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Finding The Right House
It is best to simply break all the influencing factors down and conquer them one step at a time. Using this system and the process of elimination a suitable home is bound to emerge. Let The Search Begin Take a drive. If you know the neighborhood that you would like to own a home in then take an afternoon to drive around and see what sort of homes are up for sale. Don't even think about dashing up the front steps of a home and declaring that you love the home and want to buy it immediately because there is so much more to buying a home than thinking it's cute. As you will soon find out, buying a home can be a long and drawn out process with plenty of legal issues involved. Even if you decide to enlist the help of a realtor you should still have a good idea of what sort of home and what sort of neighborhood are ideal for you and your particular needs. Know your open house etiquette. If you are working with a realtor many times you will find yourself searching dozens of homes in one day. This can be a dizzying relay and may also result in people sometimes getting desensitized to the fact that they are walking through someone else's home. Preferably, sellers will not be home when you come through since it makes it harder for buyers to get a good look around, but the absence of the seller does not grant you permission to be discourteous. You should behave in a house for sale in the same manner you would behave at anyone else's house. Wipe your feet before entering the house. Don't rummage through their medicine cabinets. Although it is true that it is a fine line between being an inquisitive buyer and a plain old snoop you need to use your best judgment. Sure, you may need to open their closets to get a good idea of what sort of space they have, but do you really need to rifle through their clothes too? Sometimes things get weird. Ask any realtor and they will tell you that not every home showing goes smoothly. There may be a time when you go to look at a house and the seller is sitting on the couch, shirtless and eating a sandwich. Sometimes sellers forget to put their dogs away or the dogs get loose, resulting in an overly affectionate dog encounter in the best case scenario or an angry dog out to protect his territory in the worst case scenario. Sellers should know better than to create awkward situations for buyers when showing a house, but in some cases it's merely a mistake (such as with a loose dog) or in other cases sellers simply get tired of hurriedly leaving the house every time a realtor calls to say they are bringing potential buyers by. Just be prepared for anything when checking out a house for sale, and think twice before loudly proclaiming a house a dump…you never know when the homeowner might be snoozing in the next room. What sort of feeling do you get from the house? When you first walk into a house you should pay close attention to the feeling you get from it. Some people love the feeling of high ceilings and an open floor plan, while others are more comfortable in a house, which is a little cozier. If your initial impression of a home is that of uneasiness then it is best to simply leave. The house may have all sorts of great features hidden within its walls but the simple fact is that a home, which does not feel "right" at first glance, is probably never going to feel "right" ever. Are you having a long-distance relationship with your realtor? In the case of job transfers it can be a difficult process to do your home shopping from a different location. Sometimes a person simply needs to rely on the expertise of their realtor to whittle the long list of available homes down to a couple of suitable homes. Luckily for people purchasing homes in this day and age there is the internet to assist in buying a home when you can't actually be there to check out the homes in person. Some realtors' websites offer virtual open houses where you can tour potential homes online, and there are numerous websites devoted to listing demographic information for certain neighborhoods. You can use the internet to find homes which are for sale, to tour the homes, to check out the surrounding area's median income, educational level, and even crime rates. You might even be able to find out tax information on a certain home including how much the home last sold for and what the annual property taxes are. One word of caution, though: no matter how great a home looks online you should never purchase a home over the internet without first seeing it with your own eyes. Even if that means living in a studio apartment for a few months while waiting for a home to become available, so be it. There are simply too many ways that you might get ripped off by buying a home sight unseen, so it is best to avoid the situation entirely.
