My recently married 22 year old daughter just bought a house. Her and her husband had both been saving well before marriage and had $50,000 to put down. We helped her find a house through a realtor friend that had been repossessed and was in terrible shape, but brick and basically solid. I think I've mentioned here that I have 11 children, 9 boys and 2 girls, ages 38-12. The entire family pitched in and totally gutted and remodeled the place. I've been in construction for 30 years and have numerous connections in the industry and got her deals on the things we couldn't do. They paid $120,000 and have around $40,000 in the remodel and repairs. The bank just appraised it at $200,000 and they had no trouble getting a loan. Their interest rate is 7% something, don't remember the fraction, but payments will be significantly cheaper than the apartment they were renting. So it's still doable but we really had to pull out all the stops.