She kept renting even after she made millions—why she chose to buy a home now
Tori Dunlap, author and entrepreneur First 100 thousand dollarsHe attributed renting to helping him build his business and reach multimillionaire status.
“One of the best financial decisions I ever made was not buying property,” he told CNBC Make It in 2024.
Although he had the money to buy a property earlier and almost bought an apartment outside Seattle when he was 22, renting made more sense for his lifestyle. He traveled frequently for work, and the house he almost bought required him to spend about three hours a day getting in and out of the city. At the age of 27, he put all his belongings into storage and spent a year traveling the world; This would have been much more difficult if he had had a home back then.
“Every time I thought about being a homeowner going through the process, I just didn’t have the bandwidth,” he says. “[It] It just wasn’t the right time. “I thought, ‘Okay, I’ve got a lot of stuff I need to do for work.'”
But that changed recently, with the 31-year-old buying his first home in the summer of 2025.
‘I’m tired of someone else deciding where I live’
From a financial standpoint, Dunlap has been able to buy a home for some time. HE He says that by the time he was 25, he had saved $100,000, and by the time he was 27, he had a multimillion-dollar net worth. But he says continuing to rent allows him to continue building his business and enjoy traveling for long periods without worrying about making mortgage payments on top of short-term rental accommodation.
But earlier this year, the owner of the house he last rented put the property up for sale; It was a situation Dunlap also dealt with during a previous hire. Faced with the decision of finding another rental or moving into ownership, wider living circumstances led him to the latter.
“Frankly, I was tired of having someone else decide where I lived every year, and I didn’t like that lack of stability,” he said. last episode from his podcast. He had been in a relationship for about three years and things were going well. This security changed his way of thinking: “I want to decide when to leave, when to stay, and what I want my life to be like,” he said.
“That’s when I said, ‘Okay, I think it’s time. I think it’s time to buy a house.'”
‘I am now a multimillionaire in debt’
The house Dunlap chose was an emotional decision rather than a financial one. He wasn’t trying to find the property that would provide the best return on investment or be the most affordable option; rather, he was trying to find the property that felt like home, an example of his broader philosophy about how people should look at financial decisions and wealth building.
“I want personal finance and money to be a tool,” he says. “You don’t want that to be the thing that makes or breaks a decision for you… If you can’t see yourself there, if it doesn’t really feel like home, don’t buy the house. It doesn’t matter how good an investment it is.”
Still, she used her financial expertise to be strategic in purchasing her home.
Eventually, he says, he made a “playtime decision” to mortgage his home and put down about 60%. The house needed plumbing repairs, and he was initially quoted around $50,000 for it. Although he found a contractor to do the job for much less, this example provided a good example of why it is especially wise for new homeowners to keep some cash reserves.
“For the first time in five years, I became a multimillionaire with no debt,” he says. “I think this surprises a lot of people, the fact that debt can be leveraged and used as an asset, because I don’t want to tie up cash that I don’t have to tie up… I wanted to think about preserving my cash and using my debt wisely.”
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