Buying a home is not like buying a car.  It’s a lot more complicated and with many more risks for you, the prospective home buyer.  We recommend attending one or more first time home buyer classes or meeting with a Realtor or Mortgage Consultant who specializes in working with first time home buyers. 

Your first step then is to locate a class.  Sometimes you will find classes offered through your local community education resource.  Other classes may be offered by government agencies.  Other sources of classes are Realtors and Mortgage Lenders who sponsor them.  Sometimes they will be listed in the housing or home section of your local newspaper or information website.

Wherever you go, whatever you do, become educated on how to buy a home.  If you know about the risks ahead of time, you can avoid the most common mistakes made by home buyers.

For more detailed information, come to our FREE NO OBLIGATION FIRST TIME HOMEBUYER class or wait for future blogs.  “Simple answers to home ownership questions”.

Buying a home is not like buying a car.  It’s a lot more complicated and with many more risks for you, the prospective home buyer.  We recommend attending one or more first time home buyer classes or meeting with a Realtor or Mortgage Consultant who specializes in working with first time home buyers. 

Your first step then is to locate a class.  Sometimes you will find classes offered through your local community education resource.  Other classes may be offered by government agencies.  Other sources of classes are Realtors and Mortgage Lenders who sponsor them.  Sometimes they will be listed in the housing or home section of your local newspaper or information website.

Wherever you go, whatever you do, become educated on how to buy a home.  If you know about the risks ahead of time, you can avoid the most common mistakes made by home buyers.

For more detailed information, come to our FREE NO OBLIGATION FIRST TIME HOMEBUYER class or wait for future blogs.  “Simple answers to home ownership questions”.

Buying a home is not like buying a car.  It’s a lot more complicated and with many more risks for you, the prospective home buyer.  We recommend attending one or more first time home buyer classes or meeting with a Realtor or Mortgage Consultant who specializes in working with first time home buyers. 

Your first step then is to locate a class.  Sometimes you will find classes offered through your local community education resource.  Other classes may be offered by government agencies.  Other sources of classes are Realtors and Mortgage Lenders who sponsor them.  Sometimes they will be listed in the housing or home section of your local newspaper or information website.

Wherever you go, whatever you do, become educated on how to buy a home.  If you know about the risks ahead of time, you can avoid the most common mistakes made by home buyers.

For more detailed information, come to our FREE NO OBLIGATION FIRST TIME HOMEBUYER class or wait for future blogs.  “Simple answers to home ownership questions”.

It’s like this:  You are out there, looking at a certain city and every home in that city that fits your price range.  And nothing really looks good.  You’ve looked at 50 or more homes, written an offer on one or two, and the offers were not accepted because you were in competitive bidding.  Someone else got the home.

Does this really happen?  Yes, it does.  I had a couple come to our First Time Home Buyer Class just a week ago…a nice young couple.  They explained that they had been looking at homes for two months.  They had looked at 70 homes in the cities they liked and written two offers.  The offers hadn’t been accepted and they were still looking.

Problem Number One:  Your budget doesn’t match the housing costs in the city you really like.  The Twin Cities, a 13 county area, includes more than 100 cities.  Each city has its own unique housing market.  In some cities, houses are a little less expensive and in other cities, they cost more.  If your budget is limited, ask your Realtor to advise you as to the cities that are most likely to have affordable housing.  You may have to change your search area to find affordable options.

Problem Number Two:  There is a lot of competition for the lower priced homes.  There are investors who want to buy these homes as rental properties.  There are folks like you with tight budgets that want to keep their housing costs lower.  If you have a limited budget, make sure you and your Realtor get out to the home within one day of it going on the market.  The only way to find a nice home is to be the first one there.  This is a little more work for you, but assures that you will see some nice homes, not just the homes that have been on the market for 3 months and rejected by all the other buyers.

Problem Number Three: You are not clear on what you need and want.  You drift from home to home waiting for the right “feeling” to occur.  Instead, take some time to sit down and write down three things your new home HAS TO HAVE.  Don’t waste your time looking at homes that don’t have these three things.  Now those three things can change over time, as you shop and become educated on your options.  But be very clear on what is important.

