<p>We are looking at this as buying our NEXT home not really as a vacation home. It happens that the location would be wonderful when the winters get cold and snowy here. But our main purpose in buying a second home now is that we plan to have it as our primary home in five years or so…or at least our winter home.</p>
<p>engineer and qdogpa, certainly it isn’t for everyone. I don’t claim that it is, nor does it appear that anyone else here who has a second home is claiming that. 
For us it works, and works well. It’s a beautiful spot, as I sit here on my (concrete-no staining!) deck, with an iced tea and my laptop, watching dolphins jumping out of the water playing, I can say it’s worth every penny. It obviously doesn’t make ‘financial sense’ to everyone but we are in the financial position to be able to afford it, we’re very fortunate, and we can still travel and stay in nice hotels when we choose to do so. I realize that most people will not be able to do what we do, but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t a wonderful idea for some.</p>
<p>Well, truthfully, what some people are thinking of as a shore house and what we have are two different things. Again, ours is half mile from the beach, and that beach is the Del. Bay. No big salt issues. If we want bigger waves, we drive or bike over to Cape May, four miles away.</p>
<p>And we certainly don’t have 800,000 or a million to spend on a house. I think our moderate house, which cost a fraction of that, mgiht not suit a lot of people who are picturing the dream house, but it works for us. We have family and friends nearby, and like Thumper says, it’s our “next” home, not really a vacation home. It just feels like one.</p>
<p>And with luck, by the time we get to retirement, it will be paid off, plus whatever we get when we sell the other home (tiny, in fairly bad condition, won’t bring much in), putting us in a good retirement position. (fingers crossed.)</p>
<p>I mean, the OP asked for personal experience. That’s what I’m offering. Not looking for an argument.</p>
<p>We built a fairly large log cabin in the mountains in western Maine. The logs were cut from trees milled on our property, so we were able to pay for the construction as we went along. Taxes are about $250/year, and there isn’t much maintenance. We don’t have running water or electricity, but that’s part of the attraction for us. Even our teenagers still love going up to “camp” (as it’s called in Maine). The place doesn’t have much monetary value, but that’s OK.</p>
<p>Garland and Alwaysamom, i am not suggesting anythng about your places… I am voicing my opinion about why we chose not to buy the beach home, which we also can afford, but not getting there enough,leads me to say it makes no financial sense…i would never rent it out,way to OCD for that…</p>
<p>@garland - we rented in Cape May for 10 years when the kids were younger. I know the area you live in, as I used to ride my bike there every day. Very nice. Cape May was just too far for us to buy in - southern Monmouth County a more practical choice and we found a town that has quite a bit in common with Cape May. </p>
<p>One reason we stopped renting is we fixed the place up over the years, and also being OCD, I didn’t want my new carpeting ruined. Hated the old stuff that came with the place. </p>
<p>Buying a second home is a very personal choice. We did the calculations 8 years ago and passed. Five years later, our views changed. I think one reason we don’t have huge maintenance is that my house is so close to the neighbors, the salt doesn’ t settle on the siding!</p>
<p>nj2011–My H and I grew up in Monmouth Co., so you don’t have to sell it to us! We ended up living in North Jersey by accident, sort of, but always wanted to get back to our roots. We were looking for a cheap area, with a little less crowding than Monmouth. Plus, we’d been doing large family gatherings down this way, and got attached.</p>
<p>But whenever I find myself on Sandy Hook, or Red Bank, or Highlands or anywheres up that way, I do get a little nostalgic. I think we made the right choice for us (taxes so cheap down here, fer instance, and family around) but a big part of my soul is up in Northern Monmouth where I grew up.</p>
<p>You are making ME nostalgic with the Cape May talk! I grew up going there for summer vacations. My mother (now 86) was a parade beauty queen way back when, as was my aunt. Long family ties. I miss it! Chalfonte-Haddon Hall. Dressing up at night to go to the boardwalk…</p>
<p>My sister and her family have 2 vacation homes. One is a lake house in the Poconos about 100 minutes away from their “main” home and the other is a Florida condo in Ft. Meyers that they got for a steal in 2009. They get to Florida a few times a year, but not all that often. They don’t rent out either place. The Poconos house (this is the 3rd Poconos lake house) is a lot of work, but it’s something they enjoy and they love to have guests. My husband and I would NOT want all that work and the drive every weekend to get there, but everyone is different.</p>
