Is the cost of living in your current home really that high as in are the utilities and maintenance there really so expensive as to seriously eat into your ability to save?
In Finland, condominiums or row house apartments are owned through corporations called housing corporations. Each homeowner is a shareholder owning shares that entitle to possessing a certain unit. The governance structure is similar to any other type of corporation. A housing corporation may get loans for renovating its property. Now, from what you've told us earlier, much of your monthly fee must go towards paying off the renovation loans of your housing corporation. That is a form of equity building. It's not money down the drain. The property has been upgraded in major ways, which in turn means a higher resale value for each unit. The less the corporation owes to the bank, the more money the next owner will have to pay for your unit.
The problem is that the upgrades aren't well thought out for the future, so the building doesn't appear to have had value added. There are coming (yet to be announced) exterior upgrades that are another loan on top, but will not add that much value, especially if the people who have made the decisions the last twenty years, will make them for the next five. The worst of stake based voting :D
For the same monthly or not much more, we can get into a house and slowly renovate it to the point it will be 30% up in the next 3 years and move in ready for a family who can't get a reno loan. We can save, but we can also pay the same and instead of saving, put that money straight into renovations as we go. We will have the deposit plus some to get started on the renovations, then add continually to them each month.
It's hard to say without knowing what the upgrades were. Have units been sold in your building recently?
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