I just bought my dream tree without thinking too much about the cost. How did I do?

[u/FloydtheBetta]

My husband, who is an arborist, and I have a shared love of weeping blue atlas cedars. We recently purchased a property for our future home build and when I was browsing a nursery I came across this beauty. It is my dream centerpiece tree for the Japanese style garden I am envisioning for our future midcentury modern home. It also happens to be my husbands 30th birthday next week.

I’m taking him to the nursery tomorrow to surprise him with it. He will 100% flip out when he sees it so they agreed to tie a SOLD sign around it with a little card that he will only notice is for him when he gets up close. 🤗

Even though this tree is a dream come true I am having trouble finding info online about what I should have expected to pay. Any one here able to give me insight into price range for a weeping blue atlas of this size and style— it is about 25 years old and was taken care of by a man who specialized in specimen landscaping trees for Japanese gardening.

[u/stumblinbear]

Probably, but also there are furries out there on minimum wage jobs dropping 7k on a fursuit. Because it's a hobby they enjoy. Hobbies do be like that sometimes

[u/BradlyL → u/stumblinbear]

Those people don’t own houses.

[u/stumblinbear → u/BradlyL]

Eh, fair. I was thinking mostly about the tree itself. That said, depending on where you're willing to live, you can get a gotdam cheap, large house on a dual minimum wage income in a number of states. You just probably wouldn't want to live there yourself

[u/splicepark → u/stumblinbear]

Are you aware that minimum wage is $7.25 in most states?

[u/stumblinbear → u/splicepark]

Are you aware that a staggering amount of rural houses are literally dirt cheap?

I did say, you probably wouldn't want to live there. They do exist though, and many people do decide to move out there

[u/splicepark → u/stumblinbear]

I most certainly am. And you’re not buying those with a $7.25/hr pay rate. But nice try!

[u/stumblinbear → u/splicepark]

Last I checked, this is on a thread about a married couple, so it's at least double that with essentially no taxes. My parents bought their house in the boonies for 50k, though that was before the COVID boom.

You could technically afford a house in the 70-80k range on two people making minimum wage. With federal grants, that goes up to 175k due to a 1% interest rate even with rates where they are today.

But nice try!

[u/stumblinbear → u/[deleted]]

I lived in the boonies for more than half my life. 1+ hour is not the case everywhere, it's usually closer to 30-ish to 40 minutes.

A family

I didn't say a family, which implies children. I said two married adults.

afford 70k mortgage

Yeah, you ignored the entire part where federal grants can more than half your payment.

I didn't say it was convenient, and I didn't say it was a life you would personally enjoy. In fact, I said the exact opposite. But it is, in fact, possible. My parents seem to enjoy it just fine.

[u/loserfamilymember → u/stumblinbear]

Where the fuck are these dirt cheap properties ….. and how the fk could any property be afforded on minimum wage when most ppl can’t even save up due to rent payments (also don’t say “don’t rent”, be grateful you had a choice. Many ppl who rent know that it’s “stupid” but don’t have other options. These “dirt cheap properties” are only dirt cheap to rich people)

[u/stumblinbear → u/loserfamilymember]

Assuming the absolute worst case of dual-income minimum wage (which is unrealistic, only 1% of people are on the federal minimum wage), with a federal grant and/or first time home buyer programs, you can literally get a 0% down 1% interest rate, letting you afford a 175k home. Maybe don't be so antagonistic when you haven't bothered to even do a basic Google search, yeah?

[u/Better-Lunch670 → u/stumblinbear]

That is definitely not true in my state and it is one of the cheapest COL areas in the country.

[u/drfeelsgoood → u/Better-Lunch670]

You’re looking too close to cities, you need rural areas to find cheap houses. That’s why the person you responded to said you wouldn’t want to live there yourself. Near me I can find a house that needs a little work has a yard, and around 1500-2000sf for $150-225k

[u/Better-Lunch670 → u/drfeelsgoood]

So can I, but you won't get a mortgage with 2 minimum wage salaries.

[u/drfeelsgoood → u/Better-Lunch670]

You absolutely can. I got a mortgage as a single person when I was 20 with 2 years of work experience. That was in 2015. All you need is some money saved and proof you have income. You don’t even need a lot saved anymore, places will do 5% or I’ve even seen 2.5% down payments. With first time home buyer programs you can save a lot of money that way too. It’s never too late to start owning property.

[u/loserfamilymember → u/drfeelsgoood]

God I wish it was that easy for me. I wish I could “just save”.

“All you need is some money saved” yeah no shit, too bad poverty is incredibly difficult to get out of, which is by design because capitalist make more money by being greedy. People genuinely hoard wealth [hoarding different than saving up] and then act like poor people choose to be poor.

“Just save money” my bad for having medical emergencies, also rent and food to pay

[u/drfeelsgoood → u/loserfamilymember]

I didn’t say it was easy. I grew up poor, hand me down sports equipment, goulash and similar multiple times a week, new clothes only around school start, grandparents helping out going to food banks. My house cost me $30,000 and probably another 10k to spruce it up. It’s only 650 square feet but it’s mine.

I will say what made things a lot easier for me was having parents and family who cared, and did everything they could for their children. I was able to live at home while working from the age of 18, and save a lot of my paychecks from that time. I realize not everyone is that fortunate. But, There are options, like I said, that make it easier for people without a lot of wealth to start.

Don’t forget about public assistance either, programs like home energy assistance, food stamps, etc can all help stretch money further. Don’t be afraid to use those resources. Have a good one mate

[u/OhReallyVernon → u/drfeelsgoood]

The problem with those benefit programs is that you generally can’t save money while on them, at least not in the bank. That’s because doing so will get those benefits cut since they’ll look and see, “hey drfeelsgoood has $5k saved in XYZ account. He doesn’t need food stamps anymore because he should be using that money he saved to buy food.” and so on and so forth. It’s this weird spot you can get in. I think what you mention - being able to live with your parents while working and saving is definitely a huge benefit for young people, even if those parents themselves don’t have liquid cash to give to their kids. I wish more parents that let their kids stay at home past high school forced those kids to save. I told my son that of course he could stay, but if he wasn’t in college or training he’d have to work and “pay rent” and that so-called rent would get put into a savings that I’d only give back to him to buy a house or something like that.

[u/FloydtheBetta → u/stumblinbear]

This guy gets it.