I lived at my future in-law’s house for over 8 months. At first I was a little hesitant to make it a long-term commitment, but when I ran down the list of amazing amenities they had, it was hard not to agree. In addition to free rent, I didn’t have to cook my own meals, there was a washer and dryer in the house, and my daily commute was cut down by over 60%. And of course, I didn’t mind my fellow house members.
After 8 months, I decided it was time to move out. I am getting married in June and I thought it was time. I was settled, my job was stable, and I wanted to prepare and have everything set up before the wedding day.
So was it worth it? Heck yes. There were very few downsides, but how much did I really save? I’m not going to go into every detail of how much I saved on groceries and laundry costs, instead I’ll stick to the big items (surprised?) and do a lot of estimating.
Rent
This is obviously the big one. Two months ago, I moved into a 2 bedroom, 2 1/2 bathroom apartment for $1,800. It’s far from cheap, but by not paying that each of the last 8 months, you could argue that I saved $14,400 on rent!
However, I probably would have moved into a 1 bedroom apartment (since it would have been just me for nearly a year, part of the reason I got a 2 bedroom now is because we’ll want more space once we get married).
Let’s say I would have moved into a slightly more reasonable 1 bedroom apartment for those 8 months, costing me $1,300/month. That’s $10,400.
Still, I would have been committed to a 12 month lease, so over the course of the first year (July 2011-July 2012) I would have paid $15,600, while under my current arrangement, I will end up paying just $7,200 in rent over the same 12 month time frame.
The final number? About $8,400. Thanks Mark and Rachelle!
Utilities
This one is pretty easy to calculate, our costs for tv, electricity, and gas is about $130, so that’s another $1,040 in savings during those 8 months.
Groceries, Gas, Laundry, etc.
My commute was much shorter, I was buying fewer groceries, and with a laundry machine in the house, I never needed quarters. I’ll guess this came out to $150/month, for an additional $1,200.
There are other costs I saved on, but there were a few other higher costs (I was going out to dinner more often because I had fewer expenses, but I was driving farther on weekends), so I’m assuming they just about cancelled each other out.
In all, it comes out to over $10,500. I have $10,500 more in my bank account that wouldn’t have otherwise been there. That’s awesome! Let’s just pretend I invest that right now and don’t touch it until I’m 65 years old. As a 7% interest rate, that’s about $170,000 that I wouldn’t have otherwise have had. Score!
Readers, did any of you think I was crazy for living with my future in-laws? Now that you read the numbers, do you think it was worth it?