For the home owners...

summerbld2

Hi!

We are in the process of looking for a house to buy and looking for some advice...

What are some things that you'd wished you "knew then that you know now" about the house buying process/decision making?

Do you felt like you should have budgeted a higher or a lower mortgage monthly payment than with what you currently have?

If you'd could do it over again what would you do differently?

 

 

Mrs.Greg

I wish the bedrooms were bigger. We have 4 but they are small. And our hall bathroom is small too. The rest of the house is great. I just worry about the girls outgrowing their bedrooms before we are able to buy a new house.

mexicolombiana

Good question, I wouldn't do anything differently personally, but I can give you advice based on what some of my clients do wrong. 

1. BUDGET for house repairs.  Like a lot of house repairs.  Budget at least $100 a month or more on repairs in the beginning.

2. For the love of all things holy figure out if your property taxes are included or not in the mortgage and make sure the escrow calculation is done right.  

3. HIRE a real estate attorney to be with you at the closing you have no IDEA how many people don't do it and then get screwed over something in the contract.

4. Pay for a good home inspection.  

5. Play hardball with the seller and ask for concessions, $ at closing, repairs to be done before closing etc.  You never know unless you ask!

6. Check out the neighbors before you buy (just for fun if you can) like check the child molesters in the area and make sure you aren't moving in NEXT DOOR to one! 

And save save save $ to have a nice downpayment.  I feel like closing costs ALWAYS get undercalculated and you have to come up more $ than you think at closing.

Good luck! (i'm a bankruptcy attorney and deal with lots of real estate issues and people who can't afford their homes later in life!) 

 EDIT: I do wish we had chosen a home with a bathroom on the 2nd floor level with the bedrooms are but at my price point and in the neighborhood we wanted it was slim pickings. 

Mustardseed2007

You need a good real estate agent that is on your side. Get your own home inspections that you pay for. Do pressure tests on plumbing.Try to pick the title company if you at all possibly can. If you don't know a title company, your real estat eagent should.

For me, neighborhood and school district was the absolute most important thing. I You can change your house over time, but you cannot change your neighborhood.

I do like the neighborhood we bought into, but if I had to do it over again I would prefer to be deeper into that neighborhood and part of the school district that I like than we actually are.  We did well, though.

gracefulruby33

Our budget for a home was decided with the hopeful future of me being able to stay at home with our kids. I wish we had put more down for the down payment. 

As for things in a home that I wish I had now: kids bedrooms away from the kitchen and bath. DD's nursery is next to the only bathroom in the Ouse and is on the other side of the kitchen. Needless to say, not much gets done during naptime on my part in the way of cleaning, loading the dishwasher, etc. 

My advice: neighborhood and location is a no brainer when hunting for a home and it is sooo true, but really consider layout and flow when it comes to the house itself. Cosmetic stuff can be changed, but you can't change the flow and function of a home easily. 

Happy hunting! I loved house hunting. :-) 

tonychelle

We did fine budgeting the monthly payment, but our power bills were more than we figured. We moved from a two-bedroom apartment to a four-bedroom house with vaulted ceilings - talk about a difference in a power bill! Just take all of that into account.

Also, we live in the city, so we pay both county and city taxes, which were more than we originally though.

Also, make sure you budget for repairs and items/appliances you need.

And I ditto the home inspection.

Nel11

I agree with the advice so far, especially about budgeting plenty of money for repairs, new furniture, etc and getting a good, thorough home inspection.  A few things I will add based on my experience:

1.  I love having a "kids" bathroom, and having the bedrooms upstairs... I don't have to worry about being too loud cleaning, etc while DD is napping or in bed for the night.

2.  I wish we had 1 extra room on the main floor to use as a den or playroom... we do have a finished basement, but the main floor is just living room, dining room, kitchen (and hallway, powder room)... I would love just a little bit of extra space to make into a playroom that could easily be gated off/baby proofed.  

