Buying a First Home Tips & Techniques From a Professional
Welcome to "Your Home Matters", I'm John Charbonneau with TMG The Mortgage Group. Home ownership is one of life's bigger goals and one that is well worth taking on. Once you've decided to enter the real estate market these 5 tips will help you along the way. My number one tip is to determine what mortgage you can afford vs what you can qualify to for. Have a serious look at how much of your take home pay is available for housing costs and determine what amount of mortgage this relates to. You may have to change your spending patterns to be able to afford the home you really want, and it is a great idea to test out the new spending patterns to see if you can live within your new budget.
Our next tip involves knowing the difference between what you need and what you want. You may want to buy a home with a swimming pool but you may need to buy a home with space to accommodate a growing family or to be able to build a granny suite for family or extra income.
Tip Number three suggests that you take a team approach to buying your first home, build a team of real estate professionals that includes a realtor, a mortgage broker, a home inspector and even a notary or lawyer. Find experienced professionals that make you feel comfortable when asking questions and professionals that will take the time to answer all of your queries. Don't be ashamed that you don't know the answers. No one ever knew all the answers before they started no matter who they are.
Plan your numbers is tip number 4, know in advance what total amount of money you need to make your purchase happen, over and above the down payment you need to take into consideration and budget for the closing costs these can include the legal fees, property taxes, set up fees and deposits with utility companies, transfer taxes as well as additional costs associate with buying a strata property and don't forget to budget for moving expense. No one wants a last minute panic at the lawyers office because you didn't plan for these potentially substantial expenses.
Our final tip, number 5 is a strong recommendation that you develop a system to rate the inventory of homes you look at during the buying process. You may easily look at from 1 to one hundred properties and it will be easy to forget what you like and didn't like about each of them. A well thought out plan would see you bring along a digital camera to take your own pictures which start with the part of the house that shows the house number as well as exterior shots of the home and neighbourhood, prepare a property evaluation checklist so you can keep a quick inventory of what each property offers, then immediately when leaving the home complete your evaluation and give the property an overall score from one to ten with ten being the best. There you have it, my top five home buying tips for first time home buyers. Best of luck as you enter the real estate market and Don't forget to get pre approved for a mortgage before you visit your first home.
