My financial adviser made a casual comment about my budget that showed me I was ready to buy a new home
- My husband and I were recently at a crossroads: Should we buy a new home to give our growing family more breathing room, or keep our spending to a minimum and stay in our first home?
- With the help of our financial adviser, we looked at our budget and learned that if we limited our spending in some discretionary categories, we could afford to spend a couple hundred dollars more each month on our mortgage.
- But we ultimately decided to buy a new home because of something else our adviser said: We probably wouldn't even notice the change to our spending in a year or two.
- A financial adviser can help you purchase your dream home. Use SmartAsset's free tool to connect with a qualified professional »
Pretty much the moment we graduate from college we immediately start having to make financial decisions that seem like they'll have an impact on our money for years to come.
When and how to start paying back student loans, which job to take (or even where to apply), whether to buy a house or keep renting, have a kid (or two or three) ... it all adds up to a monumental weight on our shoulders - and our bank accounts.
Recently, my husband and I were at such a crossroads: We loved the house we were living in, which we had purchased a little more than three years prior, but with our growing family, space was getting tight.
We wanted to upgrade, but we were having trouble deciding whether that was the right financial move. Our financial adviser helped us see that, by cutting a little bit from different buckets of our budget, we could make a more expensive home purchase work. But just because we could make something work financially, did that mean we should?
Our financial adviser's life-changing advice
I've talked before about how our financial adviser helped us figure out the finances of buying a new home - how to determine how much more we could afford per month on a mortgage, how to ensure we continued saving for our other important goals, etc. - but despite all that planning, there was actually one thing he said to us that really helped me make up my mind.
He said that although yes, for the immediate future, it might seem like siphoning off a little extra to cover a larger mortgage is a struggle, it was likely that just a few years down the road we wouldn't even feel the difference.
What he was essentially saying, in my mind, is that budgeting and planning and saving are essential for hitting goals, but in this game of life, sometimes you just have to have a little faith and take the leap. We'd get used to our new budget over time and, with any luck, we'd be making more money in the future, too.
The moment things finally clicked
Suddenly, buying a new home became about much more than just paying a couple extra hundred dollars a month.
It meant investing in a future where I saw myself and my husband continuing to advance in our careers. It meant providing my family with a little extra room to breathe. It meant purchasing a home that could, if all goes to plan, reap us larger rewards when/if we're ready to sell again.
When he put it in that context, I began to see how having a proper budget in place is the key to allowing you to feel safe when it comes to taking these kinds of leaps of faith.
I also began to see how most of my financial decisions up to that point - forgoing a large wedding to get married at city hall, deciding to freelance full-time, investing in our first house, and having our two daughters - had been leaps of faith as well.
Luckily, with a solid budget to back it up - and some professional input from time to time - leaps of faith can be just a little bit less scary.
Talk to a financial adviser about your dream home today. Use SmartAsset's free tool to find a qualified professional »
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