Since home buying is the largest personal purchase for most people, the first time will be the most overwhelming. You do want to go into a home buying experience with expert guidance to avoid any major issues and smooth out the impact of the minor ones. To help new home buyers, here is just a non-exclusive list of things to look out for. Happy house hunting!
1st Time Home Buyer Checklist
- Cash purchase or financing?
- Have you spoken to a lender recently?
- Do you have a preapproval letter?
- Have you kept up a good credit score?
- Who can help you with down payment? Did the transfer/gift letter season?
- Special financing options for 1st time buyer
- Less conventional financing
- Do you know what type of property you want?
- Hoa or no hoa?
- Yard? Distance to work, family
- Appreciation potential
- What is tax deductible?
- Neighborhood crime statistics
- Age of property/maintenance budget
- What’s market like today?
- Seller market currently, multiple offers is the norm
- How to make you stand out
- How much above listing?
- Escalation clause
- Other methods
- Write offer with inspection contingency
- Offer negotiation (may need to accept counter offer)
- When offer is accepted, more work starts
- Buyer checklist/time table
- Why is appraisal important
- If higher than, its great; if its lower than purchase price, we have work to do
- Other contractual/escrow obligations
- Open escrow, order title report
- Complete inspection within and determine if anything needs attention
- Ensure all financial obligations met and collected all necessary disclosures
- Close of Escrow date set
- Verify repair work/title issue included in contract is completed and accepted(if specified)
- Understanding closing statement and buyer expenses
- Monitor close process until close date, obtaining signatures as required
- Why is appraisal important
- Smooth Close/Key turnover/Celebrate
- Post-close checklist
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- Post-close checklist
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