Home Buying 101

Home Buyer's Guide

Know Your Credit
Define What You Want in a Home
Start Searching for Your Home
Make an Offer
Inspect the Home
Arrange for needed Repairs
Negotiations
The Closing
Moving in to Your New Home
Enjoy Your New Home

Know Your Credit
- Get pre-qualified or pre-approved for a loan before you even begin searching for a new home, this determines how much “home” you can afford. This allows you to act quickly once you find something suitable to your needs. It also indicates to the seller that you are serious and really can afford to buy the property. Use the mortgage calculator to help you get started if you are not pre-qualified already. (Link Mortgage Calculator)
- Know the difference between pre-approval & pre-qualified.
- Get the best loan for your individual needs. For example: If you are a first time home buyer, there are FHA Loans available. If you are military personnel or are a veteran, there could be VA Loans available to meet your specific needs.
- Shop around for the best mortgage rates and terms. A difference of even half a percentage point can mean a huge savings over the life of a loan.
Define What You Want in a Home
- Location, Location, Location! You hear this phrase frequently used in the context of real estate, but there is truth to this saying. Where you want to live is a very important factor in determining what you want out of your home buying experience.
- What kinds of amenities are you looking for? (Link to Amenities)
- One story or two story home? (Link to Home Finder)
- How many bedrooms and bathrooms are you looking for?
- What features are most important to you?
- What size lot are you looking for?
- Would you like to be in a certain school district?
- What do you want out of your community?
- What are the recreation options available in the community?
- Are there adequate shopping facilities nearby to suit your specific needs, i.e. grocery stores and pharmacies?
- Are you looking to buy a pre-built home, work with a builder to design a look all your own or choose a specific floor plan to meet your needs?
- Create a checklist of amenities. Be flexible, your dream home may have all the right features, but it may be located on a small lot. This list needs to consist of the things you want/absolutely have to have and the things you can live without.
- Keep this checklist with you while searching for a house.
Start Searching for Your Home
- Now that you know what you’re looking for, it’s time to get out there and find it.
- Don’t forget to bring that checklist of amenities mentioned above. This is to make sure you don’t leave anything off your list of features and benefits that are important to your buying decision.
- Carefully inspect each home you tour and list the things you like and dislike about each of them.
- Rate the homes that you tour and compare them side by side to help you make a decision.
- Review the list of homes and your comparisons and possibly tour them again to finalize your feelings on each of them. You may find a feature that you dislike about one but you may love a certain feature about another home.
Make an Offer
- Now that you’ve selected a home that suits your tastes, it’s time to make an offer for purchase.
- You may want to act quickly, in case there are other home buyer’s interested in the same home. They will be making offers as well, sometimes they may even counteroffer your bid and/or bid higher in order to obtain the home.
- Negotiations on price and certain aspects of the home will be made during this time. And may be negotiated yet again after inspections have been made.
Inspect the Home
- Once you’ve made your offer and arrangements have been made for purchasing the home, you will need to have it inspected.
- There will be several companies serving your community that will be capable of doing proper inspections. Choose an inspection company that you feel is reputable.
- After all applicable inspections have been made, depending on the outcome of the inspections; you may need to have some repairs done to the home. Even if it is a newly built home, inspections should still be done, if recommended, to cover any flaws that may have occurred during the building process.
Arrange for needed Repairs (If Needed)
- After all inspections have been completed, you will then need to make arrangements to have any necessary repairs done.
- Sometimes, the seller may be obligated to pay the repair costs. Other times repair costs can be added to the amount of your mortgage. This is all dependent on the type of loans that you may qualify for.
Negotiations
- This process can include any changes or repairs made to the home prior to the final contract being submitted.
- You may want to include repairs recommended by the inspector.
- You may have the option of negotiating that the closing costs are added in to the final contract.
The Closing
- Now that all pre-qualifications have been made to obtain a loan, you have made the necessary decisions on what you expect from your new home, the search has been completed and a suitable home has been found, inspected and repaired as needed, its time to sign the contract.
- This process is called closing. All parties involved in the buying and selling process should meet at this time to sign the final contract for purchase of the chosen home. Keep in mind that this may not be the final meeting. The verbiage on the contract may not include something specific to your requests or the seller may revoke a previous offer. If this happens, stay relaxed; you want to make sure that everything is correct before you sign the contract.
Moving in to Your New Home
- You’ve agreed on a purchase price and signed the final contract for purchase of your new home. Now you can begin the moving process.
- If you have purchased a new home, you may want to go ahead and move right in. If you have purchased a previously owned home or if you would like to make cosmetic changes to your new home i.e. paint walls or replace wallpaper, replace carpeting or refinish hardwood flooring, you may want to make these changes to the home, all before you make the big move.
Enjoy Your New Home
- Plan a housewarming party. Invite your friends, family, and even your new neighbors over for a barbecue to enjoy your new space.
- Get to know your new neighbors. Visit the community center in your neighborhood, it is an excellent place to introduce yourself and your family to the community and also find out if the neighborhood does any community projects together. Such as a neighborhood wide garage sale, or block parties on certain holidays, plan on attending these events to learn more about your neighbors.