3.  Our pantry is along the wall going down the stairs to the basement... when we moved in we didn't have any kids, and I thought "eh, that's kind of annoying, but not a deal breaker."  Now that I have a kid, I HATE it.  The basement door is opened a million times a day, and I am super paranoid that it will be left open and DD will fall down the stairs.  

 Good luck!  I loved house hunting, and still love looking at houses in general. 

LatteLady5

You've received some really good advice.

Find a realtor with experience that you trust. Our fist one sucked. She kept encouraging us to go above our price point and really made us feel uncomfortable. The realtor we ended up going with was amazing. He knew the answer to any question we asked and helped us every step of the way.

Find a bank you're comfortable with. The bank we have our checking/savings accounts with handed us a packet of information and told us to fill it out and come back. The bank we ended up going with was phenomenal. The banker stayed after work late several times to meet with us. He filled out the application with us the first day and told us everything we needed to expect. He explored different loans with us and worked to get us the best loan.

Get a good home inspection. Seriously, don't skimp on this. 

Set aside money for repairs/changes. I wish we had more money to do everything we want all at once but we don't right now. We are doing small projects each month. I know it will all get pulled together eventually.

Ask questions. Lots and lots of questions...really. Get your realtor's cell number and ask him/her any thing you are even a little curious about. A good realtor isn't going to make you feel silly for asking questions and can reassure you and help you make the right decisions. 

Happy house hunting!

 

Sparks in training!

Add an additional 400 in what they say your payment will be. They always seem to down play PMI and insurance. Also, go big =as in if you dream of a pool GET IT NOW. I know that this was our "first" house and we settled. We wish we would have , should have etc. 

Write you wish list- make your agent start there.

With the way the economy is...who knows when would be the best time to sell and re-buy.  

mama&baby

Ditto so much of the advice that PPs have said.

My big thing-- go over your budget a million times up until closing. Just because you were approved for a certain price point doesn't mean you should buy up to that point. This is why so many people are in foreclosure situations- "oh great we were approved for $350,000- so we can buy a $350,000 house!". While people were partly responsible, the banks were also to blame.

Only you can decide how tied you want to be to a home. We ended up going around $35,000-$40,000 below our approved budget. Our house doesn't have many bells and whistles, but it does have beautiful hardwood floors and pretty much was only in need of some cosmetic things. This is fine with me because later on down the line we can customize things how we want them. I've known people who were "house-ridden" as I call it because after they bought their home and figured out the payments with insurance, taxes, HOA payments, utilities, repairs, etc ... the budget they had to go out and do things shrank dramatically. So you have to look at what's more important to you- dinners out or stainless steel appliances, etc.

Since we were so realistic/frugal with our budget, we've been able to stay in our home despite the fact that DH was laid off. It sucks to plan that way, but in this economy you kind of have to consider "if this situation happens, are we so tight on our budget that if one of us loses a job, will we be able to make it work?". If the answer is no, I might reconsider.

Good luck and happy hunting! 

eyenigh

There is really no such thing as move-in ready! Even in a brand new house, there are always additional expenses to get it where you want it. Even if it's something that can wait, it's still wise to take it into consideration when budgeting and projecting how much you can afford. Though some things are cosmetic, others are just smart things to do to save yourself money in the long-run, like replacing your thermostat with a good programmable one or, like we just did, installed a backup sump system so we don't ever have to worry about flooding in the basement. I feel like once you experience one basement flood, you'll never put yourself through that again! Ours flooded two houses ago but it's still something we think about. $1000 here and $1000 there adds up fast. 

Soxgirl07

Closets! Storage space wasn't something I even really considered. We have no pantry, no linen closet. We work around it but I wish we had them!

