<prompt> Human: I rent right now with my SO 2150mo, 1600 is my share. Im saving 1500-2000mo. My SO graduates with a PhD in May. At that time, we could comfortably put down 25-35k, but this is nowhere near enough for a 20 downpayment on a home want to live in 550-750k in our area. After he graduates, we expect to make roughly 200kyr, so the mortgage payment on a home in that price range would be more than reasonable for us to handle monthly even with a low downpayment. If we continued to rent a place to live at roughly the same price as our current rent and saved until we could afford a 150k down payment, we would spend roughly 60k in rent. This sounds like a lot more money than the cost of PMI over the years that it would take to reach 22 equity and kill off PMI, and thats even if we didnt bother to pay down additional principal early on in the loan.Is the conventional logic not applicable to this situation or am I missing something?edit for more specific math: a 750k home would require a 150k down payment, which I estimate would take roughly 30 months. 30 months of renting at 2150 is 65k. On that same 750k home, buying in May instead and not bothering to pay additional principal each month would mean paying PMI assumed 0.5, 296mo for 105 months of 31k.And some additional context, were both pretty fiscally responsible, credit scores approaching 800 limiting factor is age of credit etc etc, so assuming the best rates available seems fair.  <response>: Youre not missing anything. Run the numbers, which it appears you have, and make the best decision for you. Paying PMI got us into a house for the first time with no down payment. A year later we were able to refinance it with no PMI. Good luck! 