To Buy or Not to Buy
Frank Bellows
MGT/230
February 28, 2012

To Buy or Not to Buy
There are many moments in life when we are faced with choices in which we simply cannot decide on. The greater the commitment, the more difficult it is to make a decision. For me, buying a home was the most difficult decision I’ve had to make thus far.
Where do I start?
“It’s always scary when you take a larger measure of your own livelihood into your own hands.” Films Media Group (2004). Purchasing a vehicle is a 5 year commitment, joining the military is an 8 year commitment, but a house? In 30 years I’ll be 57! But time waits for no one, and the longer I wait, the older I’ll be. This is the decision I was faced with when being stationed in Louisiana for 6 years. Without any type of structure on decision making, this is how I decided on buying my home.
To rent or to invest?
The first thing I decided to do was call my bank and find out the process of purchasing a home. After speaking with a representative, it didn’t seem all that difficult. So to decide whether I should go forward or not was the big decision. My only other option was to rent. But renting for 6 years doesn’t seem like a financially wise decision, so I started to budget. If an apartment is going to cost me $700 a month and a $150,000 house is going to cost me $1,000 a month then it may be smarter to buy. After all, the military was giving me $1,289 at the time for quarters. After weighing out the pros and cons of renting versus buying and reading multiple articles as well as calculating all my expenses for each alternative, I decided to buy.
The decision-making process
My not-so-structured process was actually very similar to the decision-making process in the text Bateman & Snell (2009). I needed a place to live in Louisiana for 6 years and didn’t know if I should buy a house or not. That was my problem. My alternative solution was to rent, whether it was a room or an apartment. By reading articles, weighing out the pros and cons of each alternative, and budgeting my expenses for each alternative, I was able to evaluate and decide on which option was the most cost-effective. The choice I made was to buy a house. I implemented my decision by contacting my bank and getting pre-approved. It is now 4 years later and I am still in Louisiana and in my home, happier than ever!
Could things have gone differently?
When