We just bought our first house!
One of the main reasons we moved out of California to Colorado was so that one day, hopefully, we would be able to buy a house. We are very fortunate that we were recently given the opportunity to do so.
When we moved to Colorado, we rented a townhome on a month-to-month basis. If you need moving tips, check out my blog post : https://www.thelexiconoflife.com/post/moving-guide for having as stress-free as possible move! And we found this house through a rental website and decided to move there sight-unseen, which could have gone badly very quickly! Thankfully, we did not get scammed and the house existed and looked the same as promised.
We loved our townhome. And we were renting it from the owner so it was a little different situation than most in that it wasn't being rented through a property management company. Pretty soon after living in the house, we realized it would be great if we could buy it from our landlord. He didn't live in the area and had owned it for awhile, but we never sat down and had a conversation about setting up something to buy from him, such as a lease-to-own option.
Cut to March of 2023, and one Saturday we are playing one of those "Hunt A Killer" box games (as you do) and we get a knock at the door. We find out that sadly our landlord has passed away from his relatives who showed up at our house. After speaking with them for awhile, they present us with the offer to let us buy the house before it goes to market. We tell them that this something we've been thinking about for awhile, so it was a tragedy that turned into a blessing for us.
With all that being said, my tips for buying a home are a little different, because we were already living in the home that we bought.
Buying a house Tip #1 - See how much you can afford
If you read anything, the first tip will always be the same. You can't buy a home without knowing what house you can afford. Do some research and find a mortgage broker that will be with you every step of the way until you sign the last document on closing day. If you are in the Denver area, I can't recommend Tara Snow from https://www.copromortgage.com/ enough! She and her team were so helpful throughout the whole process and we learned so much from her.
Tip #2 - Start searching
Once you know how much you can afford, the fun begins! Check out sites like Zillow, Trulia and Redfin to look at listings and start going to open houses! As someone who watches every Real Estate reality show out there, going to open houses is so much fun! It lets you get an idea of features you want (or don't want) and you can start imaging your life in the houses you look at. This is also a good time to connect with a realtor in the area. You can talk to the realtors at the open houses - they will be happy to give you their business cards, or ask friends and family for people they've worked with before in the area. Because we already had the home we wanted to buy, we didn't use a realtor for our side of the deal, but if you are in the Denver area, Kristen Issel is great and would love to help you out! https://kristenissel.myrealtyonegroup.com/
Tip #3 - Making an offer
Again, we had a different situation and the seller of the property had a fixed price they wanted to meet. And we negotiated the price with our mortgage broker/ their reator to come to a compromise. Your mortgage broker will help you come up with different options based on your income, credit score, etc. Because of how crazy the real estate market still is, it can get pretty competitive when making an offer. I know it's hard to think of, but I like to think that if one thing is not meant to be, the next thing will be!
Tip #4 - Closing on a house
So you found your dream home, negotiated the price, and now you're ready to buy! It's not like on TV where everything happens so fast. You will be signing a lot of documents (thankfully most of them electronically) and you will need to do things like verify your financial accounts, find homeowners insurance, do an appraisal to make sure you are paying a fair price for the house, and an inspection. BUT, once you do all that and everything is approved by all parties, now you can close!
The realtors and or mortgage broker will arrange for a date and time once the loan details are all squared away (if you have one). And they will let you know how you will pay for your down payment - wire transfer or cashier's check. This is all on a case-by-case basis so make sure to ask what they prefer so you are all ready to close. Then, on closing day, you will meet and sign your name at least 50 times (it seemed) signing over the house to you.
Tip #5 - Enjoy your new house!
It still hasn't clicked for me that we are homeowners! Of course I instantly want to start on projects making the house more our own, and it's so nice not having to ask a landlord for permission. But I will be doing projects slowly since there are things we will need to get fixed that was pointed out from the inspection.
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