<p>I did not like having two homes much. We had our large family home in a nice suburban town where I was very comfortable, where we lived for 20 years. Five years ago we bought a smaller home in an island beach community 1 1/2 to 2+ hours away, depending on traffic. There is a short ferry ride in the middle, so it breaks up the drive, but there can be long backups in the summer. </p>
<p>I thought it was too hard to take care of two homes, both with landscaping and perennial beds. I was constantly working on each end, trying to keep up, and that was with cleaning help and some gardening help on both sides. I had to haul food to the vacation home, in huge insulated bags, haul it in, unpack it all, cook and clean up all weekend (few restaurants here), and then reverse the process on Mon. AM. I got so I didn’t feel at home anywhere! </p>
<p>The costs of the two houses plus the cleaning and gardening help got to be too much as well, so we moved to the beach house and sold the larger family house. </p>
<p>I don’t think I’ll ever own two homes again; possibly a condo in a warmer area. I don’t like that pulled between two places feeling.</p>
<p>I don’t have a vacation house and probably never will have. But I did have to take care of and sell my parents’ two homes after they died. Selling the family home was bad enough but then to do it again out of state was just a real pain. The economy in Florida was and still is bad and we had to deal with storm damage from afar. I would rather rent a place for a month and rent a different place somewhere else then be tied down. Just my opinion.</p>
<p>As some have said, one home is more than enough for us.</p>
<p>Thanks for this thread. Nothing to contribute, but am enjoying reading it. We are thinking about retirement and trying to decide. I definitely have enough stuff for two houses in this one house.</p>
<p>I’ll assent with those who say one is enough. We would dearly like to sell the “main house” but alas, we are not nearly old enough to retire, and we can’t find work near the prefered house. So we’ll just keep driving backand forth till we can. It’s worth it to us to be where we’d rather be more of the time.</p>
<p>Only get the second home now if it is affordable and you will definitely be able to use it now. Ten years from now you may have changed your minds about where to retire. We redinfined our retirement plans several times before ending up in a city in FL recently. Never would have thought this would be our choice ten years ago. You don’t want to be saddled with a house and forced to go there instead of actively thinking about things only a year or two before you retire.</p>
<p>Like many New Yorkers, we had an apartment in the city and a house on a lake for weekend. It was a nice house with a beautiful lake view. Kids were little. We would pack them up every Fri night to go to the house and drive back early Mon morning. </p>
<p>As kids got older, we all got tired of going back and forth. We had a housekeeper in the city, but we didn’t have one at our vacation home, so the first thing we would have to do was to clean the house every weekend, go grocery shopping, before we could relax. Whenever there was storm, we would worry about the house and make sure someone plowed the driveway before we went out there. I felt like there was such a weight on me having the 2nd home.</p>
<p>If I were to have a vacation home again, I would get a condo/apartment where there would be security and maintenance people on site, so I wouldn’t have to worry about it when I am not there.</p>
<p>Unlike the sensible posters here, our second home was an impulse purchase in an area we knew little about. Somehow it all worked out, we love our time here and have made great friends. The challenges of a second home described up thread are undeniable, but it doesn’t seem to matter, when we are so happy to be here. We’ve had the home 11 years now and still get very excited anticipating every 1800 mile trip to our slice of paradise.</p>
<p>This is my first chance back online since I posted my question. Thank you all so much for you input. As we expected, there are lots of pros and cons. Much food for thought, especially about the burdens of maintenance and cleaning, the conflict between being OCD and thinking about renting the property out to others, and whether or not this would be our “forever” place. We are going to check out the property we are eyeing next weekend (visitors’ day at camp), and will make sure we leave the rose-colored glasses at home. In the meantime, keep the responses coming. The more informed we are, the better.</p>
<p>We moved into our summer beach house a month ago. We plan to spend about 4 months a year here. We outfitted one room as a home office for my husband. I love having two residences but I do agree about the feel of the place being less relaxing now that we own instead of rent. Everyone wants to come and visit and this also contributes to more work for me. Once we get the printer up and running I have to come up with some basic house rules so that I dont burn out from the constant hostess duties.</p>
<p>^Amen to that. you can spend a lot of time washing sheets and towels if you’re not careful!</p>