Hi! This is Natasha again. I got so much help from my last post, I am going to try it again. My husband and I are looking at relocating and now are trying to find a "farm" or small acreage, 5 acres minimum, to rent, lease, or have the owner finance. Low monthly payments as well. I know..you're thinking, that's a lot to ask for, but hey...if it's meant to be, it'll happen! If you have a place in Missouri..that's even better!!! *grin* Just let me know and we'll go from there! I sure hope that SOMEONE out there has what we're looking for! Here goes nothin' ; ) Have a SUPER weekend!!!!!

-- Natasha (gideon@bestnetpc.com), January 04, 2002

Answers

Interest rates depend in large part on your creditworthiness, and even an owner will want to check your credit, because even though they could foreclose on you, they may not really want to (your payments could be their retirement income, for example). Monthly payments will be also determined by how much you are able to put in for a downpayment, and whether or not you can avoid carrying PMI (private mortgage insurance, usually waived if you put 20% down)

If you itemize deductions, you would probably be best off having either owner or bank financing (house debt being good debt, most other kinds of debt, unless for investments that will make you money, such as rental property are bad debt to have, and that includes car debt, vacation debt, etc.), unless in your state you can claim a renter's deduction on your taxes. I assume you wish to relocate permanently, and rents can go up at any time, whereas you can get fixed rate mortgages. Good Luck.

-- GT (nospam@nospam.com), January 04, 2002.

Natasha, I do not know or understand all the financial stuff about morgages and all that. What I do know is that you can buy a modest place for little down and small payments. I bought one old house for nothing down and $150 monthly. It had about 1/2 acre a chicken house and an old barn as well as the house. The place I have now was $500 down, $200 a month for 5 years with 10% interest. It has 1 1/4 acres, house and garage/barn. I had to replace the wiring and some of the plumbing on the house. I bought the 2 1/2 acres of overgrown pasture behind me for $2,000 and made payments on it with no interest. There are lots of small towns in southeast Kansas that have houses and land for sale at reasonable prices and can be bought "on contract". We are pretty close to Missouri and Arkansas! And the nicest folks in the world live in Kansas. Email me and I will give you the name and number of the local real estate lady. We are all just down home people, and live in a small town where you wear jeans to weddings and funerals. karen

-- Karen in Kansas (kansasgoats@iwon.com), January 04, 2002.

I agree with Karen, why can't you just buy a place like everyone else is doing? Interest rates are the lowest in 30 years, and unless your credit is shot ( in which case no one is going to privately owner finance you anyway!) you can get a mortgage with nothing down as a first time homebuyer.

-- Annie Miller in SE OH (annie@1st.net), January 07, 2002.

Have you ever thought of Canada. I just made a crude website of my offerings in Saskatchewan, Canada. Check it out! www.store.yahoo.com/bigbluesky

-- Alexander Levin (morsealexlevin@hotmail.com), April 09, 2002.