Rent or Own?

As you know, I own a one bedroom condo thanks to a below market rate inclusionary program offered by the Mayor's Office of Housing. Among the many rules and regulations surrounding the program, one states that the city sets the sale price and ultimately qualifies a potential purchaser.

Out of curiosity, I went hunting around the Mayor's Office of Housing web site and found a few potential calculations for pricing the condo. Unfortunately, the condo can go down in price--below selling price. In that case, I can make a request that it be sold at the purchase price instead (which would mean I'd still lose money, just not as much).

There are 3 potential ways to price a unit, but it seems like since I purchased before 6/26/2007 there are only two available to my unit:

Method 1: Consumer Price Index Series ID : cuura422sah at http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/srgate

Original Price $278,000
DOP 6/1/2005 CPI 223.0 (June)
DOS 3/1/2007 CPI 238.429 (Dec 2007)
CPI % Difference 6.919% (CPI Sale - CPI Purchase)/CPI Purchase
Resale Price $297,234 ($19,245)
5% for Agent $14,862 The city allows a % to pay Realtor fees
Resale Price $312,096

The other method is a bit confusing so I won't show you the mess I made of it.

The city gave me $50,000 through a down payment assistance program (DALP) which I repay only when I sell. The catch is I have to give them a percent of the profit equal to the percentage size of the DALP loan. In this case, with the house costing $278,000, the DALP is 18% of the total price. The breakdown of sale price minus original price is as follows:

Gross appreciation $312,096 - $278,000
Profit $34,096
DALP repayment $6137
5% for agent $14,862
Profit $13,097

My mortgage payment is $1073 and my home owners is $622 and my house tax is $300. After living in this space for 2 years and eight months, that works out to $409/month coming back to me as a profit, in addition to the $250/month in principal ($8K so far) and whatever amounts I got from the tax breaks which must be $100-200 a month. So I spend $2,000 a month and get back $800.

It's like spending $1,200 in rent for my place. That's not a bad deal as a quick whirl in craigslist shows the majority of 1 BRs are in the $2K range with ones around $1200-1400 as really tiny, run-down, and in the outer edges of the city.

Assuming the CPI or whatever measure they use continues to climb, the condo remains a good deal. Friends seem to think that with inflation going up the CPI for housing will too, even as housing prices drop. I sure hope so.

who's fat?

I think the BMI is a liar. Is a person REALLY overweight at 5'1" and 133 pounds but normal at 5'1" and 131? I don't even know what normal weight would look like on me as the lowest I recall weighing at my 5'1" is 150 pounds (except for those 2 days when I was sick, dragged myself from bed and poised on the scale at 145 back in 2004). In high school my weight hovered in the 160s and when my mom bullied me into joining track for a season I managed to drop down to an impressive 155.

I'm one of those women who 'struggles' with her weight. It's a challenge. It's a process. It's a thing. The sort of thing when I look in the mirror I never quite know what I'll see because I'm never sure how fat I really am because I'm only ever looking in a mirror to see how fat I really am and the fact that I need to be constantly checking means there is no absolute measure and no way of really knowing. Cause that's the way I play it. Cause even if I check every 2 minutes, I still manage to look different to myself every time.

Fat is equated with so many different measures in my mind that have nothing to do with size: beauty, health, fitness, mobility, desirability, how things fit me, and even my skin color. Problem is, most of the stuff I'm trying to measure by determining how fat I am are really hard to measure--forget what happens when I conflate them with my fatness.


In 2001 I hit my peak. Somewhere in
the 220+ range. Size 22 at Old Navy. This is me (center in purple) in the Doofhaus with Rene, Chaney and Joe. Notice how I am big enough that people can hide behind me. I look at this picture and one second I can see how fat I am and the next second I can't. Then I look at a picture from Cancun taken in January 2008 when I weighed about 155-156 and in my head I KNOW I must look different, but I don't actually see it. I think because I'm always looking at myself so critically I don't see the shrinking--only the parts that aren't shrunk magnified till they are bigger than humanly possible.



It makes me wonder when I get to that magical normal BMI range, will I see it? When I hit a weight I like will I just realize I'm done?

I wonder sometimes if I'll ever let myself be a comfortable weight. I'm comfortable calling myself fat and identifying as a fat girl. Now that I'm waffling in the 150's I've been testing out the new identity of being 'not fat,' and it's uncomfortable.

Why all the navel gazing? the angst? the bullshit? Well, I re-started Jenny Craig today after my 2 month hiatus. In the Fall I did the 20 pounds for $20 and lost 15 pounds in 3 months. This is impressive given it was birthday season (me and my fiance) and Thanksgiving which involves many heavy eating meals. MANY. I regained just under 6 in part from the post-diet bounce-back, Christmas weekend, and illness (not the kind that gets me to 145 pounds). I knew this would happen--sort of planned for some weight gain mentally so I made it happen. Now, I'm resentfully back and feeling nervous. I'm ready and I'm not ready and part of this whine was to get more into ready.

Here I am. Weighing 156.6 with a lowest maintained weight of 150. Ever. I'm feeling a little scared and a little defeatist even as I declare to the nice Jenny Craig woman that my goal is 132. Just between normal and overweight. Take that BMI.