Chloe and Jake spend about eight hours on yard work during a typical weekend at their four bedroom Virginia house. The property includes an office, a pool and 1.5 acres, but the demands of owning it have left both of them wanting out.
Around the 1990s, the house belonged to one of Jake’s uncles, a multimillionaire whose grounds featured two koi ponds and a staff of gardeners. Much of that landscaping had gone untended by the time Jake’s parents sold the couple the house in late 2020.
Chloe, 32, works as a software engineer, while Jake, 30, is a senior manager in an engineering department. Despite the familiar promise of homeownership, Chloe questioned whether the supposed dream made sense for them.
“Everybody that we talk to is like, you know, homeownership is the dream,” Chloe told personal finance author Ramit Sethi on the Nov. 3 episode of his podcast. “And I’m like, are we just dumb?”
The couple secured a 2.7% mortgage when the average fixed rate mortgage over 30 years tracked by Freddie Mac was near its record low of 2.65% in January 2021. Freddie Mac’s Nov. 12 survey placed that average at 7.11%.
Data for the second quarter of 2026 from the Federal Housing Finance Agency showed that only 19.2% of outstanding U.S. mortgages carried rates below 3%. That made walking away from their loan a difficult decision, and Chloe spent about eight months going back and forth.
Before buying, the couple had paid $2,400 per month in rent. Jake believed such low mortgage rates might never return and considered rent wasted money, even though the house appraised at $595K, above their $500K budget.
They skipped the inspection and accepted the property as is. The mortgage was placed in Jake’s name alone because, according to him, averaging their credit scores would have put them below a 760 cutoff.
Their monthly mortgage payment with escrow increased from $2,990 to $3,072. Once maintenance and other expenses were included, Chloe and Jake estimated that the property was costing them closer to $4,500 each month.
The financial burden expanded through what Chloe called their “schemes.” Two years ago, they took out an $80K home equity loan to fund renovations intended to convert the property into an Airbnb rental, despite barely examining rental demand in an area Chloe described as soft.
They also purchased a 44 foot RV that was eight years old for $50K, along with a new truck capable of towing it. The RV proved so difficult to get off the property that it never went on a trip, and they sold it two years later for between $30K and $32K.
As of the podcast episode, the couple was directing about $7,000 each month toward the remaining $45K balance on the home equity loan. They need to eliminate that debt before selling the house.
Their finances nevertheless showed substantial income and assets. Sethi calculated that they earned $30,166 per month before taxes, or $361,992 annually, while holding $304K in investments, $68K in savings and a net worth of $692K.
Jake favored selling the house, taking about $250K in equity and placing it in an S&P 500 index fund without touching it. He believed that approach could largely provide for their retirement while they were still young, but Chloe continued worrying that the house could rise further in value.
Sethi calculated that keeping the property and retiring in 25 years could leave them with about $4.8 million. Selling now and investing the equity could produce closer to $6.2 million, although rent would probably consume some of that difference.
“One way or another, both of these decisions will be fine,” Sethi told them. Rather than treating the choice as a purely mathematical contest, he repeatedly directed the conversation toward the life they actually wanted.
Chloe had considered renting out the house, but she acknowledged that the yard was a mess during the previous tenancy and that she would probably handle the renters. Sethi also noted that without the house, responsibilities involving the well and septic system would disappear from their list.
“We can buy another house if we want to,” Chloe said near the end. “We have the money.”
Sethi advised counting the full monthly cost of ownership, including upkeep, while also assigning value to the time a property consumes. Before renting a home, owners should determine how tenants will be screened, who will handle repairs and where money for breakdowns will come from.
In Sethi’s view, most renovations do not pay for themselves, making borrowed money for such work difficult to justify. Chloe and Jake said future major purchases requiring debt would first face a cooling off period.
The couple has spoken with a real estate agent about listing the house and plans to move to the West Coast. Their choice means relinquishing a rare 2.7% mortgage, but it also removes a property whose financial costs and constant demands no longer fit the life they want.