2 million dollar budget

lostinirvine

New member
Hello everyone,

Quick and easy question. My wife and i are planning on buying our first home in Irvine. We plan on this being our final home and plan on having kids soon. Our budget is 2 million dollars. Which developments should we consider and why?

Thanks!
 
Laguna Altura. Guard gated and a perfect location in terms of access to the freeway, toll road, beach and entertainment. Great designated schools including UNI.
 
Laguna Altura sucks.  The lot sizes are small so the homes are close together.  Plus it's expensive for Irvine just because it's closer to Laguna Beach.  I think answering the question depends on what you value.  Personally I would go with Northpark for lower property taxes or Portola Springs/Great Park for the cheaper homes. 
 
Lots of options with that budget?good problem! 8)
Some neighborhoods in play (in my order of preference):
1. Orchard Hills: newer community/construction, some homes with views of Catalina island, beautiful topography, the Groves section is guard-gated, larger lots
2. Quail Hill: Great community, some homes with great city-light views, easy access to Laguna Beach, average-sized lots
3. Turtle Ridge: Newport adjacent and close to UCI, guard-gated, quiet neighborhood, tend to have larger lots
4. Turtle Rock: older homes, nice community, tends to have larger lots
5. Laguna Altura: tony neighborhood, guard-gated, smaller homes and lots, easy access to 405/5/133 and Laguna Beach
All of these neighborhoods have excellent schools.
Good luck!
 
For me personally, would not buy a $2M dollar house in Irvine but if I did, it would be in Turtle Ridge.  Dont even think Laguna Altura or Northpark has $2M homes.  If they do, there are very few and I bet you are getting a bad deal. 

Good luck....

 
All areas have their positives and negatives.  Can you provide us with a little more color on what is important to you? 
 
Quail Hill for elevated semi-newer.

Turtle Rock for elevated older.

Woodbridge if you like older, flatter area.

Pavilion Park for newest flatter area homes.

Brand new... no recs... nothing seems worth $2m in new home offerings in Irvine to me.
 
lostinirvine said:
Hello everyone,

Quick and easy question. My wife and i are planning on buying our first home in Irvine. We plan on this being our final home and plan on having kids soon. Our budget is 2 million dollars. Which developments should we consider and why?

Thanks!
You're only in the kid planning stage and you're already shopping for your final home?  What if you end up having seven kids?  You should get what you need now and when your family is complete, then get your final house.  BTW, two million won't get you much of a house in Turtle Ridge.
 
Someone that have 2 mil. to spend and you go on here to ask. I think you got it all wrong. With 2 mil. even though its not that huge of a budget by Orange county standard. You should have an exclusive agent. Not some forum to tell you.
 
Real estate agents are just like used car salesmen and useless.  I would try to find one who would give back commission or just use Redfin if you can't find one who will. 

Also why is everyone suggesting to get a 2 million dollar home because the budget is 2 million?  The home mortgage interest deduction only covers up to 1 million and most lenders want 25% down for borrowing 1mil+.  I would go at most half the max you can afford so a budget should be less than 2 million if you can afford 4 million.  Preferably 6 million plus.  DTI is 36% for the max and after paying 50% of your upper bracket income in taxes it almost all goes towards paying for the home.  So it's pretty foolish to be at 36% DTI for a 2 million dollar home. 
 
collected said:
Real estate agents are just like used car salesmen and useless.  I would try to find one who would give back commission or just use Redfin if you can't find one who will. 

Also why is everyone suggesting to get a 2 million dollar home because the budget is 2 million?  The home mortgage interest deduction only covers up to 1 million and most lenders want 25% down for borrowing 1mil+.  I would go at most half the max you can afford so a budget should be less than 2 million if you can afford 4 million.  Preferably 6 million plus.  DTI is 36% for the max and after paying 50% of your upper bracket income in taxes it almost all goes towards paying for the home.  So it's pretty foolish to be at 36% DTI for a 2 million dollar home. 

people are suggesting 2 million dollar homes because it's what the poster asked for and said it was his budget.  whether he can afford it or whether he should be buying a 1 million dollar or 4 million dollar home is irrelevant because you don't know his how much money he has and he didn't volunteer it or ask you to analyze it. 
 
dethman said:
people are suggesting 2 million dollar homes because it's what the poster asked for and said it was his budget.  whether he can afford it or whether he should be buying a 1 million dollar or 4 million dollar home is irrelevant because you don't know his how much money he has and he didn't volunteer it or ask you to analyze it.

It's not exactly what the poster asked for.  Budget means maximum so in that case a 1.2 million dollar home would be fine for a 2 million dollar budget if it fulfills what the poster wants. 

I would try Cressa plan 3 - https://nwhm.com/neighborhood/771/residences or just look for low PPS for the lot size/location/upgrades such as this one: https://www.redfin.com/CA/Irvine/117-Catalonia-92618/home/54780233
 
Real Estate Agents, carefully vetted, are often deal makers/deal savers. Yes, in any profession the 80/20 rule applies (perhaps in the case of Real Estate Agents its 98/2%). There are plenty of cases I can provide when a Realtor's actions overprotected their  clients from a ruinous transaction. Not the subject of this thread, but my .02c on one part of the discussion.

Interesting to see so many posts saying "close to Laguna..." or something similar. At $2m why not just buy in Laguna? You avoid HOA fees, Mello Roos, and the schools are equal to Irvine's (HERETIC!!!) and with smaller class sizes. Don't most advisors say to purchase the smallest home is the best neighborhood? That's about what $2m in Laguna Beach will get you.

If Irvine is a "must" then my vote is for OH. Really think that's a great location and as a whole development  a well drawn up community.
 
Believe it or not, change is coming to the real estate buying and selling process.


Soylent Green Is People said:
Real Estate Agents, carefully vetted, are often deal makers/deal savers. Yes, in any profession the 80/20 rule applies (perhaps in the case of Real Estate Agents its 98/2%). There are plenty of cases I can provide when a Realtor's actions overprotected their  clients from a ruinous transaction. Not the subject of this thread, but my .02c on one part of the discussion.

Interesting to see so many posts saying "close to Laguna..." or something similar. At $2m why not just buy in Laguna? You avoid HOA fees, Mello Roos, and the schools are equal to Irvine's (HERETIC!!!) and with smaller class sizes. Don't most advisors say to purchase the smallest home is the best neighborhood? That's about what $2m in Laguna Beach will get you.

If Irvine is a "must" then my vote is for OH. Really think that's a great location and as a whole development  a well drawn up community.
 
We've already seen changes.

In the end you can do it yourself if you want but you'll probably have to offer a commission to buying agents to get them to bring clients to your property or you'll most likely be depending on people looking at FSBO and then they'll expect to get a reduced price since they know there is no commission.

 
I agree that with $2mil, Laguna Beach would be a great place to live with pretty good schools. 

Otherwise, in Irvine, buy a home close to the best high schools to retain the value of your new home.  That would be Turtle Ridge/Turtle Rock (Uni HS), Orchard Hills (Northwood HS) and PS/Altair/GP/LR (Portola HS).  TR and OH both feed into established HS and both have nice topography and will retain their value.  Portola HS will be the next #1 HS in Irvine and there will be some nice properties coming up in the neighborhoods very close to the HS in the $1-2+mil range from PS (gated and non-gated) and Altair (gated).  These will be a little cheaper than TR and OH to start but once the area becomes more developed, the prices of the homes will go up just as the Northwood Pointe homes went up after Northwood HS became more established and the area became more developed.
 
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