, you know?

:)

Interesting HOUSING cost vary dramatically ALL over the country, but SALARIES vary much less. So there are areas where we could live like kings, and areas where we could barely manage a studio apartment on our household income.

You're probably talking about $550K currently in my neighborhood for that size home. (South Orange County, CA) In 2005, when we purchased, homes generally went for about $700-$800k.

Gee, to be honest that seems like a bit more than modest to me. Personally I would consider modest to be about 1500 sf with 3 beds 2 baths.
Anyhow, a house that is your idea of modest would cost at least 150K in my area. And that would be in a slightly older, middle-middle-class area. In the newer, gated communities it'd be more like 200K.

The Houston area (which is HUGE), a modest home in a neighborhood you would feel comfortable living in would run you $150,000-$200,000

A modest home in the Northern suburbs of NYC would run you anywhere between 500-700k+++ (small lot) within a 1/2 hour of NYC (3 beds 2 baths) and between 300-700++ (depending on size) 45 minutes to an hour north of the City. Westchester County has lots of VERY rich neighborhoods where you can't get a decent home under a million.

Want to talk taxes - I paid $15,500 in property taxes last year. Highest county in the country. It's killing me to pay so much.

I think the latest figures around here are about $320-$340K. Down by about half of what it was three years ago, but still unaffordable in my books.

Santa Barbara, below, is still pretty crazy.

Homes in our modest neighborhood range from $125k to $200k.
Another way to get a better idea might be to ask about price per square foot.
When we moved here it was around $75.

J., icky. I bought my house in 06 and I dont want to talk about it. :)

I appraise houses too. Even ickier because I know the damage. :(

No! I lied, it was 08. Duuur, Im tired. Still, it sucks!

Hmm, south of DC, I'd say homes like that are going for about $300k. Give or take...

My area can range wildly........in the suburbs could run you anywhere from 125 to 250........the houses near my downtown and swanky areas nearby can run you millions.

Our house was last appraised at $115,000.00 at which time it had around 1200 finished sq. ft. It is a split level and has 3 beds/2 baths, a huge yard and two garages. It is one of the nicer houses in the area. That said, we have since finished the unfinished areas bringing it up to around 2000 sq. ft. so it would probably appraise around $145,000.00.

For what is considered modest around here (1000 to 1500 sq ft., smaller lot, usually only one bathroom) one would pay between $55,000 and $100,000 depending on the neighborhood.

Between $100,000 and $400,000 for a 4+ bedroom house in this area but the lot sizes vary greatly with those homes so you might get a modest house with 9 acres or a big, upgraded house with a .2 acre lot for $350,000.

Where we are modest homes run anywhere from 1200sft to 2000sft and can vari in price depending on neighborhood. A small 1200sft home in the historic area would run the same as a 2000sft home in a new development. Our neighborhood was started in the 80's has river access and homes ranging from 1mil to 250K. Our home is 2100sft 4bed 2 bath on 1/3 acre lot built in 1995 and we paid $232,000. in 2008. Luckily our area has not been hit hard by the housing crisis and there is not a lot of turnover in our neighborhood so pricing is pretty stable. In fact values have been on the rise for the past 2 years. Our home is appriased at $260,000 up from $240,000 in 2009. This is not unusuall for mid range for custom built homes in established neighborhoods but those developments by builders DR Horton, KB Homes ect the values are either stagnant or declining due to a large invenory and high turnover.

In a mainly middle class neighborhood in Columbus, OH, it ranges between 200k to 300k

Right now in Oklahoma suburbs they are selling for around $80K to $175K. Depends on the features and extra's like neighborhood. The same house sitting on one side of town can be in a nice neighborhood then sit it on the other side of town and it is thought to be in the poor area and not worth near as much.

A 2,000 sq foot home in a "nice" area with a 1/2 acre here would cost anywhere between $700,000 - $1.2 million. 15 minutes south of town there are newer neighborhoods - totally safe, but the houses are jammed together. A 2,000 sq foot home would cost about $350,000.

Hmmm...depends on your definition of modest and the market in the area. Our home is slightly bigger than 2,000 square foot but we live on very expensive land...1/3 of an acre and a pool. We live in California about 45 minutes from San Francisco so homes are higher in this neck of the woods... but we live in a less expensive area. Homes are still selling quite fast in our area..it is a nice older neighborhood. There are still lot of original owners.

Still most homes in our neighborhood start at 575K and go up to about 700k. We are in between. To me it is not so much about the overall price but the equity in the home and if we can make payments. We put a large chunk down, got a fabulous interest rate and our mortgage is quite small compared to even rent. We pay half of what most renters pay. We have been blessed by wise financial decisions,good investments and living within a budget. I have always been a SAHM and work my arse off to make our dollars stretch.

Good luck and best wishes!

One thing we have been really educated while moving around a lot is that the cost of living from place to place differs greatly. Our home in Oklahoma was 2250, 4 bdrms, and cost $126,000. To buy a home in Dayton, OH in an older (not well established, just old homes), $169,000 would get you about 1100 square feet of living space.

Here, that would not be modest. As others have said, 1500 sq feet is modest for our area. There are a few of these 1500 sq ft homes (most are older too) peppered in nicer and more newly developed suburban and urban areas and they run about 200,000 on the low end and 230,000 on the high end. However, a home that size in lower income neighborhoods (the hood) can run from about 75,000 to 120,000.