Looks Aren't Everything What are your absolute "must-haves" and "don't-wants?" Most people have some very specific desires when looking to purchase a home. Some people insist upon a two-car garage while others refuse to live in a split-level home. It is important to eliminate homes right off the bat which do not correspond to your specific needs. If you know that a home in a certain neighborhood would make you miserable then don't even entertain the thought of looking at homes in that particular area. Not only will it be a waste of your time but you may wind up talking yourself into purchasing a home there and eventually wind up miserable when you realize you should have trusted your initial instinct. If you are working with a realtor it would help for you to sit down and compose a detailed list of what you absolutely insist upon having in a home, and also what sorts of things are unacceptable for your potential home. This way your realtor will not waste their time (and yours) by taking you see houses which you would never in a million years consider buying. Look deeper than the exterior. You pull up to the curb and you see the total package: the white picket fence, the tire swing on the tree in the front yard and even the mailbox is just as you dreamed it would be. Sellers spend a lot of money to give their house what is called "curb appeal." Curb appeal is an attempt to make the first impression of the house appealing and inviting. Landscaping, a new exterior paint job, and other details add to curb appeal. The important thing is to look beyond the initial impression of the house. If you fall in love with a house based solely on how it looks on the outside you may be getting trapped into a home wrought with problems. Pay close attention to every detail inside. If you notice things like cracks in the walls, condensation in the window panes, an odd smell, or various insects running around it may be that this house looks great on the outside to compensate for serious trouble on the inside. Remember the old saying: you can't judge a book by its cover. Décor is temporary. You may be put off by the velvet paintings over the fireplace, or maybe it is the martini glass motif painted in the kitchen that turns your stomach. When you are looking at different homes, though, you need to put up some filters in your mind, which see beyond the tacky furnishings and horrible decorations. Look instead at what the home has the potential to be after you put your own finishing touches on it. If, however, you have no intention of spending time with decorating and would rather find a home, which is ready to move into without any alterations then by all means, pass up the home with the spinning disco ball in the master bedroom. What's the neighboring market value? As a general rule it is best to not own the cheapest or the most expensive house in a neighborhood because when it comes time to sell you won't attract the types of buyers who are interested in your price range. If your home costs more than all the others on the block then people in that price range will go to a higher socioeconomic area, and if your home is the least expensive on the block then people in that price range may not even think to look in your neighborhood because they will naturally assume that there is nothing there they can afford. Keeping this quandary in mind, it is best to not purchase a home with the same issue: being the most valuable or least valuable home in the neighborhood. It's different if you completely fall in love with a certain home and you are absolutely sure that you will never wind up attempting to sell it someday. The main concern revolves around eventual resale. Since you never know what the future may hold it is best to buy a house which will not give you too much grief when the time comes to sell. For this reason, try to find a home which has an estimated value comparable to the surrounding houses. What's nearby? What sort of amenities are you looking for? Would you like a grocery store to be within walking distance? Would you rather live as far away from any sign of civilization as possible? You should take these sorts of things into consideration before deciding on a home. If you find a great home but you clock the drive to work at about an hour and a half each way you may find that this simply won't work for you. Being in close proximity to an elementary school may be ideal for a couple with small children, but far from ideal for a retired couple looking for some peace and quiet. Other considerations can include things like stinky meat packing plants, huge power lines, airports or air force bases, train tracks, or busy highways. No matter how much you love a house you are bound to curse at it when the midnight trains come rolling by every night, interrupting your sleep. Things like these can also greatly affect resale value, so be sure to find out what sort of developments are planned for an area before buying.
Fixer-Uppers Are you handy? Lots of people have the fantasy of fixing up a run-down home to make it what they have always dreamed of, but the difference between fantasy and reality is great. Take a step back and have an honest look at yourself. Have you ever built anything before? If the bird house you constructed in shop class back in high school fell apart when one hapless bird attempted to make it their home, and you have yet to make an attempt at building anything then maybe fixing up a house really isn't a task you should be taking on. If you mess up a shop project then it results in a poor grade, but if you mess up the repairs on a home it can cost big dollars when it comes time to hire contractors to repair your mistakes. It is one thing to hire out the work on a home to customize it to your liking, but doing it all yourself takes dedication and talent. Be realistic when deciding how much you can handle. Do you want a house which is ready to move into? If you are in a position where you really need to get into a home quickly then purchasing a home which needs major repairs is probably not the ideal situation for you. If you absolutely fall in love with a particular home like this then you can do a couple of different things: either live in the house while you tackle the repairs or rent out a temporary home while you work on fixing up the house. Either situation will probably involve quite a bit of hassle, but if this is your dream house then maybe it's worth it. Sometimes the problem is a little bizarre. In some states realtors are required by law to disclose to potential buyers if a home was ever involved in any sort of gruesome murder or other undesirable situation. Some will disclose if anyone passed away in the house, even from natural causes. Although there are some buyers who honestly don't mind homes having histories like this there are certainly other buyers who steer clear of any home which has the potential of giving them the heebie jeebies. Don't rely on your realtor to disclose this sort if information, instead tell him or her in the very beginning that you do not want to see any available house which has this sort of history or a reputation for paranormal activity. They are required to follow your wishes. If this sort of thing doesn't bother you, then by all means check these sorts of houses out. You may get a great deal on a home that nobody else wants.
