6 Months Left on My Jeonse Lease: Really Torn Between Buying vs. Renewing
We're a dual-income couple in our third year of marriage, currently living in a 300 million won jeonse rental. We still have about 100 million won left on a loan we took out when we were newlyweds.
Home prices have fallen in a way that's hard to read, so I can't tell whether now is the bottom. Some people around me say, "If you're actually going to live there, now is better," while others say, "It'll drop further"...
If anyone made a similar decision around this stage, I'd love to hear what criteria you used.
9 answers
Agreed — if you're actually going to live there, it's better to pound the pavement than spend time agonizing over it.
If you base your decision criteria on home price predictions, you won't get an answer. When I was deciding, I only signed if all three of these passed: ① whether the monthly repayment burden was over 30% of income, ② whether I was prepared to live there for at least 5 years, ③ whether I would still have six months' worth of emergency savings left. If even one is unclear, I think renewing the lease is the right call. You can't predict home prices anyway.
Well, aren't the people saying "if you're going to live in it, now is better" the same ones who said the exact same thing back when home prices were rising? That's not a basis for judgment—it's just cheerleading. At today's interest rates, for a property in the 300 million won range, have you actually run the numbers on acquisition tax, brokerage fees, and interest? This seems like a stage that calls for calculations, not deliberation.
Got a source? I'm curious what the basis is for calling it the bottom.
I'm someone who bought at a similar point in 2021 and lost my mind after hitting -8% within a year. Now I'm holding on because I can handle the monthly interest, but I still regret pushing forward back then with that one line, 'It's a primary residence.' I've learned that you buy a home based on cash flow, not emotion. Just take it as a reference.
What's the basis for the people saying it'll drop further? That side is just making a prediction too. In the end, your own financial plan is the standard; everyone else's opinions are just noise.
Same here, seriously T_T
Six months is quite a bit of time left. In the meantime, try refinancing your loan and sorting out your housing subscription savings account. When I renewed my lease, I lowered the interest rate even just a little and used that money to build up some seed capital, and in the end that worked out better than buying. This is an issue that changes completely depending on the area, so you first need to pin down the neighborhood before you can get a clear answer.
If you're a dual-income couple, don't buy unless at least one of you can say with certainty, "We'll live in this house for 10 years." We bought without checking that and ended up selling after 2 years because of a job change — transaction costs alone ran into the thousands lol. You need to factor job-change risk into buying a house, just like you would with a company.