Buying a home is an exciting time! Don't jump the gun and start looking before making some important
decisions to save time and energy. A good start would be to pick a neighbourhood and style of house.
It's a good idea to also decide what amenities you need and provide this to the agent.
The more you share with your real estate agent, the faster they can match your wish list to
a set of potential houses you can look at. Making a two-column list of what you must have and
what you hope to have is a good idea and gives the agent breathing room when matching your wants
and needs to available listings.
Financial Preparedness:
After choosing the style, the necessities and listing the wish list, it's a good idea
to get your financial ducks in a row. Prequalification and pre-approvals save you time
and energy so you know precisely what you can afford. If you haven't done this yet, ask
your real estate agent for referrals to get the ball rolling. By getting pre-approved,
sellers will take your offer more seriously as well which is a huge bonus if you find your
dream home because they have confidence that you will get approved. Financial approvals are
a nail biting occurrence for buyers and sellers and being prepared can minimize a lot of stress
in the buying and selling process.
Start Viewing Homes:
Once you've followed the first two steps, you're ready to look at homes your agent
has matched up to your lists of must-haves and nice to haves. When you work with an
agent, you don't have to blindly wander from open house to open house. They will
use their skills and connections to organize viewings for you for tours of homes
that meet your wish list. Your agent can do the alerting with whatever preference
you choose such as e-mail alerts, telephone alerts or faxes. If you want to
work on your own as well, you can find many listings online as well as in newspapers
plus you can drive through neighborhoods you like while looking for "For Sale" signs.
While some people do find their perfect home on their own, more than two thirds
of homes purchased come due to work by a qualified real estate agent.
Let's Make a Deal:
Those who find the home they want to purchase will need assistance in making an
offer. The agent can use tools and calculations based on their expertise to help
you make an offer that is likely to be at a price that can be accepted. The agent
creates a offer in contract form that lists responsibilities by both the buyer
and seller with financial particulars, items to be included in the sale and any
conditions. If accepted, that draft contract becomes a legal document. Because
it is binding, be sure you understand everything contained in the offer. Your
agent will be happy to explain all details to you.
Striking a Deal:
Often, a seller will accept the first offer but expect an offer to come back
with some changes such as to the pricing or list of included items or repairs.
Your real estate will negotiate for you and use leverage to try to close the deal.
Many things are negotiable and the seller can often be very motivated to sell which can work in your favor.
Here's a list of items that might be negotiable:
Sell price
Type of financing
Closing costs
Closing date
Repairs
Included Items
By staying in touch with your agent during the deal making time, you
can be sure that your chances of getting the house with the terms you are
hoping for will be maximized. By being flexible to the seller's wants
and needs you also increase your chances of getting the house you want.
Closing That Deal!
After the deal is done, your agent is still a big part of the process as your advocate.
They can help you determine what you need to do to complete the transaction. Steps
that are often involved include appraisals and dealing with your financial institution
regarding your mortgage, the inspection of the home, title insurance and home warranties.
Many real estate agents can help you with all these steps so that the closing of your new
home is done with minimal fuss. If you need referrals to anyone relating to this list,
your agent can likely refer you.
The agent will also work with everyone involved in order to ensure there is access
to the property so that the property is ready for the closing date. Your agent also
should serve as your advocate, helping to coordinate activities and making sure the
vendors have access to the property to perform their jobs.
A Done Deal!
Welcome to your new home! Break out the bubbly! The documents and transfer happens
so that you are now listed as the homeowner. Yourself and the sellers as well as
any real estate agents will all attend a meeting to finalize the details. Most often,
this happens in a law office where the documents are signed and the money part of the
deal takes place as well. Your agent will likely have a statement for you detailing
all the closing costs and will walk you through the process of everything from the
search to handing you the keys to your very own home.
It is a formal meeting that most parties involved in the transaction will attend.
Closing procedures usually are held at the title company's or lawyer's office. The
closing officer will coordinate all the document-signing and the collection and
disbursement of funds. A few days before your closing date, your lender will
send a final closing statement that outlines your closing costs, if applicable.
Your real estate agent will review this document with you to ensure its accuracy,
as well as help you gather any necessary documentation that you'll need to bring to closing.
Buying a house you can afford is important. To start the process off, it's
really important to get pre-qualified or pre-approved. This will help you
and your real estate agent move forward in the process. If you need help
getting pre-qualified, your agent can refer you to a broker.
Why get pre-approved or pre-qualified?
It's important to get a number in mind prior to beginning the house hunting
so you can save yourself time, energy and spare yourself disappointment.
It's heartbreaking to find the perfect house and have the deal fall through
because you cannot qualify for the sale price.
Also, having a pre-approval can help you secure the deal you want with
a seller because they know they won't lose the deal based on your inability
to secure financing. A pre-approval is like a green light for you.
Getting pre-qualified is something that you can do easily based on basic
financial info such as income and debt information. While you still don't
automatically get financing with a pre-qualification it gives you a good
idea of what house price range you should be shopping in.
A prequalification isn't the same as a pre-approval and it's important to
understand the difference.
Prequalification vs. Pre-approval
Getting pre-approved means that your lender wants your business. This is a very
good thing and worth doing up front. This process doesn't look just at numbers
but involves a full loan application which gives you a much better chance of
having negotiations approved by sellers. While it's not a complete approval,
it does show sellers that they have an extremely good chance of having a solid offer.
Conditional sales can make sellers nervous and without this approval, your
seller might be more inclined to entertain multiple offers.
Your lender might still require certain terms and conditions and fine
print but the pre-approval is very helpful to you, to your agent and puts
the seller at ease immediately which makes you appear more attractive to
do business with. Other areas that need to be looked at by the lender might
be underwriting, appraisals and inspections.
Questions to Ask the Mortgage Broker
Many agents have established relationships with mortgage brokers
who they are going to be pleased to recommend you to. It's important
that you feel comfortable with the process and here are some things
you will want to cover in your broker meetingr:
The difference between a great buying experience when buying your house and having
a stressful, nerve-wracking time can be something you control by choosing the right
real estate agent. By taking the time to choose the right person who not only has a
personality you appreciate but who makes guarantees that make you comfortable, you'll
minimize the time and effort you'll need to expend and maximize potential results.
Don't assume you need to make an immediate decision. Take the time to interview more
than one person so you can make a wise choice.
The below list of questions can be of great assistance in helping you make the right choice.
What cities or neighborhoods does your territory cover?
Are you a full-time real estate agent?
How long have you worked as an agent?
Do you specialize in residential real estate alone or work in multiple specialties?
What is your website address?
What methods of communication will we use to discuss my account and home buying process?
What kind of response time can I expect when I contact you?
Can I contact you outside of normal business hours?
Do you work alone or do you have an assistant? Tell me about your assistant's experience level and who will be my primary point of contact?
Do you deal just with your own listings or will I have an opportunity to view homes from multiple agencies?
What are your agent fees and what services are covered in that fee?
Will you show me homes where you represent the seller as well?
Why should I choose you as my agent?
Do you have references I can contact?
It's also a good idea to learn about guarantees. Compare guarantees among agents and decide what's important to you.
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