Have some hope.  There’s a home out there for you that’s just perfect.

For more detailed information, come to our FREE NO OBLIGATION FIRST TIME HOMEBUYER class or wait for future blogs.  “Simple answers to home ownership questions”.

If you’ve Google-d or Bing-ed or Yahoo-ed in order to do research on home buying, you know there’s A LOT of information out there… mind boggling amounts of information… contradictory information… confusing information…technically worded information.  What’s a person to do???

Rule Number One:  If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

There are a lot of incredible offers out there.  Auction houses promise to sell you a home for $1 or more.  Banks offer astounding mortgage interest rates.  Credit repair services promise to fix your bad credit for a low fee and enable you to get a mortgage.  Nothing good comes cheap.  Use your head.  Check with an expert.  Make sure you know all the fine print in the offer.

Rule Number Two:  If it can’t be explained simply, they are trying to fool you.

Real professionals, both Realtors and mortgage consultants, know how to explain complicated ideas in simple terms.  If you run into a website where you are reading double-talk or which says, “trust us”, beware.  It’s your money and your new home.  Walk away from someone you don’t trust and work with someone you do.

Rule Number Three:  If the costs sound astoundingly low, they haven’t listed ALL OF THEM.

 Homes are more like pieces of custom jewelry than boxes of cereal.  They are all unique and have unique costs as well.  Some websites might have a low-priced home offered on their site in order to attract you to it.  However, the offer may be limited to people with high credit scores or large down payments and they fail to tell you that.  Make sure you get ALL the information before you lock in a loan or buy a home.

The best way to make sure you don’t make a fatal (i.e. expensive) error is to work with a loan consultant and a Realtor who are experienced, honest, and willing to spend time with you to answer your questions and guide you at your pace through the home buying process.  Come to class and find out how to locate the best!!

For more detailed information, come to our FREE NO OBLIGATION FIRST TIME HOMEBUYER class or wait for future blogs.  “Simple answers to home ownership questions”.

Buying your first home is a big step.  You need two things before you decide to make that purchase.  First, you need to have all your financial ducks in a row.  Make sure you have money set aside for the down payment and that you have some money in reserve for any problems that might come up after you buy your home.  Look at your credit report and see if you need to change or correct it.  Make sure it presents you in the best light possible and that it tells the truth about you.  If there are mistakes or inaccuracies, take the time to get them fixed.

Second, make sure you are emotionally ready.  Buying a home means assuming responsibility for the new home.  It is a big financial commitment and a time commitment too.  When something breaks or needs repair, there is no landlord to call because the landlord IS YOU. 

I advise you to NOT buy a home if you also are planning a wedding or having a baby or changing jobs.  At least provide some time between these events.  Make sure that you are not taking on too much at one time.  All of these events are stressful and cost money.  Home buying should be a pleasant experience but it can become a nightmare if you are under too many time pressures and too many money pressures.

First time homebuyers will find good opportunities year round, but here in Minnesota, fall is especially a good time to shop.  The market is usually a little slower and sellers are delighted to see you visit their home.  Prices tend to be a little softer in the fall and mortgage interest rates usually drop in the fall as well.  However, any time is a good time when you are ready.

For more detailed information, come to our FREE NO OBLIGATION FIRST TIME HOMEBUYER class or wait for future blogs.  “Simple answers to home ownership questions”.

We cover this pretty thoroughly in our First Time Home Buyer Seminar.  There are several mistakes Home Buyers may make when they decide to purchase their first home. 

Probably the biggest mistake that Home  Buyers make is tackling this complicated purchase without proper education or information.  Buying a home is a lot more risky than buying a car or a boat.  There are a lot more things that can go wrong or be wrong.  Go out and take a class or two.  Work only with real estate professionals who have been in the business awhile and know how to prevent the biggest mistakes.  Education, information and a great Realtor consultant can save you tens of thousands of dollars on a home purchase.