New vs. Pre-Owned A new house can be awfully tempting. You have undoubtedly heard of the sought-after "new car smell," but the same holds true for new homes. New houses just have a clean, crisp smell to them, which proudly announces that they have never been inhabited before. There is something innately appealing about a new home. In theory, there should be many less potential problems than with an older home; all the appliances are new and the house has yet to start drooping or cracking. Buying a new house is like conquering new territory. Many homeowners like the idea of buying a home, which is theirs and theirs alone nobody else has ever lived in the house, and all the history related to the house is solely that of the buyer's. New houses just generally look nicer too. No previous pets who have scratched up the floorboards, no little handprints in the cement. A new home is like a clean slate, and that idea is incredibly attractive to some people. Building your own house can be exciting. There are a couple different ways to build your own house. There are some people who still pull out the wood and nails and actually construct the home themselves, but these sorts of people are more and more becoming few and far between. The new version of building your own house is to go visit model homes, find one that you like, then pick a lot and have a builder construct the home. There are pros and cons to this sort of arrangement, but the best thing to do is to find a builder who allows for some customization of the home. Some builders charge extra money for even the slightest of modifications, and you need to make sure you understand what sorts of extra fees can be involved. New neighborhoods aren't established. The problem you may encounter with buying a new home is that if the neighborhood itself is new there really hasn't been an established market value for the homes. The builder sells the homes based on what they figure the home should be worth compared to other similar neighborhoods, but when it comes time to sell these estimates may not hold true. Nearby occurrences such as large corporations shutting down or a large natural disaster can affect all home values, new or used, but newer neighborhoods can take the brunt of the depreciation with things like this since there is no true market value history to reference. You may buy a new home in a new neighborhood for $250,000 but if you're the first one in the housing development to eventually sell then you're setting a precedent, either high or low. If buyers won't purchase your home for anything over $235,000 then you have essentially just driven the home values in your entire neighborhood down. New neighborhoods can indeed be tricky. Older houses have history. For better or for worse, older houses have some history attached to them. This bodes well when it comes time to sell since the above mentioned scenario generally won't happen in an older neighborhood, but many times home buyers simply do not like the idea of buying a home which has already had one or more owners. Let's face it…houses show signs of wear and tear no matter how gently people use them. It is nearly impossible for a home to stand for more than a couple years and not get some dings in the walls or cracks in the driveway. While there are some people who seek out historical type homes because they love the idea of living in a home, which has a rich history, there are other people who would simply rather have a new home. Older houses can have some issues. It's usually right around the twenty-year mark that things start to go wrong in most houses. By this time any original appliances are barely hanging on and if the house hasn't been well maintained then it really starting to show. Don't let this dissuade you from purchasing a used home, just be sure to check all the original items to see if they are on their last legs. In some older homes no original appliances or fixtures exist so this isn't an issue, but still be on the lookout for other things. How many times has the house been painted? Will the roof need to be replaced soon? Is the fence in the backyard almost to a point where it will need to be swapped with a new one? It is important to realize that purchasing a used home will inevitably bring with it a higher likelihood that repairs will be needed sooner than later. On the next page we examine Permanent vs. Investment Property.
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Best Home Buying Moves > Finding The Right House
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