You probably think your mortgage is your biggest expense, but there is a “Shadow Bill” lurking in your mailbox that is growing faster than your property value. Between hidden maintenance costs, rising insurance, and the sheer price of labor, the average cost of owning a home has spiked another 5% this February alone. If you feel like you’re working just to keep the lights on and the roof from leaking, you aren’t imagining things. The system of homeownership has become a high-stakes game of financial whack-a-mole. Here is the investigative look at why it now costs an extra $16,000 a year just to exist in your own house.
