Summary: Are you downsizing from a house and thinking of renting an apartment? Or is it better to buy a condo instead? Never miss an episode. Install our FREE Podcast App available on iOS and Android. For your Apple Devices, click here to (https://apps.apple.com/us/app/winnipeg-real-estate-news/id1098802561) For your Android Devices, click here to (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.bokauffmann.android.winnipeg&hl=en) [00:00:00] If you're ready to sell your house and consider apartment style living, are you better off renting or buying a condo? That's what we'll examine on this episode of Winnipeg's Real Estate podcast. [00:00:09][9.1] [00:00:14] You're listening to the Bo Knows Real Estate podcast. Tips and advice for home buyers, sellers and owners with award winning Remax agent Bo Kauffmann. [00:00:24][10.2] [00:00:27] I will work from time to time with elderly clients who, for a variety of reasons, have decided to sell their houses. Take a look at the option of living in a high rise, whether it's an apartment or a condo. Some of those reasons might include that the houses have become too big. Too many stairs, too much upkeep, too much yard work, too much maintenance. Or perhaps a change in lifestyle where the people want to move to live in the states for three, four months, five months, a year. And then the house becomes kind of a liability because you have to come have to have somebody come into the house every couple of days to check the furnace and make sure that everything's fine for your insurance. So the question comes up, what's better? Should we rent an apartment and take the money we get from the house and invested or should be buy a condominium? So there are two facets to answer this question. One is purely financial, which is which is cheaper to do. And I will look at that. And the second one is what about quality of life, which will offer you better options and more happiness throughout the year that you are here living in either an apartment or a condo. So for our purposes today, I'm going to be looking at two similar style living quarters. One. One is a two bedroom, one bath apartment, about eight hundred square feet and a 40 year old building in a decent neighborhood. It does not have in laundry. It does, however, have underground parking. And of course, there are no upfront costs to this. Comparing that to a similar condo, same size, but a $200000 upfront cost that you have to buy, two bedrooms, one bath with ensuite laundry and a much newer building, about five years old. And again, with with an indoor parking spot. The numbers I'm going to use, the prices and fees are actual real life numbers in Winnipeg at this time. [00:02:11][104.0] [00:02:12] I know that you can get cheaper apartments. You can get more expensive condos and the other way around. But this is just for illustration purposes. I've picked two buildings that are somewhat similar. So let's start by looking at the apartment rent in this apartment is thirteen hundred and forty dollars a month, which adds to a shade over sixteen thousand dollars a year. Utilities are fully included in this. So heat, hydro and water. Of course, I'm not counting tel- television and cable vision because you have to buy that anywhere else. And it's the same no matter where you are. So that's not really become part of the equation. Insurance you're going to want content insurance. In this case, it's about $250 a year to insure your content. It's a good idea in case something happens. Could be a break in. Could be a water damage from a neighboring suite. You want to make sure that your contents are insured. But now we have something to offset against this expense. Remember, with an apartment, you don't have to take that two hundred thousand that you would spend on a condo. You can take that money and invest it. Now, if you are in your 60s, 70s, certainly in your 80s, I personally probably would not recommend anything
