Call a great Realtor. This will make things smooth and easy for you, I promise 🙂 The Realtor will guide you through the necessary steps to start the process. They can also connect you with a great local contact for your mortgage pre-approval if needed.

The entire process typically takes approximately 30-90 days from the start to the day you get your keys!

A seller’s market is a market where conditions favor the seller. Indicators are typically low inventory and rising home prices. In this type of market, buying a home is competitive, and homes typically sell quickly, and for full asking price or more.

A buyer’s market is a market where conditions favor the buyer. Indicators are typically rising inventory, and either stable or decreasing home prices. In this type of market, buying a home is less competitive, homes take a bit longer to sell, and buyers can often negotiate the price and terms more easily to their favor.

Another way to describe this type of market is a balanced market. Conditions neither favor the buyer nor the seller. Indicators are a steady supply of inventory, and stabilizing home prices. In this type of market buyers typically have the opportunity for negotiation, homes sell for a bit less than the asking price, and buyers and sellers are on relatively equal footing.

$0.00 – Zero!! You pay nothing at all. Great news, right! In general, sellers pay real estate commissions, so buyers do not pay anything for the professional services provided by a Realtor! Take advantage of free representation as a buyer and call a Realtor.

There are a lot of programs out there, but best to have a credit score of 620 or above.

You can buy a home for as little as 3.0% down.

Here are a couple of options to consider. 1) If the purchase of your new home requires the sale of your current home it is recommended to at least have your current home on the market, or even better, under contract. Most sellers will not consider accepting a contract that is contingent on the sale of the buyer’s home that is not yet under contract. Therefore, if you find a home that you really want, you will not be able to act on it. However, most sellers will consider an offer contingent on the buyer’s home “if” the buyer’s home is currently under a solid contract with a set closing date. 2) Another option would be to obtain a bridge loan, which is a mortgage product specifically designed to help bridge the gap between the transition from your old home to your new home.

There is no set number for this. It could be that the very first home you see is the perfect one! Of course, it could take a few or several. It will be different for everyone, every time, but when you find “the one”, be confident and go for it. Your heart/gut will tell you when you found the one : ) Do not feel like you have to see more homes just to see more; you could end up losing the very best one!

Earnest money is a “good faith” deposit that is “put down” by a buyer on a home or real estate purchase to show the seller your seriousness towards purchasing. The earnest money is held in a third-party escrow account and credited back to you at closing. Also, if at any point after signing the contract you do not move forward, this earnest money will be refunded back to you, as long as you had a contingency protecting it. Examples of earnest money contingencies are financing, inspection, sale of the home, etc.

At the time of the offer, you should include a deadline for the seller’s response time. This response time is typically 1-2 days from the time of the offer. If the seller does not respond prior to the deadline, your offer immediately becomes null and void.

If your offer is rejected the first thing I recommend is to not take this for an answer. Instead, ask your Realtor to call the Seller/Seller’s Realtor and ask them to counter your offer rather than rejecting. Oftentimes this strategy works. This way you are not bidding against yourself. If all else fails and you really want the property, you can always revise your offer to something more attractive and resubmit it to the seller.

In general, yes. A real estate purchase is a huge investment and protecting that investment can be greatly enhanced by ordering a home inspection. This can also provide peace of mind. An easy way to think about it is that you can spend hundreds of dollars on a home inspection to protect the hundreds of thousands you are spending on the home. Oftentimes the money spent on inspection will be saved by the credits or repairs you will be able to request from the seller for items discovered.

Yes, every time. Things happen; sometimes bad things… ACs go out, plumbing leaks/floods happen, the seller’s movers damaged the wall at move-out, that sofa you were supposed to get is missing, etc. You want to do a final walkthrough as close to the closing as possible so you are seeing the home in the exact same way that you will be receiving it at closing.