The True Monthly Cost of Owning a Home: What Buyers Need to Budget For

When buyers think about affordability, the monthly mortgage payment is often the first number they consider. But owning a home comes with several additional expenses that can affect your true monthly housing costs.

Property taxes can change, utility bills fluctuate with the seasons, and maintenance or unexpected repairs can quickly become significant expenses. Insurance costs and HOA dues may also change over time.

In this video, Grand Allure Home Group breaks down some of the costs buyers should consider when creating a realistic homeownership budget.

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Watch the full video to hear the complete breakdown of the additional costs that come with owning a home and why planning beyond the mortgage payment matters.

Video Transcript

All right. Why do buyers focus on the monthly mortgage payment but forget the true monthly cost of owning a home? So, property taxes, explained simply, are why taxes vary by area. And you'll see that various cities and counties have different property taxes that go into typically your monthly mortgage payment. they may go up. Your home value is reassessed and that depends on how the city, county, or state handles your local property taxes and sometimes they even reassess after a purchase and that surprises some people. So, be prepared. Know that that can fluctuate and is important to factor in.

Also, utility costs vary by season. So, if you own a home and it's in the winter months, you might have to pay more to heat it in utilities. Also, during the warmer months, if you are paying for your AC to run more frequently, that may be more expensive. Also, depending on how you're choosing to pay internet or cable TV or streaming and all those factors go into the utility costs as well.

Now, also think about larger homes do equal larger utility bills. Older homes sometimes are a little less energy efficient than some of the newer ones. Also, you want to keep in mind if you have a water bill or sewer, trash, and those sorts of things.

Maintenance and repair on a home is one of those fun things that sometimes there are unexpected things to fix. Other times you just have routine upkeep with a home, and that pride of home ownership is important. If you notice something wrong, maybe prolonging fixing it uh could make it a much bigger deal or a more expensive repair.

So, homeowners should expect to always keep an eye on your HVAC, your roof, your plumbing and appliances. Also, your landscaping and exterior maintenance. Keep an eye on the outside of your home, what your landscaping looks like, if you have sprinklers, if those are running or not running.

And the best piece of advice I can tell you is have an emergency repair fund so that you put a little bit away maybe each month for that just in case. Um because some of these repairs are not as fun to pay for as a kitchen remodel um that you can look at every day and see the value of your money put there.

Budget planning, budgeting for these utilities and your monthly mortgage payment and maybe that repair or maintenance fund is important. Also, as I said, build in that cushion for taxes maybe to go up. Insurance costs do vary, so that may increase as well. And then if you have an HOA, sometimes the HOA dues can fluctuate as time goes on and as maybe the budgets change for the neighborhood.

So the importance of maintenance, emergency funds, and just being comfortable with what you can afford in that monthly payment is very important to us. We want to make sure that you are comfortable in what decision you are making in moving forward with your new home.

And that's it today. So, we hope you have a grand day from Grandalure Home Group.