Pay off debt. Get this: On average, close to 10% of Americans’ monthly income goes toward debt payments. That’s a 10th of your income wasted paying for stuff from the past instead of going toward your future home! Let’s say your monthly take-home pay is $5,000. According to that statistic, debt would swallow up $500 of that each month ($5,000 x 10%). So what if, instead of continuing to throw that $500 out the window every month, you put saving for a house on hold for a year or two while you worked really hard to pay off your debt? Then, once your debt is gone, you could put that $500 toward saving for your down payment each month—which adds up to an extra $6,000 over a full year! Plus, adding a mortgage and other homeownership costs (like repairs and taxes) on top of debt can be a big financial burden. So be patient and keep renting until you’ve paid off your debt and saved a full emergency fund worth 3–6 months of your typical living expenses. Get a roommate. If you’re single and renting an apartment by yourself, this tip is for you. Remember how we said the national median rent for a two-bedroom apartment was at $1,374 Well, that’s barely $150 more than the median rent for a one-bedroom apartment ($1,220). So, instead of living alone, why not upgrade to a two-bedroom apartment for that extra $150, get a roommate, and split your rent costs in half? Based on the medians we just looked at, you’d go from paying over $1,200 on your own to paying about $687 with a roommate—a difference of $533 a month or $6,396 a year! We are Here!
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