I usually don't post non-science questions like this, but the members here are probably my best source of *cough* older *cough* people Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! . I am looking to purchase a house in about a year. (I want plenty of time to prepare and make sure I'm well educated.) I will be 21 by then so I don't really feel i'd be trying to move too fast into things. What I need to know is some advice from some of the older homeowners here. What types of prices should I look to pay (I know it depends on so many variables), what kind of down payment should I expect? How does one go about getting a mortgage? How does one keep from getting screwed in the mortgage? How many points should I expect to pay? Whats a good interest rate? 30 year or 15 year? You guys get the idea. I'm incredibly scared, as this will be my largest purchase ever and it's quite a step in life I feel. But i'm sure its the right move, becuase if I can find the right house, I'll be making an investment in my future...property prices rarely go down as far as I've seen. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! -AntonK
35 to 80 grand,no lower than 35g,think of the work needed,but it depends on your perception of a nice house.Im not getting into all of the rest,just to much info to give you,you have gotta be sharp on buying a house,very sharp.
35 to 80????? WOW that would be great, I'd pickup 2. HAHA. In the area I live (around Orlando Florida...yep..near Disney), If a house is under 75k there is something wrong with it. Most of my questions are about the remainder of the process. Anyone help? -AntonK
First, you'll need to find a lender. They'll go over your credit to see how much you can afford and the price-range for the house you'll be able to buy. Make sure that you have good credit and haven't missed a payment to your creditors in the last year. Also, you'll need some money in savings, enough for a down-payment and a 'good merit' payment in case the owner asks for a payment to make good on your down-payment... that's what happened with us anyway... Find a buyers real estate agent, who will work with you and won't pressure you to buy. Once you find a house that you like and are definitely interested, you'll need a home inspection to find out what needs to be fixed. Finally, you can make the owners, or the real estate agent who is representing the owners, an offer low-balling them but not too ridiculously. The owners will counter-offer until you make a negotiation. There may be some details that I'm leaving out coz it's been a couple years since we've had to close on our house but I think that's the gist of it..
Okay, that was actually [me] who wrote that message above. So you can direct any quetions or comments about that post to WMB and not WM. I think all-in-all, your lender or real estate agent will walk you through the process. When you're about to close, you'll need to buy some insurance but that can be summed into the loan. You'll get a really good rate if your car insurance also offers home insurance.
I'm refinancing this month at 5.5%. Freakin unheard of rates RIGHT NOW. A year from now it's difficult to say. You have to look at the market at the time.
I forgot how expensive houses are in america,come over to the united kingdom,you can get houses as cheap as chips.
They are also smaller than a matchbox. No thanks. My parents' house is about 3,000 square feet and is worth about US$200,000. Yes, welcome to Ontario.
Really? Hmm.. That's expensive. The houses in midwest USA are pretty decent. I'd say you can get a decent, two bedroom-two bath home for between $65K and 70K. Of course, then, you have to worry about job security, and living in a community of people who (1) always wanna know your business and/or (2) are small-town snobs. [Edit]: Okay, so maybe I was thinking of the hometown where I grew-up which is smaller than most midwest towns, but bigger than the ones surrounding it. We have one Wal-Mart there.
You are SO full of shit! Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! hehee.. it's about 20K higher than advertised! Decent homes here (in our town, which is basically the average for the state) run around 85,000 dollars minimum. What most people would consider a "nice" home, maybe 2300 - 2800 sq ft is from $110,000 up. We got a great deal on our place though. Lucky as hell IMO. We've got a great house w 2810 sq ft for $95,000. 5 bdrm, 3 bath.. 1 car garage, etc all in nice little culdesac sweeeeeet. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Oh you know what though, she's probably right in the tiny town or in the sticks. Sweetie, you are only partially full of shit! LOVE!
