Buying A Home
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Dream of a better world...where chickens can cross the road without having their motives questioned.
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
WWYD?
We received our pre-approval from the bank and called our realtor to see a house we've been eyeing for a few weeks now (we waited until we had the pre-approval to act).
We set up an appointment to see the house this weekend. The listing agent told our agent as an FYI that she is showing it to 7 other people on Saturday.
We are VERY interested in the house. It has everything we want and in a location we love. We ended up scheduling the viewing tomorrow to get sort of a jump on the others (hopefully).
Couple questions:
- Would it be crazy to put an offer on the first house we have seen. Literally.
- Would it be crazy to offer the asking price to perhaps get our offer accepted before others (house is very reasonably priced for the area and the asking price is within our budget).
- Any other drawbacks about this situation you can think of?
TIA!
ETA: house has been on the market for over 200 days and the price has dropped 20K since then.
My Blog
Dream of a better world...where chickens can cross the road without having their motives questioned.
Re: WWYD?
Are there any other houses that you are remotely interested in? If so, could your agent set up showings of those homes tomorrow or Friday, just so you have something to compare to? I firmly believe that if a house meets all of your "needs" and most, if not all, of your "wants," and you connect with it, and it fits within your budget, it doesn't really matter whether it's the first or 100th house you've seen. The right house is the right house. Period. But I, personally, couldn't buy the only house I ever looked at. I would always wonder "what if." That's just the kind of person I am. Only you know what kind of decision-maker you are.
As to offering, our house that we are closing on this week had been on the market 8 days when we offered. The sellers had already rejected 2 offers, the turnout for the open house was huge, and we could tell that another couple was really into the house as much as we were. We were stuck in a short sale contract for a few more days, so we had to sweat it out until we were free to make an offer. We went in slightly above list price, no seller assist, 30 day closing, and with a genuinely heartfelt letter about how much we loved the house and wanted to plant our roots there. The seller signed our offer in 4 hours and we successfully avoided a potential bidding war. The house appraised for $15k over the selling price. So even though we paid more than list price and are eating all closing costs, we will still come away feeling like we got a good deal and the right home for us.
I agree I don't think its crazy to buy the first house, I think we bought the second one we looked at, but we asked our realtor to look at a couple comps in the area before we offered just to make sure that we were getting the deal we thought we were getting.
I also second seeing if you can at least view another house or two the same day just so you know for sure!
GL!
I have to sort of echo the other posters. Would it be crazy to offer on the first house you see? Nope. I personally, however, wouldn't be able to offer without looking at other houses. Our situation was very similar. We had only gone to a few open houses and fell in love with one house/style (cookie-cutter neighborhood). We decided to take a look at the open house home and another one around the corner that was the same style with our realtor two days after the open house. Being first time home buyers we realized quickly that walking through with our realtor was different than on our own as he was able to point out a lot of things we just didn't know. The open house home had too many issues (roof, windows, etc) but the other home was perfect. My husband fell in love right away and if I wasn't there would have put an offer in right away. Talking with our realtor, he didn't seem to think we had to rush into this. The house had been on the market for a while (though it did just have a price drop, which brought it into our range) and we are in a slow market. While I loved the house too and could find little wrong with it (not a huge fan of the cathedral ceilings and tile floor), I couldn't bring myself to put in a offer without at least having our realtor show us a few more houses. We set up showings with him that next weekend and we really didn't see anything that came close to the house. On the way home we drove by it and saw people being shown it. That freaked us out a bit and that's when I realized silly or not, I'd be really sad if we lost the house. We set up a 2nd showing that same day and put an offer in that night.
It's really something you need to way out. If the house is truly perfect and has all the big things you find important, are you willing to risk the house and perhaps not find anything better or even close to it. Or are you willing to risk something better coming along? Have you at least gone to some open houses to see what's out there? Somewhat fortunate in that the houses in our area, in our price range fall into just a few different styles. So we had seen that majority of styles (split ranch, split level) in open houses and were able to quickly realize this style was our favorite. What made the house perfect was huge fenced yard and location within the development. It tough, you have to figure out what possible regret you could live with more, not getting this house (or one as nice) or missing out on something better . . .
Nope and nope. Not crazy.
But just be sure to write in your offer that it is contingent upon a professional inspection to be completed by an insepctor of your choosing.
Also, be sure to add in a deadline clause. A 24 hour response time is typical. However, given that this might be a "hot" house that will be wanted by others, you might even put in a 12 or 8 hour clause if that is permitted in your area.
Lastly, don't get so emotionally involved in the place that you can't make sound decisions.
You have no idea if you'll like this house in person. I think looking at others is a good idea to really understand what you want or are looking for and what you are willing to compromise on. If you have never looked at houses, you will be in for an eye opener.
We saw a lot that looked great from the pictures, but once we got in there and started looking around we realized they just weren't what we expected. We also ended up finding a house that neither of us would have considered at first.
Second, DH and I saw a lot of "dream" homes that were nothing like their online listings. And the house that we ultimately bought -- the one that was perfect for us -- sparked no confidence when we first saw the listing. We only fell in love once we opened the door.
Finally, if this IS the house, I think it's more important to see it more than once than to see other properties. You don't want to spend 10+ years in a house you've only seen for an hour.
So, in short, good luck, but most importantly, keep your cool. Don't get sucked in by the mind games.
Thank you all!
We have drove by the house and peeked in the windows (it's empty). DH is a tax assessor so he has some contacts that do property value assessing in the town the house is in. He spoke to one that knows the property and they gave us a price we can go in with. If they don't except we will take it as a sign it wasn't meant to be and keep looking.
That is if we like it when we go to see it tonight.
One other question...is it inappropriate to carry my 5 month old (in a sling) while we are doing the walk through? I don't have a sitter.
My Blog
Dream of a better world...where chickens can cross the road without having their motives questioned.
My Blog
Dream of a better world...where chickens can cross the road without having their motives questioned.
Would it be crazy to put an offer on the first house we have seen. Literally.
When we met with our realtor she said this:
"Many couples don't buy the first home, but sometime's I believe it is the best option for them, though I will never try and sway you to buy a home it has to be your decision"
If you have a gut decision about this and it meets your wish list, I say go for it!
Best of luck!
Hi there! I wondered if I should have posted an update or not.
We went last night and if someone would have offered me a chance to write an offer before I went I would have...once I got there I realized it was not what we were looking for.
It had an amazing yard and location close to my MIL(where my son goes while I'm at work) but the inside left a lot to be desired.
We will continue the hunt!
Thanks for asking!
My Blog
Dream of a better world...where chickens can cross the road without having their motives questioned.