One thing you should always ask yourself before you purchase a home is how long you plan on living there. The answer to that depends on your geographic area as well as the neighborhood you intend to purchase in. The recommended time is to stay in the home for at least 5 years. The reason behind this is if you do not you will probably end up losing money. The first area you’ll end up losing in is closing costs. Every time you go through closing, whether you are a buyer or seller, you will have to give out money. The second area you would lose financially in is the mortgage payments themselves. The way a mortgage works is you pay the most interest in the first few years you own the home, only making enough progress on the actual principle after roughly 5 years to not end up losing money when you sell. If you can, you should wait 5 years before resell and you should get a better return on your home.
Although 5 years is the recommended time, there can be exceptions to this. As most people tend to purchase a house that is towards the upper end of what they can afford, they tend to just pay the regular payments. However, if you buy at the lower end and toss in extra payments you will pay down your principle faster allowing you to get a bigger return as well as sell sooner than the recommended 5 years. You could also buy a home you know you don’t plan on staying in long term, pay it down, fix it up and then rent it out. Before you do this you should be sure you are financially set up enough to handle both mortgages in case you are ever without a renter.