A house with your specifications (2000 sq ft and 3-4 bedrooms) could run anywhere from $250,000 to $380,000 in the burbs and certain nicer urban neighborhoods here.

If a house with those specs is near a lake or high demand or gated community it could cost even more (as much as 500,000 and up). It really depends on the neighborhood/location, the circumstances under which the house is being sold (like is it a short sale for instance) and the condition and age of the house here.

I would say for Houston, $200K for a house built in the last 5 yrs.

My friend in Cherry Hill, NJ lives in a similar size home, make and model and she paid $500K.

200,000 in the nice part of town and 70,000 in the barrio with repairs needed.

In my town 2,000 is not modest. I would say that about 70% of the single family homes in our city average 1,200 to 1,500 sf and range from $150,00 to $225,000, are at least 50 years old, with approx 1/5 to 1/4 acre of land.

Around here, it can range from $70,000 - 150,000. when you get up into 150,000 and higher, there is usually some land involved.

My house is right under 1,200 sq ft. I guess that would be considered modest in my area. 2,000 sq ft is really large, and generally always comes with land.

The "median" home purchase price in Pittsburgh, PA is right around $100K.

Within a 20 minute drive of my home, there are homes ranging in value from $40K to $500K.

Pittsburgh has been pretty resistant to the home value fluctuations many areas have seen.

Probably between $100,000 and $150,000 here where I live.

October of 2010 we bought a brand new house for 148,000. It is 2 story with almost all the upgrades and is 2400 sq ft and has 4 bedrooms and 2 1/2 baths plus a study and a gameroom. If you were to go down the street from us you could get around 3,000 sq ft with really nice upgrades for around 200,000 - 300,000. I am about 20 miles north of fort worth.

It depends. Since I am in Chicago, we have tons of foreclosures. So anywhere from 180k to 500k.

In the Hamptons, it depends which side of the highway you're on. My area you're looking at $600K - $800K. South of the Highway and it's over $1 million. Yes, for 2,000 sq feet.

I'm in a middle class metro Detroit suburb and around here you can probably get that for about $160K to $200K. We paid $200K for our house when it was built, it's around 1800 sq feet, 3 bedrooms (newly constructed 3 years ago). The base price as around $160 but we got a number of upgrades (all hardwoods downstairs, nicer carpeting and fixtures, walk-out basement, etc.). Land here is cheap. When we lived in central MA, we probably would have paid closer to $300K to $350K for the same house, depending on what town you were in (way higher if you are closer to Boston).

Because of all the lakes around here, there are a lot of waterfront homes, so they can run $200K to $300K.

We bought our home in 2009. Our home is very modest. We are in the DC metro area our home is 1800 sq feet, 60 years old and we paid $240,000 and that was considered cheap because it was a short sale. I'm originally from Florida and $240 there could buy me three times more house but this is a very high cost of living area.

I'm about 35 miles from NYC - a 2000 square foot home - 3-4 bathrooms, 50 years old, one old bathroom, one new, dated kitchen, 1/3 acre is probably about $400K. If you really want a shocker ask about real-estate taxes. On this house described (ours) the taxes are about $6500 and ours are one of the lowest on our street since we've been here for almost 20 years. Someone up the street from me with a similar house on a 1/2 acre pays more than $10,000 a year! For what it's worth, we have good schools, excellent libraries, beautiful parks and many public beaches. But there are homes in our school district that are waterfront homes worth $1 - $5 million - taxes go up to $50K+.

YIKES!!!

It's a lesson for our kids when we pull up to the school in our paid-for 10 year old vehicles and other kids are driving their own BMWs and Audis... Oh well!

The type of home that you are describing is a typical home for a family raising school aged kids in my area. That sort of home would go for around $350,00 - more if it was new construction, never lived in.

In my neighborhood that's a million dollar house.
Someone suggested a price per square foot comparison. I think that's an easy way to look at it.
Around here (so cal, by the beach) price per square foot is high. Our house is on the market and the the price per sq. ft. is $538 which is actually quite low for a finished out home... it's because we live on a busy street. The average is probably closer to $700 near the beach.

a 2000 square foot house in southern MD (depending on how far south you go LOL) runs around $300,000 give or take (probably actually a little lower).

We paid $335,000 for our brand spanking new construction house last year and our total square footage is about 3000 (I think, but I'm including the finished basement too, which is normally not included in a listed square footage).

Now you go north a little ways and you're talking dc and it's true suburbs and you can almost double that price for the same size house.

We have a 2900 sq ft trilevel with 3 or 4 bedrooms depending how you want to use it. Almost 1/4 acre listed now for 163,000. We bought it 5 yrs ago for 172. (And we've done lots of improvements - ouch!) On the upside, we hope to make up for the loss on the buying end. We live in SW Ohio if you are interested!

$500k at least in our school district, for a fixer-upper at that! We are in in the number one school district in our state, which I am sure has something to do with it. 10 minute train ride from the city.

Often makes me want to move though :)

2000 sq. ft. is quite big! I don't think any of the homes in my immediate neighborhood are that large and our average price for 3-4 bedrooms for something smaller is around $240K.

However, the city across the street from me features very large homes plus modest much smaller homes and those smaller ones probably average $400K+ just to be in the city.