We moved straight from my parent's basement apartment to our house. We knew nothing. I still love a lot about our 113 year old house, but there are so many things I wish we had realized. Mostly repeats of PPs though. If you're not handy, don't take on a house that just needs a little TLC. It'll take more than you think!

summerbld2

Do you mind elaborating on why you would now want to have put more down? What %would you wish you'd had done?

superchixor

Our banker talked us into an Interest Only plan for 3 years. Sounded great at the time but after 3 years, if your house doesn't appraise more than you owe, you have to put down the difference. So if our house appraised $50k less, guess what? Luckily ours did appraise higher and we didn't owe. While the smaller payment was nice for 3 years, I had no idea what the outcome could have been.

meg_2006

1. If you get pre-qualified, the monthly payment they give you for whatever the highest loan amount is could change significantly due solely to the property taxes in the area.  Ours ended up about $100 more than what they said.

2.  After you buy, your monthly payment can change quite a bit.  We bought in Oct. and received a bill in January saying we were short on escrow.  Apparently they originally used the tax assessment made years ago, but re-assessed it after we bought it and the house is worth more so our monthly payment just jumped $40 (and we are in a LCOL area)!  We are now having to scramble to readjust our budget.   

3.  Do your research and get a good inspector.  We just got the most affordable, and he missed a few important things that if we had known about, we'd have asked the sellers to fix. 

Karen1998

Spend less than you're "qualified" to spend.  We nearly fired our mortgage broker when he offered, again after we'd told him no, to qualify us for over double what we were comfortable paying.  We based "what we could afford" off of one salary. Doing that has given us a lot of freedom.  Think carefully about what you want and how much you can really spend.  If you're only able to put a small amount down and are getting a higher interest rate then you're probably not in financial shape to buy a house right now. 

Home repairs will come.  Every home has issues.  Nothing will be perfect.  Older homes tend to have more issues, but newer ones can also be lemons.  You just never know.  Go for a solid structure in a good neighborhood.  Make sure you are there when it's inspected and that you ask a lot of questions.  Be prepared to deal with repairs.  In our state, a one year home warranty is pretty standard.  It's usually paid by the seller here.  It covers appliances and basics and can give you the time to find a plumber, electrician, etc... that you like.  

One thing I did was carry a pad of paper into each house we looked at.  After viewing the house, I immediately wrote down my impressions and a list of everything I'd want fixed or changed.  This helped me to remember which house was which and to figure out an offer amount.  

Our realtor had a great suggestion.  He said to not look to the details (wall color, hideous wallpaper, etc...), but to focus on the layout.  You can change details fairly cheaply.  Changing the layout is really expensive.  

ChaiMomma

There is some great advice here.  I would agree to budget for home repairs.  Our house was in "move in" condition, but right after the warranty ended we had to get a new water heater.  Our mortgage is totally doable, but we should have made more room for maintenance.

ElatedMom2B

mexicolombiana:

Good question, I wouldn't do anything differently personally, but I can give you advice based on what some of my clients do wrong. 

1. BUDGET for house repairs.  Like a lot of house repairs.  Budget at least $100 a month or more on repairs in the beginning.

2. For the love of all things holy figure out if your property taxes are included or not in the mortgage and make sure the escrow calculation is done right.  

3. HIRE a real estate attorney to be with you at the closing you have no IDEA how many people don't do it and then get screwed over something in the contract.

4. Pay for a good home inspection.  

5. Play hardball with the seller and ask for concessions, $ at closing, repairs to be done before closing etc.  You never know unless you ask!

6. Check out the neighbors before you buy (just for fun if you can) like check the child molesters in the area and make sure you aren't moving in NEXT DOOR to one! 

And save save save $ to have a nice downpayment.  I feel like closing costs ALWAYS get undercalculated and you have to come up more $ than you think at closing.

Good luck! (i'm a bankruptcy attorney and deal with lots of real estate issues and people who can't afford their homes later in life!) 

 EDIT: I do wish we had chosen a home with a bathroom on the 2nd floor level with the bedrooms are but at my price point and in the neighborhood we wanted it was slim pickings. 

