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Depends on where you are exactly.

Everett Community College was great.

Moments later, the ferry disappeared. A leprechaun was heard mumbling something about needing a bigger pot.

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You need to get pre-approved by a lender, find out what your debt/income ratio is, and the lender will be able to show what your monthly payments are.

Hahahahaha!! Top tier! Thanks for enlightening me.

I think the bigger issue here is your income. $170K for a 20% down means you're buying an $850K home. Your mortgage is going to be too high.

At $70K/year you should be paying out less than $2K/month on your mortgage (1/3 income), and you're going to have a tough time financing $680K+ (fees + property taxes usually, at least) and stay under that number.

If you want to put down $170K on a $500K home, well… I wouldn't put down that much personally, but you'd be much more likely to qualify because the financed amount is within your means.

The amount you put down is a bad thing for the lender, they don't make interest on that. And it can come from anywhere (e.g. inheritance, lottery win), and doesn't in any way guarantee you will pay the amount they finance and actually make money on. The reason you even bother to put 20% down is because otherwise you have to get PMI (Private Mortgage Insurance) — if you get an FHA loan, you need to get PMI regardless.

Personally, I ended up needing to get an FHA loan because of a foreclosure in my history that happened > 5 years ago but less than 7 (IIRC, might be 3 and 5 years?), so I decided not to put down 20% as it wouldn't avoid PMI, and instead put down 10% and put the rest of my downpayment into home improvements (kitchen in particular) with the goal of earning out the other 10% in equity (between improvements, payments, and the market) within 2 years so I could refinance with a standard loan and remove the PMI. My house is way nicer than it would've been otherwise, effectively doubling my budget for improvements.

Would love to stay there sometime but I'm too poor. $600+ a night seems outrageous and a 2 night minimum on weekends. That's like a small fortune just for a hotel room.

It'll get you a mobile home or condo on the $170k alone. With patience you'd be able to find a standalone home that needs some real work, but it won't be close to town. That's again without taking on any debt.

On that income and down payment I suspect you could swing $350k total, maybe $400k. That will buy you a small house in a small town here.

If by "western Washington" you really mean Seattle, that's a lot tougher. A standalone house here will min out around $500k, and condos min out around $250k. I would probably aim just a little above the bottom of the market and think about a condo around $300k.

When you say 'no debt' do you mean zero? Or minimal? Lenders look for debts being paid on time, over long periods. If you have no or minimal credit history, you're gonna have trouble getting a loan even with 20%+ down.

I made less than 35k a year and was 40k in debt, but I had lenders calling me to sign me up for home purchase, simply because my CC and other bills were paid on time for several years. Almost bought a house with zero down payment, but it got snatched up by an 'investor' that paid cash while my paperwork was being processed.

It depends on where in western Washington you want to live and the quality of house you buy. My folks sold their home, in Renton, at the end of the summer. Interest rates were hovering around 5.5% at the time. A 20% down payment would have been $189k with an estimated payment just shy of $5k a month. They ended up taking a cash offer for $60k under asking, as it had been on the market for three months and they had already moved out of state.

A lot of that is contingent on where you are buying ie. purchase price and the amount you're gonna finance. Credit scores and debt ratios are also factors that lenders will consider when evaluating your application.

You should look at getting prequalified, plenty of lending institutions will do that for free. You may wanna check with your bank or credit union.

The main issue is finding a home in your price range. Unless from Cali, the housing market can be quite expensive. But one town I'll suggest is Duvall, WA, it's a town that has a rural feel even though you're very close to the urban sprawl. Many people think it's full of hicks, but the reality is like 90% of the families have someone in the tech industry, so the town is mostly progressive. The hicks are just very loud and like to put up there signs come election season.

Depending on where OP is planning to go, some of the forest roads are essentially goat roads and they can be almost impossible to turn around on. OP is unlikely to end up on one unless they're going to visit someone's homestead, but I've taken a wrong turn at dusk and been legitimately terrified.

Be aware your GPS may take you on entirely imaginary routes. I've been directed to go down locked timber trails or drive directly through a forest.

Download offline maps ahead of time, and it's not a bad idea to get a print atlas as well.

Thanks, so of those two, WSU is somewhat better rather than impending lawsuits and such?

Neither. They both receive state funding and waste our money 💴 on things like COVID research that held zero benefits to the populace.

Btw, UW is just as bad at lying as Dr. Fauci. Check out their pending lawsuits and what students/staff have said about hidden funding.

Have fun!

It would depend on your income. I'm putting about that much down on a home I'm currently in the process of buying in Western Washington, and I can afford it.

Use the 28/36 rule https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/twenty-eight-thirty-six-rule.asp

Highline Community College is great! They have CWU on their campus as well and you can get your bachelors from them depending on your major.

The part east of the Willamette and Puget sound is yes. The coastal mountains are the Coast Range.

Pierce college is alright. It’s all that I go to as a RS student.

Sucks to be you because everyone knows the best stretch of WA state i5 is through the bow hills by lake Samish. It's fucking beautiful.

Lol most aggressive drivers in the nation? That's about as wrong as you can get. Passive aggressive is the pnw and it shows in our driving. Drive in the east coast, like Jersey and say we're more aggressive, or Phoenix, fucking Phoenix driving is steroid induced aggressive.

r/Bellingham had a post about someone thinking they were going crazy because they kept hearing a horse by their window in the middle of the night. Later on someone posted asking where they can take their “indoor horse” for night walks. The people of Bham put two and two together and the mystery was solved.