Courtesy of Beatrice de Jong
Beatrice de Jong and her husband.
- Beatrice de Jong is a licensed real estate agent and consumer trends expert at Opendoor, a real estate company that makes it simple to buy and sell a home online.
- She bought her first home at 24, and is passionate about educating and empowering home buyers and sellers.
- When de Jong and her husband were first engaged, they decided to elope to avoid an expensive wedding day - and prioritized saving money to buy their first home together.
- They also saved money on the house itself, choosing to buy a fixer-upper that they could renovate and customize to make it their dream home.
- De Jong says it's important for couples to be on the same page and prioritize their must-haves as well as consider what's practical, such as location and layout of the house.
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I bought my first home when I was 24, and I fell in love with real estate throughout the process.
I saved up $64,000 for a down payment by using the 50/30/20 finance rule. Managing such a massive purchase on my own taught me to think about the value behind experiences and things, as well as how much happiness I expect from the things I spend money on.
By the time my now-husband Michael and I were engaged to be married, I was 33, and realized that spending a lot of money on a wedding probably wasn't right for me. Though we entertained the idea at first, we were both dealing with family matters and felt strongly about paying for our nuptials on our own. Once we dug into researching costs, we felt even more validated in our decision to forego big wedding day plans to elope and save money. Eloping to our dream vacation spot, Bora Bora, cost about 40-50% less than what we would have spent on a wedding. We wanted to prioritize something else that was deeply important to both of us: our future, and having a home we could share.