Stress the safety of a house and a yard for a dog. In an apartment you never know what kind of person will move in, but you do know they will change. Todays nice neighbor may move out ,letting a terrorist move in.
Start browsing the on-line realty sites for your area. See if maybe there are some open houses she’d go with you to see. You haven’t hired a realtor, you haven’t made any commitments, you’re just dipping your toe in the water. The first couple you go to may be deliberately underwhelming, so she doesn’t feel pressure to jump on the first thin you see. By house 3 or 4 start showing her the real condenders. The idea is to slowly get to the point where she doesn’t feel pressured.
StG
Right idea but lets prime the pump a little first. Since the Op (and mate) are handy with their hands I would tempt the missus with a trip through an IKEA store. Apartment dwellers have just as much fun there and they have a lot of mini-examples of various rooms. then buy software for remodeling and make a fantasy kitchen. Show her the kitchen you built and let her play with the software. Then build a house around the kitchen.
Be forthright in your attempt to seduce her with a house. She knows the current apartment is going to be a problem and moving is a real hassle. There is nothing preventing the situation from happening again. A plus for moving into a house.
Oh, before I forget, if you use Bing mapping you can walk through neighborhoods by entering into street view and using the < > symbols to navigate. This works while you are looking directly at a house unlike the Google version which just rotates 360 degrees within each captured image.
This is very true, and we have just recently experienced it first hand. Well, not the terrorist part. We had great neighbors the first 4-5 months we lived here. Everyone in our building, and many of the people in the building across the way all were friends. We used to have big barbecues and hang out by the pool. Slowly though, they started moving out of the complex, and now we only know three other people, one person below us, and a couple across the way. It stinks when you have a great group of social neighbors, and they move out and get replaced by people who don’t want anything to do with anyone else.
I think a couple of your theories need expansion
1b. She is afraid that one or both of you might become unemployed. I know two people who lost their jobs right after buying a home before the economy tanked, so it’s possible these days that she knows someone in that boat too.
2a. She is afraid to make the commitment, with you, to a home without knowing if/when/how many kids you might have. What if you buy a cute two-bedroom and have three or four kids? Or buy a four bedroom home and end up with no kids, but three empty bedrooms? Either situation makes the prospect of having to go through home buying all over again in a few years come up, where with an apartment you’re only commited to it for a year before you can with much less hastle swap it for another.
2b. She’s afraid that the two of you will make the commitment to a home, then find out your careers will prompt a move.
2c. How far do you live from your repective parents and how is their general health? Having to take care of an ailing parent can uproot a couple too.
4a. Living in a house is more work than living in an apartment. Repairs and yard matenence (including shoveling snow, raking, lawn mowing) fall to you instead of a landlord.
I’m not trying to suggest that I can read her mind, but don’t be too quick to assume you’ve thought of all of the same issues that she has with your list.
Thanks Elfkin477, I wasn’t assuming I had the complete list. I was actually hoping for contributions so I can get a better idea of things she might be considering that I am missing.
BTW, when figuring the expense of owning a house, don’t forget property taxes, homeowners insurance, and utilities.
She doesn’t like the idea of a garden?
There are a few things to think about. It is largely a myth that you will come out a lot better financially if you buy. Theoretically, you should be able to rent a comparable space for less than it would cost you to buy & maintain it. If you invest the savings, you’ll come out about the same in the long run.
However, you’re saying you live in an area where you can easily find a $100,000 house, yet it costs you close to $1000 per month to rent 870 sq feet? That just doesn’t sound right. Are you living in a big city, and looking to buy out in the suburbs? Maybe that is her issue. If not, you might be living in an apartment that is much nicer than anything you could buy. Maybe that’s another issue.
Also replacing appliances, the roof, HVAC systems, etc.
Having just bought my first house at 50, let me tell you this new landlord (IE :ME) sucks!!!
She’s lazy, she fired the landscaper (I cant afford it!) it took her forever to replace the dishwasher…Like having a baby, you really don’t know what you’re getting into until you do it.
I’m still glad I did…but I have 3 dogs and 4 cats and now I live in the woods.
Man…I have grown cynical in my old age…That was the first thing I thought of! 
A house is a huge responsibility and I am gun-shy about it too. Last year, our heater didn’t work. We called the landlord, and they came down, called a service guy to look at the furnace, over two days tried to figure out what it could be. They finally figured out the thermostat was broken. We got a brand new programmable thermostat.
This…was all paid for by my landlord. Imagine the stress and cost if I had to pay for that myself. We rent a house, for the record. $800 a month. I don’t pay property taxes, of course, and while I still maintain the outdoors, it’s nice because I have a garden. It’s probably one of the best places I have ever lived.
Houses are scary. If anything breaks it’s on you. If anything goes wrong you have to pay for it. It gives you a sense of permanence you may not be ready for.
All that being said, none of these reasons may apply to your wife and you’ll have to talk to her directly.
I just can’t imagine anyone renting forever. Way too impersonal for my tastes.
Even if you don’t move into a condo, there are people who will do things like yardwork for a monthly fee. Mr. Neville and I own a single-family house, and we pay someone to do our yardwork (he doesn’t have time to do it, and I’m too allergic to the grass).
This is all true, and how well I remember that feeling the first time something went wrong with our house, and I thought “oh shit, something’s wrong, and there’s no landlord to call and get it fixed”. That was not a pleasant feeling.
However, if you rent, you run the risk of getting stuck with a bad landlord who can’t or won’t do needed repairs in a timely manner.
You’ve said a couple of times that she tends to move more slowly than you on these things; perhaps she’s just got a different style of decisionmaking? My husband is this exact same way. Even if he’s made a decision about something, he has to look at it from every angle possible to take action. On the other hand, if I’ve made a decision on something, while I try to make informed decisions, I want to do something now. I’ve found that the best thing to do in those situations, as others have mentioned, is to back off a little and allow him to think things out. If I push, he just digs his heels in because he feels pressured to come to a conclusion or do something even if he’s not ready.
I don’t know why you think people on a message board can tell you what’s bothering your wife. There is exactly one person who can - YOUR WIFE. Communicate with her on this. Communication is absolutely key in any marriage. Go talk to her. Listen. Discuss.
You can get shitty house neighbors as well, except you cannot move and get away from them. Look at Indygrrl’s situation - the neighbors let their dogs run & bark, and when she complained, they became threatening.
Being a homeowner is a giant pain in the ass sometimes. When the garbage disposal goes, guess who gets to fix it. When there is a leak, I have to call the plumber and be prepared to foot the bill. It can be a bigger expense, and you can’t just up and move somewhere else as easily as before.
What’s more, if you own your home, shitty neighbors can result in an actual financial loss for you, if they drive down the value of your property when you want to sell. That wouldn’t happen if you were renting- if the people living in your complex drive down the rent, you benefit financially.
Taking on that much debt for the first time can be scary. I remember that sinking feeling of “what the hell am I getting myself into” when I signed the mortgage paperwork for our house. The amount was more money than I’ve ever thought about at one time, except in lottery fantasies. I’d never had student loan or car loan debt before, either, so I had no experience with that kind of thing. I’m glad we did buy a house, but it was scary at the time.