What would you do with an extra $55,000?

The lease on our apartment goes until November, and then Mike and I want to buy a home.  We're thinking about Lincoln Park which offers more space and grass than the city, but you still have a city view and it's a far cry from the dreaded 'burbs.  (By dreaded I mean he thinks they'd be terrible, I think they'd be filled with oh-so-fun Super Target's and Carrabba's).

I started looking at homes last week, and found that we can actually buy!  I did a mortgage calculator and figured that we could own for about $500 a month less than what we pay for rent.  The homes are super cute too...they're basically brick-stone townhomes with little yards and large roof-top decks.

But then I read the fine print.

I realized to park at our beautiful home, keep in mind I'm talking about ONE parking spot, that's an extra $25,000.  Yeah, and I'm not kidding.

This is apparently a bargain too.  In our workout facility, I saw that someone is selling a parking spot downtown.  It's either $290 a month, or $55,000 to buy the thing!  Can you imagine if your car leaked oil, you'd be like, "Noooooo!  I paid $55,000 for this...it can't have stains!"

Welcome to city life....