A second mistake Home Buyers  make  is not knowing how much house they  can afford.  Before you even think of starting to shop for a home, you should meet with a mortgage consultant.  Work with a reputable mortgage broker and someone who has been in the business at least 5 years and offers VA, FHA and conventional mortgages.  Let them tell you if you are ready to buy and how much house you can afford.  And then listen to them and don’t overbuy and make yourself “house poor”.

A third mistake is not using a home inspector to carefully review and check the house on your behalf.  Once you have found the home you want to buy, pay the dollars necessary to hire the best homebuyer inspector in the business.  One good inspector can save you thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours in repairs and replacement costs.  You can use their report to negotiate seller paid replacements and repairs.  Read all the documents you can get on that home including the Seller’s Disclosure and the required city inspections.  After you have paid for the home, if you find something wrong with it, it will be MUCH HARDER to get it repaired at the seller’s cost.

A fourth mistake Home Buyers make is not realizing how credit mistakes can affect their ability to qualify for a mortgage.  If your credit is shaky, especially in the current tight credit environment, you may not qualify for a home loan.  Meet with a mortgage consultant to find out where you stand and take the steps necessary to improve your credit rating.  You’ll have to do this sooner or later, if you really want to buy a home.  DO IT SOONER.

Can you see a theme in these four mistakes?  They all have to do with choosing ignorance over education.  An educated buyer is a happy buyer, one who is walking into a home purchase with their eyes wide open.  And a successful home buyer too!!

For more detailed information, come to our FREE NO OBLIGATION FIRST TIME HOMEBUYER class or wait for future blogs.  “Simple answers to home ownership questions”.

Just to be clear with you, I LOVE the internet.  It has made more information available more quickly than any public library ever could.  It has made shopping for homes easier and faster for home buyers, much faster than paging through those phone-book-sized “home books” that Realtors used 15 years ago.  But it has caused some problems too.

When we revised our First Time Home Buyer Class a couple of years ago, I went out and met with six different parties that had come to our class in the past.  I wanted to find out why they came to the class, rather than just gathering information on the WEB.  Everyone agreed that the internet was confusing.  All six parties HAD been on the web at some point in preparing to buy a home.   There was a lot of information, it was true, but some of the information was contradictory.  Some of the information was hard to understand and too complicated.  Some of the information was written in highly technical terms.  There was no way to ask questions and get immediate answers.  The consensus was that the internet wasn’t very user friendly.

These are the folks that then decided a class might be more what they were looking for and signed up for our seminar.  They all agreed that sitting face to face with someone and getting answers on the spot from knowledgeable teachers was far superior to reading information on-line.

The internet can be very useful.  We hope this blog is useful.  But it can be confusing, complicated, contradictory and too slow in answering questions.  If you need answers NOW and if you find the information you’ve been reading is hard to interpret, sign up for a class.  You’ll be glad you did!!

For more detailed information, come to our FREE NO OBLIGATION FIRST TIME HOMEBUYER class or wait for future blogs.  “Simple answers to home ownership questions”.

Did you know that one of the most powerful tools for first time homebuyers is right here? We offer free homebuyer classes in the Twin Cities MN. We’ve been teaching these classes for over ten years.  Hundreds of our students have graduated and had a successful experience buying their first home.  Our classes have much more to offer than any online class ever could because we tailor our classes to meet your needs! They are updated monthly as the information for home buyers changes.  Did you know, for instance, that there are special grants through Minnesota Housing Finance Agency for first time home buyers in Minnesota?  You can receive up to $14,999 to help with your down payment and closing costs.  There are also federal plans such as the time-limited $8000 first time homebuyer credit. There are also city and county sponsored programs, and many important details that our experts here can tell you about!

We have special homebuyer advice and ideas that you can tap into immediately. We cover an array of topics, including credit scores, mortgages, finding the right home, and much more! We also follow up with our students, sending you ongoing information after the class so that you’re in the loop for current home buying news and events. Visit our Signup page and signup for your free class today!

For more detailed information, come to our FREE NO OBLIGATION FIRST TIME HOMEBUYER class or wait for future blogs.  “Simple answers to home ownership questions”.