Just when is a good time to buy a home? Do you feel you've achieved steady employment? Have you maintained a decent credit history? Do you really desire to own a home? Do you want more space to have to keep clean? How about yard work? Be prepared to have at least a small lawn to maintain, unless you move into a condo where you don't have to maintain any yard or amenities, or move into the city where the only grass you see is a tiny bit creeping up from the cracks between the concrete, no wait, that's a weed! I'm getting off track here, sorry.

The point is, there are things to think about before buying a home other than whether you have enough down payment. Actually down payment isn't really an issue nowadays. Speaking of down payment, many first time home buyers look at how much they need down and try to figure out whether they can afford (or qualify for) what the mortgage payment will be.

A rule of thumb is that it rarely makes sense to buy if you expect to move within two years. That's because when you do sell, there are costs associated with selling. We're not just talking about sales commissions to the buying and selling real estate brokers. Most owners rely on home appreciation to pay those costs and to provide the down payment nd closing costs when they buy their next home. So buying a home when you expect to move before too long is a risk, especially in an uncertain market.

However, most buyers live in their new home an average of seven years or more. If that fits you, it almost always makes sense to buy rather than rent, in practically any market.

Why? First, if you are thinking about delaying a purchase because you want to "time the market" to get the very best deal, that is almost impossible to do with precision. Even if you are in an area with declining market prices, the most knowledgeable experts cannot reliably anticipate the "bottom" of a real estate market. After wards, they can look back and say, "The market began to turn in 1997," like it did in some areas of California that had a tough market in the nineties. Before the turn, though, no one knows.