Lot of the ability to get a loan these days hinges on your credit score, sadly. I lucked out, and did well with my bills through college, so I ahve a score in the 750's. THis allowed me to buy a house last year- $0 down, 103% loan (to cover most of the closing costs). So I paid about $1000 in closing costs, and ended up with a house. The good things: rent in my area for a one bedroom is about $920 a month. My mortgage for a 3 bedroom (ie I have rooms to rent out) is $906 a month. Plus, if/when I sell the house, I will get most of that money back. Also, the mortgage interest is tax deductable if I use it to improve the property. Plus I have my very own grass (about 25x20x20 foot triagle of grass, but grass none the less) the bad things: if anything goes wrong, I have to fix it. If the house drops in value, I lose out (however, I'll still get *most* of the mortgage money back when I sell. I have grass to mow every week! details: I went to a realitor, talked to their recommended mortage agents, got approved for the amount the house I was looking at was going for (do not pay anyone for a good faith estimate. they are ripping you off). Went online to fannie may.org and read all I could about the process. talked with my sister, who bought a house 4 years ago to get an idea of the current proccess. by this time, the house I was looking at had sold Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! (the average time on the market around here is about 3 days Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! ) Found a second house, and as I was already pre-aproved for the mortgage, I put in a bid. signed some stuff, hired an inspector over the internet at the US House Inspectors association website. About $150 for the basics + Radon and termit testing. Got that done, requested that the owner fix two things, which he did (thankfully without a fight). I gave the mortgage co a good-faith downpayment of $1000 (this confused me, as I was getting a 0% down loan, but I had run out of time to argue. luckily, I had set aside $1000 in case crasy stuff occured.). closing came, they gave me a check for $300 (overpayment for the first month's payment from my $1000 down payment), signed 20 papers, and got the keys. all in all, took about 3 weeks. I'm now taking tax deductions on the section of my property that I use for my buisness (bonsais), plus the morgage interest is huge the first few years (about 90% of your's monthly payment is interest the first year. Only about 3% goes towards the principle of the loan), I should get a *huge* tax refund this year, somewhere in the thousands. So all in all, a little more work=a *lot* of long term savings. Not to mention that I bought a house a few block from where a new trainline will be going into center City Philly in the next 5 years, so house values should skyrocket soon Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! here's to hoping. note: beware PMIM! If you have paid anything less than 20% of your mortgage off at any time, they will chanrge you for Mortgage Insurance, which is really expensive. Tricks to get rid of PMI: 1)while they are required by law to remove PMI once you;ve paid off 20% of your loan, if you call and ask them to, they have to remove the PMI charges once you reach 18%. But you have to call them first! 2)Any increase in the value of your house can be applied towards how much of the loan is "paid off" So if you buy a $100,000 house with a 0 down loan, you will hav to pay PMI. The day after you buy the house, gold is discovered in your foundation, and the value of the house goes up to $120,000. that extra $20k increase can be applied to the calculation of "how much have you paid off?" which deterines if you pay PMI. as 20k is 20% of 100,000 (the amount of the loan, you have now "paid" 20% into your loan, so your PMI is gone. 3)pre-pay. every mortgage payment in the begining is mostly interest. however, if you get a loan w/o any sort of pre-payment penalties, and then kick an extra $100-$200 per month, directly into the principle, you will cut your overall loan cost, as well as shorten your PMI term by a huge amount. note2: check out www.fool.com for tons of usefull tips on saving money so you can retire early! get out while you still can!!! :d good luck! edit: Where I am west of philly, houses are expensive. I got my 1,200sq ft 3 bedroom (one bedroom is 8'x9'), 1 bathroom twin house for 99,000. I've had it for 6 months, and it's already be re-estimated at $109,000 I hope the housing market doesn't crash in the next 7 years, though... oh, yeah. interest rates: go for as low as possible. you should be able to get between 6% and 9%. also: ARM vs 30 year fixed. Are you planning on staying in the house? are you planning on selling in a few years? at this point, mortgage rates are note likely to go down much more, and you can always refinance later. I went with a 30-year fixed to try and keep monthly costs down (as opposed to a 15 year). but I'm also planning on selling on 6 or 7 years. Any money I put into the house will just sit there doing nothing, so It's better for me to put that money into bonds and bank CD's that bare positive interest. If I were planning on living in the house longer than 15 years, I would have gotten a 15 year fixed in order to pay off the loan faster. However, given that I got a loan w/o prepayment penalties, I can still pay offthe loan in 15 years If I want. having the 30-year just gives me more flexability. This is my expirience. again, good luck!
If your in the UK and have any sense, you would avoid trying to buy a house just now, in fact if circumstances permit it would have been best not to buy one for the previous year or two. When even The Economist is sugegsting that house prices are a bubble fit to burst, that usggests that prices are going to go down. Probably not as badly as they did in the 80's and 90's, but still...... Oh, and get a fixed rate mortgage deal, its likely to be cheaper in the long run, unless, like Japan, you all end up with interest rates at 0, in which case the world economies screwed so who cares. Oh and to Jerrek, in case you hadnt noticed the UK is a smaller place than the USA and we cant be bothered rebuilding all our housing. In fact much of it is 80, 90 years old. Builders build small so they can squeeze more into a given space, and still sell them for loads of money.
Hey, sorry I havent been able to reply as of late, been busy. I have read everything though. Excellent tips guys thanks. Oh and Wesmorris & fam...lets try to keep the marital bickering outside the forum Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! ;-) Thanks for the tips river-wind. How did you get your credit score? Did you have a co-signer? Did you need a co-signer? May i ask how old you were when you bought the house (which was 6 months ago you said..right?) I hear there are some special deals and such that you can get for first time buyers, did you take advantage of any of this? Thanks again, I may PM you if I have any questions, if thats alright. Thanks again! Anyways, thanks everyone for the tips, even the UK tips. I doubt I'll be moving to the UK any time soon, but if I do, I'll know now Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! -AntonK
