Buying House, when you have a house... what to do with extra $$$

12-month CDs? Bonds? You'd barely be beating inflation, even in a 5-year CD.

Personally, I would park it in an ETF. That'd be the rational thing to do, despite your wife. Or go with a bond-only ETF and play by her rules:

https://personal.vanguard.com/us/...IntExt=INT

Keep the cash in something liquid or semi-liquid. You will need cash for down payment and closing costs. Don't put it in stocks or anything relatively volatile.

I don't know much about ETF's, and what little I know about Bonds are they grow slow, little risk. I have a ROTH and my 401K maxed to my employee max, again with little thought to it, other than I am 'high risk/high reward"
I trust that whatever I lost, I could make up in 3 years, and my wife is blind to what I acctually do with the $$, but she can multiply 36 months by 400$ and get that the number needs to be that amount or more lol

ETF like a mutual fund? where there is a guy stealing 1-2% of my money every month :ROFL: or something different? I have TD Ameritrade right now, and Fidelity with my ROTH and 401K

I do agree 100% with you heavylee, that I need closing cost ect... in the last 6 months, so i guess whatever i do i need to pull it with a few months left

Quote from heavylee : Keep the cash in something liquid or semi-liquid. You will need cash for down payment and closing costs. Don't put it in stocks or anything relatively volatile.

This is good advice. With a three to four year window, savings is your best option.

Also, you may want to reconsider waiting until you've bought your next home to sell your current one - unless you can swing the payments indefinitely. Many people have gotten trapped with two homes for much longer than they expected and suffered severe financial harm. It might make more financial sense to do the reverse: wait to buy your next home until your current one is sold.

You need to sell your current home first. You can always put in a rent-back clause in the sales contract for 30-60 days to find a new house. There are no shortage of houses for sale. We rented back for a month. You will have a LOT more purchase power if you are unencumbered by a house and able to make a no-contingency offer on the new house. Just bank your "extra" money. Use it for moving expenses when the time comes.

I think what i meant to imply was, I will put my house on the market at the same time as looking, probably a month or so before I really start looking. I just don't want to be forced into a home, because we just sold ours. I have never heard of the rent-back, not a bad idea, but I was hoping to go into both contracts, selling/buying, with little strings attached, so i can get max money and pay less money.

I think I might just split the difference, put 200-300 against my house, and 200-300 in a savings (easy to get out). Maybe even open an equity line, and if the first house doesn't sell as i buy the 2nd, borrow against that for a month or so.

so many things to think about, and my wife gets a clear head thinking about none of it... rainbows and butterflies I say

Quote from MrTickle : I don't know much about ETF's, and what little I know about Bonds are they grow slow, little risk. I have a ROTH and my 401K maxed to my employee max, again with little thought to it, other than I am 'high risk/high reward" I trust that whatever I lost, I could make up in 3 years, and my wife is blind to what I acctually do with the $$, but she can multiply 36 months by 400$ and get that the number needs to be that amount or more lol ETF like a mutual fund? where there is a guy stealing 1-2% of my money every month :ROFL: or something different? I have TD Ameritrade right now, and Fidelity with my ROTH and 401K I do agree 100% with you heavylee, that I need closing cost ect... in the last 6 months, so i guess whatever i do i need to pull it with a few months left

I'm not saying to put your money in ETF...but you might want to do more research in ETF/mutual funds before making statments like that.

There is no guarantee of selling your house in a timely fashion. Are you able to sit on it for a long time or take an offer far less than its "worth". You can always sell your house, when it sells, find a house to rent month to month while you do your house hunt for your dream home.

Just put it in a savings account. Go to bankrate.com to find the best offer currently.

Don't put it into the stock market or ETF or mutual fund.

Don't put it into your current house equity because then you won't get that back until you sell and there is a chance the value decreases and you could lose your money that way.

Quote from MrTickle : I don't know much about ETF's, and what little I know about Bonds are they grow slow, little risk. I have a ROTH and my 401K maxed to my employee max, again with little thought to it, other than I am 'high risk/high reward" I trust that whatever I lost, I could make up in 3 years, and my wife is blind to what I acctually do with the $$, but she can multiply 36 months by 400$ and get that the number needs to be that amount or more lol ETF like a mutual fund? where there is a guy stealing 1-2% of my money every month :ROFL: or something different? I have TD Ameritrade right now, and Fidelity with my ROTH and 401K I do agree 100% with you heavylee, that I need closing cost ect... in the last 6 months, so i guess whatever i do i need to pull it with a few months left

You have no idea how mutual funds work. You call them stealing and in the next sentence say you use them. Educate your self.

Quote from B9FYwspP8J85 : Just put it in a savings account. Go to bankrate.com to find the best offer currently. Don't put it into the stock market or ETF or mutual fund. Don't put it into your current house equity because then you won't get that back until you sell and there is a chance the value decreases and you could lose your money that way.

Quote from saladdin : You have no idea how mutual funds work. You call them stealing and in the next sentence say you use them. Educate your self.

Wow, you know a fund manager that works for free? Let's throw him a party cause my manager doesn't work for free, he takes fees (not commissions, because he gets paid BY ME, even when he losses me $$$) from the funds he manages (hints the comment 1-2%)
All i was saying, was I did no know much about ETF's and my 401k forces me to use mutual funds, I don't use them by choice. So just wanted an explanation because 10 minutes of Googling didn't fully explain it.

Back to my original topic before I was ... I think savings might be the best play here. Its easy to get out if I had an emergency and lost my job, and easy to show as a DP or Closing cost. Next topic might be success stories of FSBO... or horror stories

Quote from MrTickle : Wow, you know a fund manager that works for free? Let's throw him a party cause my manager doesn't work for free, he takes fees (not commissions, because he gets paid BY ME, even when he losses me $$$) from the funds he manages (hints the comment 1-2%) All i was saying, was I did no know much about ETF's and my 401k forces me to use mutual funds, I don't use them by choice. So just wanted an explanation because 10 minutes of Googling didn't fully explain it. Back to my original topic before I was ... I think savings might be the best play here. Its easy to get out if I had an emergency and lost my job, and easy to show as a DP or Closing cost. Next topic might be success stories of FSBO... or horror stories

this is getting off topic but I'll chime in since you don't know. ETFs are exchange traded funds, they trade like a stock, you can buy the S&P500 or Dow Jones or Nasdaq or Agriculture, or Korea, etc. It is not through your 401k, you buy them like you buy any other stock through a broker, but unlike stock the ETF trades the market or a group of stocks as a whole, instead of a company There are hundreds of ETF's. Mutual funds are what you were talking about and they are the ones that charge fees. ETF's you can buy for commission from a broker.

Either way if you don't know much about it I would stay away. ETF's are as risky as any other stock and it is not a savings vehicle.

Money market or CD's or savings bonds are what you should be looking for. Another plug for bankrate.com to compare current rates.

edit so I don't start a derail: there are safe ETF's also like bonds or whatever and they are lower risk than the stock market but they still aren't a savings vehicle. They are an investment vehicle with inherent risk and if you don't know what you are doing and the risk you are taking then you shouldn't. This thread is about saving not investing.