Whether you decide to wait until Spring or jump in now, here are Five Savvy Buying Tips that ensure you'll get the best property for your needs, at the best price, with the minimum amount of hassle and disappointment:
#1. Apply Smart Buying Rules: If you consider yourself a smart buyer when purchasing a car, a phone, or travel, apply that savvy to buying real estate. Understand what you need and why. Set a realistic budget. Learn how things work. With all these issues, the right professional should save you time, stress, and money.
#2. Ensure Location Overrules Features & Decor: Real estate is an immoveable object. That reality dictates that where you buy is the prime value concern. Smart buyers look for the least property in the best area, so their real estate improvements result in increased market value. Values within a neighborhood or community are not uniform. There are specific streets, even ends of streets, that represent the highest local value just as boundary streets and other locations may represent lower prices. Particularly in urban areas, proximity to the most highly-regarded schools, popular shopping areas, and sought-after local features like parks dictates price, as your real estate professional will explain.
#3. Maximize Move-In Timing: The more flexible your move-in date, the more room to negotiate with sellers. Agree to their ideal move date and that may generate concessions in price or inclusions. When you have a fixed move-in date, you may find yourself paying more to buy what you want, when you want it. Timing is a significant consideration when deciding whether to buy your next home before you have sold your current property, that is, taking the risk of paying on two mortgages at once. Since the market where you are selling may be different from that where you want to buy, timing decisions should involve the experience of a real estate professional or two.
#4. Own The Money Factor: Affordability encompasses costs ranging from purchase price (including legal fees and other costs), mortgage financing, and the cost of customizing the living space to including ongoing expenses like heating, cooling, commuting, and anything else that matters. With mortgage rates on the rise, reducing consumer (car) loans and credit card debt may open up borrowing room.Mortgage professionals can help you shop a wider range of lenders. These money experts can also explain why there is so much more to consider than just interest rate.
#5. Face Reality Head On: Compromises to your "must have" list can maximize value and returns.
- You may want four bedrooms, but if two younger children share a large room until the eldest child goes to college, maybe that 3-bedroom with significantly-better location and greater appreciation potential will really work for your family.
- If cosmetic or minor renovations don't daunt you, this could also provide a location advantage and may even mean a larger home is affordable.
- Compromising on location can also mean more living space, just be sure that commuting costs, including needing an extra car and possible lower appreciation rates, don't swallow up that saving.
- Your buying perspective is also an important consideration. Do you expect to stay until a second child appears or until all the kids finish school or are you in for the long haul? Shopping for a "forever home" is a popular approach. Just take care that projections are fact based and not fantasy that leaves you buying more home than you can comfortably afford in a rising interest-rate world.
Most people have more real estate choices than they realize. Are you sure you want to wait for Spring to get started?
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