Deciding Your Long-Range Policy on Housing

What will be your long-range policy on housing— rent, buy, or build? What have you studied which might enable you to buy or build more wisely?

The young couple planning marriage may feel that the only thing they need to know on this subject is, "Take anything you can get, anywhere, any way you can get it." Yet the problem is neither so desperate nor so simple. Chances both to buy and to build should increase considerably, especially if the pre-fabs get the green light. For any couple a real opportunity may come at any time. They should be ready to take full advantage of it. Before you marry, then, formulate two kinds of housing programs for yourselves. Consider first, the one which you may have to accept. Then work out one which you will follow if you can.

One possibility which some couples will face is that of living with in-laws. Undesirable though this is, there may be no alternative. Here are some questions which may arise around this problem:

• If you have to live with your in-laws, for how long?
• What problems will you face in living with them?
• How can you keep your own independence without hurting their feelings?
• What understandings and agreements can you have with them which may help avoid embarrassment and unpleasantness?
• Could you persuade the folks to do some remodeling so that you will have at least the semblance of a separate establishment?

After all, with the children all grown, they no longer need all the room in that big old house. And after you move out, they may be glad to get the revenue by renting it to someone else.

Now let us get on to your permanent policy. Do you plan to own or to rent? At present, when almost anything which is hollow can be sold for twice the price by tomorrow, buying may seem the only intelligent policy. But some of us remember the depression when many houses could not be sold at all. We will leave this question for you to decide. Your decision will depend in part upon how much you expect to move. If you expect that for the first few years the husband will move about considerably, buying or building should be avoided if at all possible. But if you do buy or build, you should first of all carefully study several of the now numerous books which deal with this subject. Every couple should know something of how to judge, repair or build their prospective dream home.