House Hunting

[Rosebud]

Ok, I am taking on yet another task that is very frustrating.

We are currently renting our house right now for a really good price. Well we have had several problems with our landlord. We have water damage that still has not been fixed since the summer, and the garage door just recently got fixed that originally he was trying to make us pay for because he accused us of hitting it with a car which later he found out he was wrong and it was his own fault for installing the door himself. This house is nice but it needs lot of work. So we have decided we wanted something else because we would have to put too much money in this house and it's already going for $170,000. When he bought the house, he did all the repairs and installed everything half ass. So after this garage thing happened we decided we were going to sign the lease as long as we could break it at any time, and we would continue to look for another house to rent.

Well I looked into all of our options. I'm still waiting to hear back on how much we would qualify for a home loan, but I'm 100% approved. Well right before this garage deal our landlord said he would email over the paperwork for the lease..ok no big deal! But haven't seen it. Well then today he sends me an email and says they have decided to put the house up on the market in May and would we be interested?

This frustrates me because now I have a deadline to find a house. We were going to rent and then decided we would stay here to save money to buy a house in the spring, but I don't want to rent another house only to move out within a couple months. Not to mention we won't be able to find a rental paying what we are paying for what we have. I don't think we'll be able to take care of the stuff we need to fix ( my bf's credit) in time to buy a house instead of renting. I'm so angry, and I hate not knowing.. Any suggestions? And I'm new to all this house buying stuff so I have no clue how it all works. Any advice would help on this one.

[vashti]

If you are goping to buy a house, here are a couple of pieces of very important advice:

1) It is better to buy a crappy house in a good neighborhood than it is to buy a nice house in a crappy neighborhood.

2) Check out your neighbors thoroughly. They can make your life Hell.

3) Check out the quality of the local schools.

[Rosebud]

Thank you for the advice vashti!

We know the area we want to live in, which is subsequently close to the same area I grew up. It's all within 3 cities, and the schools are top notch. I definetly plan to look into the neighbors though, thank you!

I just don't know whether to jump into a crappy house to save money until we can buy what we want or try and get all this stuff taken care of as soon as possibe to be able to buy a house right away. I think the hardest part is trying to find out what we qualify for in a loan. I asked about this the last week in december and while I've talked to this guy several times, he seems to be really pokey!

[Lloyd95]

Main thing: Location, location, location!

Other thoughts:
-School district, like shh! said.
-Are you handy? If not, go for newer construction.
- You're not married. Whose name is this going to be in? In case of a breakup. You'd be pissed if it were in his name, then you split, you have no grounds for keeping the house, or entitled to any percentage of it's equity.
-Get buyers insurance. It's about $300 and it covers any big appliance breakdown for the first year. For example, if the water heater were to go. I did this and ended getting a new AC unit outside, dishwasher and garbage disposal.
-don't buy on a busy street (kids).
-if you can find a house with nothing in the backyard, like another house, do it. I wouldn't want my backyard running into someone else's backyard and look straight at someone's house.
-Make sure to check the last 5 "comparables", or last 5 houses in the neighborhood to see how much they sold for.
-During the inspection: check foundation, and signs of water damage. If it has a deck, have it checked out for sturdiness. these can be expensive fixes.
-Roof. Is it the first roof or second (on top of the first) You don't want one with the shingles on top of the old roof.


There's probably more, and I'll post them as I think of them.

[Rosebud]

Thank you for that! I've been writing down all kinds of stuff to look for and look into when house hunting. And the house will be in my name! I do have a question about something though, that I don't know if anyone can answer but I'll try!

Let's say we find out what we would qualify for and it's less than what we want. How do we raise that amount? Do we just work more on our credit report and score and hopefully lower the debt ratio, or how does that work? Like I mean how do you get a specific amount you want.

[vashti]

Personally, I owuldn't suggest trying to get more than you can qualify for. The reason one can only qualify for x amount is that that is all they can afford to pay. You don't want to be married to your mortgage, so you? Better to buy a townhouse or something.

[TAVS]

Bigger Down Payment. Co-Sign from Parents helps a bit but not a lot.
What Shh! said is probably the best addvice.

GO BRONCOS

[Rosebud]

No No, I didn't mean try and get more than we qualify for, I meant what do I fix to get a higher amount later down the road? Like if they say you qualify for $50K (which I doubt) but what do we do over time to raise that amount to get something more? Do you see what i mean?

[TAVS]

More Income

[Rosebud]

I see, I knew I'd have to go back to work!

[Lloyd95]

NO more than one third of your take home money should goto mortgage.

If neither of you are handy, I strongly suggest a townhouse. Wish I went that route, kinda.

[TAVS]

NO more than one third of your take home money should goto mortgage.

If neither of you are handy, I strongly suggest a townhouse. Wish I went that route, kinda.

Sounds about right. I'm at like 33% and It's a pinch.

[Rosebud]

Yea I agree, I know how to look at all that stuff. I mean I know taxes aren't included in what you qualify for and how to figure out what our monthly payments would be off what we are qualified for. I find out tomorrow how much we can afford, But My Bf is thinking it isn't going to be what we are looking for, so we'll probably have to rent a house for around the same amount we are now to save up and raise his FICO score. The thing is we have a decent amount of money to put down on a house which looks good as well but my concern I think is, to get where we want to be I didn't know if it was based off making more money or just raising credit scores, because My Bf makes really good money!

[vashti]

NO more than one third of your take home money should goto mortgage.

If neither of you are handy, I strongly suggest a townhouse. Wish I went that route, kinda.

It used to be on 25% was supposed to go to mortgage. Maybe they upped it?

[Rosebud]

Actually I just saw today it's 28%. But the total amount you should pay in regards to debts and mortgage is 36%.

Well actually that's how you figure out your debt to income ratio!