home can be a stressful and time consuming event in your busy life. The good news is that it doesn't have to be. A good Realtor can take the stress out of home buying by saving you time and taking care of all the hard stuff! The initial search is the most time consuming and frustrating part of buying a new home, and it's just the beginning. Scanning newspaper ads, websites and driving around looking at yard signs can take what seems like forever.
Then once you find a house or two, or three, or however many, now you have to find a way to comfortably view the insides without the current owners following you around looking over your shoulder. When that happens people tend to just want to rush through and get out without really having a chance to inspect. When we're thinking of buying a house we want to bring the family. We want to open doors, cupboards and closets, not to be nosy but just to get a feel for the place. We want to see the kids run around gauging their reaction. After all, it's a family event. Everyone wants to feel at “home” in the home your thinking of buying. That's near impossible with the current tenants present. I'm not saying it will happen, maybe it won't, maybe if your lucky, which no ever is, you'll fall in love with the first one seen. Then you'll never know what could have been!
Let's say you find a few houses you might like. You've arranged and rearranged schedules and viewed them. By now your exhausted and the original excitement of buying a new home has definitely worn off. You've probably completely lost track of what you were looking for and why to begin with. It happens, we've seen it.
Your real estate professional, preferably a Realtor, takes care of all the headaches for you. At his finger tips are virtually all of the homes for sale, with detailed descriptions, in any given area. Now you and your family can sit down in the evening together and make lists of what you want in a new home and what you need. Your Realtor then takes that information, your dream list, and narrows the search in a fraction of the time it will take you to do so on your own.
How many bedrooms and baths do you need? The size of the rooms is important. What kind of square footage are you looking for? Do you need a fenced yard? All of these questions and many more can be answered quickly. With this information a list is generated of prospects for your new home. The Realtor then arranges for showings where you can view the house at your own relaxed pace without annoying owners present. This way your family and you get a good feel for the place. Check out as many as you need to. Buying a house is a major event and finding the perfect one is of the utmost importance.
Once He or She has found the perfect home for you, the next step is to negotiate the best possible price. This is done by first putting in an offer on the house. The offer is the price that you, with your Realtors professional help, decide you want to pay for the house. Offers can include extras like window covering stay, leave the refrigerator or sometimes to even do some work on the house. Whatever, the first offer should be reasonable but tilted to your benefit. Getting the seller to pay closing costs or other expenses is a popular offer theme. The seller than excepts or comes back with a counter offer, and on and on until an agreement can be reached. A Realtor is a pro at negotiating. Their job is to guide you through the whole process to assure you the best deal possible.
Once the contract is in hand there are a number of tasks yet to be completed before you get your house. If you haven't already you'll need to find a lender, unless of course your paying cash. A Realtor knows the market and can suggest mortgage brokers to you. Then Inspections and appraisals and more inspections are next. A title company will need to clear the title making sure it's not held up by any previous obligations, liens or trickery.
Finally one day you, the seller and your respective agents sit down at the title company and sign papers. That's the day the house is yours. The real estate professional carried this whole process through for you. They took care of all the headaches, running around and complicated paperwork while you carried on comfortably with your everyday life. Now you and your family can celebrate and move into your new home. But don't despair, there is something you can do for that person that worked so hard to make your dreams come true.