I can't stress the importance of #6 for sure.  Unfortunately, it sometimes happens beyond your control.  Our next door neighbor moved in just a month or two before us and she is a complete HOARDER and slob.  Her property looks like crap and we want to sell our house in about a year or so.  DH and I have already discussed the fact that we will have to probably pay money or take the time to clean up her house before listing our property.  It is disgusting!  Also, about two weeks after I brought my first daughter home from the hospital, I had a knock on the door from the county prosecutor's office who were going door to door to advise neighbors of a registered sex offender moving into the house directly behind us - YEP, looking right into our backyard and my older daughter's bedroom window.  PLEASE research and do some spying on your potential neighbors!!

outnumbered

mexicolombiana:

3. HIRE a real estate attorney to be with you at the closing you have no IDEA how many people don't do it and then get screwed over something in the contract.

4. Pay for a good home inspection.  

6. Check out the neighbors before you buy

I think the above are the most important things to keep in mind.  We had a tough lawyer, but she was on our side.  She was much more important than a real estate agent.  She went over every contract and at the closing she brought up a list of things the seller had not done.  She held their feet over the coals and wrote up a contract on the spot to make sure things were done correctly.  

As for the neighbors make sure you drive through the neighborhood at different times of the day and week.  This will give you a big picture of what your neighborhood is like.

 

blueandgray

With kids, school district & neighborhood were top of our must-have list. Also, a good backyard and space to grow/renovate in the future if the house didn't exactly fit all our other inside wish list at the time of purchase (ie, an unfinished basement that could be finished, room on the lot to expand in a few years if needed, etc...) We bought our single story 2br, 2ba house 6 years ago and are currently undergoing a renovation now to add a second level. The location of the house otherwise was too perfect, and the cost for the addition was less than what we would pay if wanted to buy a new house with added space already in our neighborhood. Good luck!

Tink112011

A lot of good advice already.  Mine to add is:  Don't underestimate the cost of yard maintenance!

 We live on a small lot with a small but adequate front and back yard.  I was surprised when I realized how much we had to spend on a lawn mower, gas, regular fertilizer, plants, re-planting, and other frequent updates to the yard and landscaping.  Those trips to Home Depot and the garden store add up quickly! As much as I love having flower pots out in the summer time, it kills me to spent the money on buying flowers and paying the extra water bill.

preggersin2011

Somethings that aren't mentioned, or I couldn't find it. New construction isn't always better. Typically they build with cheap materials and to minimal code to get the job done. That doesn't translate into what it should be. Also, in addition to home inspection I would also get an infrared inspection of the home. You can pay $200 or $500 a month on energy bills depending upon cracks, leaks, insulation etc. Does the roof have a different amount of snow than the neighbors? Climate depending, window locations on the house. If you live in a cold area you will mostly only get sun in through south facing windows. If you have a large wall of glass on the north side, odds are that room will always be cold good for summer bad for winter.. Also, think about cross breezes, windows typically go West and East, so if you move into a town home and have north/south windows you will need to use fans to help move air through the house on spring days..... If you want to plant a garden and the backyard is on the north side of the house- well good luck getting tomatoes to grow. Other things to are HOA- they can be a giant PITA depending upon the codes. Sometimes you need city building approvals to put a swing set in your backyard.

RayRay007

We bought new construction and spent about $35,000 on the yard and $20,000 in the basement. It's nice to have a new house, but make sure you take into consideration the cost of finishing it. And don't get yourself into a position of being house poor. On paper, we could afford something twice the size but we wouldn't be able to do the other things we do.

M&M227

As far as payments go, a little lower is always better.  Ours changes as our taxes change (but not a huge amount).  I like to put a little more toward the mortgage each month anyway because that amount goes straight to your principal which in turn means you end up paying less interest.  I wish we had more space in general but hopefully this is not our forever home.

molisar

I love having everything on one floor. 

I love having a fenced in yard.

I love having a nook in our kitchen where we can put DS's high chair and little table without it being in the way. 

I wish DS's bedroom was further away from our living room (so after he goes down, we don't have to tip toe around).

I wish we had a formal living room and plus a family room.  Right now we just have a living room, so we're planning a remodel of our basement to make a family / play room. 

Honestly, we did not put much down at all on our house.  We've been here 4 years and I still can't say I regret it.. Who knows we might if we decide to buy a new home eventually.