Triangle Real Estate & Homes For Sale | North Carolina » Home Buying Tips

There are a lot of Triangle neighborhoods!

Raleigh Real Estate — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 06:16:28 +0000

I’m not sure where you are moving from or how people there tend to organize housing developments. In the triangle the neighborhood is king. When surfing Triangle area websites you’ll undoubtedly come across lists of neighborhoods with descriptions trying to delineate one from the next (we do some of that here too). Funny thing is, lots of these neighborhoods meld into each. So knowing definitively where one stops and another starts can be tricky business. This is not always the case; there are lots of neighborhoods (subdivisions) with well defined borders. When looking for a new home in The Triangle it would be best not to get too caught up in owning a house in a specific neighborhood; just for neighborhoods sake. I understand there will be people who simply must live in a certain neighborhood because of its historic quality or the status living there garners. In my opinion when you are choosing a new house you ought to consider what amenities are a must have and which are negotiable. Odds are that several neighborhoods in an area will provide you with equal access to the things your family can’t live without.

Home Buying Tip… No one buys a house at the bottom of their price range

Raleigh Real Estate — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 07:09:50 +0000

I see it all the time. I’ll be going through an initial consultation with new buyers. They are of course very excited and I’m excited for them. At some point the conversation will bend to how much they are willing to spend on their new place. The couple will say, “Well, we’ve been approved up to $300,000, but we really only want to send $220,000. I say okay and customize a search to meet their criteria. A few days go by we go out hunting. We look at a couple places and I can tell something is up. They’ve been doing their own side hunting –and who can blame them. The internet makes it so easy. First you start looking at the homes that are $220,000. Then you get curious, ‘What does a house for $250,000 look like? We’re approved up to $300,000. No harm in looking.’ Honestly, there is no real harm, but once you’ve opened that door it’s hard to look back. The house that is $220 will not hold a candle to the one that is $300; it can’t. And in my experience only the incredibly strong willed are able to come back down that golden staircase. I want my customers to be happy, and that is the heart of the question. What is going to make them happier; a $300,000 home or a more affordable monthly payment? If it’s not a stretch to make the $300,000 mortgage payment go for it! But if that payment is going to be too big a burden, the house will also quickly turn into a burden.

Here is my advice to you the home buyer.

1. Before you go to talk to a lender sit down and figure out a budget.

2. When you go to talk to your lender come in with your monthly payment firmly set. This monthly payment will translate into the total purchase price of your new house.

2. Don’t even bother to learn your outer barrier. Use the monthly payment as your outer barrier.

3. Don’t look at houses above your price range. Sure you may qualify for the loan amount but you want to enjoy your new place not resent the monthly payments.

Home Inspections …do I really need one?

Raleigh Real Estate — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 05:21:24 +0000

After a few weeks of looking for that perfect house we finally find, “The One.” We write up the offer and the sellers accept. What comes next? How can you be sure this house is worth your hard earned money? What are you really getting yourself into? This is where the home inspection comes into play. The inspection period of the sales transaction provides you with an opportunity to do your “due diligence” in investigating the neighborhood, schools, and the house itself. Most people hire a licensed home inspector to go through the house with a fine tooth comb. On the day of the inspection you and your Realtor will meet the inspector at the house. A good inspector will walk you through the house to point out all the “stuff” he discovered wrong with it. One thing to remember, there is going to be “stuff” wrong with the house; probably more “stuff” than you were anticipating. The general purpose of the home inspection is to open your eyes to the next five years. A good inspector will prepare a report for you that can act as your house maintenance road map for the next five years. If the list of projects on that report seems to daunting a task for you to take on, this is your opportunity to opt out of the contract. In some cases the people selling the house will be obliged to make repairs for the buyers. However, the purpose of the home inspection is not to put the sellers over a barrel, it is to make sure you know exactly what you are getting yourself into when moving day comes.

Where Should Your Next Home Be?

Raleigh Real Estate — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 07:02:16 +0000

A local mindset is coming:

Choose your new house carefully because your attitude to traveling will evolve. We moved to Durham from the hustle and bustle and dustbowl of Phoenix, AZ. In Phoenix it takes a minimum 20 minutes in the car to get anywhere; some of my closest friends lived 45 minutes away. When we got to the Bull City we brought this travel mentality with us. What we quickly found was that the people we made friends with, who had lived in the Triangle for years, did not share our notion of commute. When we’d tell them we lived in North Gate Park you could watch them workout the drive time calculation. If they lived more than 12 minutes away from us maintaining a viable relationship was tenuous. What ended up happening was that we built close ties with our neighbors-something that doesn’t really happen in Phoenix. We also, unbeknownst to us, adopted the 12 minute drive mentality. I don’t know how it happened, but it did. Here is my advice to transplants. Try to live near where you work. Traffic on the major arteries that run through the Triangle can be murder at rush hour and if it happens to snow; forget about it. If you opt for a suburban local, get an ipod download This American Life and enjoy your drives. If you’d like help picking your new homestead give me a call.

Interest rates change …so what?

Raleigh Real Estate — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 07:12:39 +0000

Let me start out by saying I’m not a lender so the ins and outs of home loans is not my specialty. When it comes to mortgages, I have trusted professionals who help my clients. That being said, I do know one thing about home loans that never changes, interest rates. The thing about interest rates that never changes is that they are always changing. The rate today will in all likelihood not be the rate a year from now. These seemingly small shifts in interest rates have a butterfly affect on how much home you can afford. Let me explain. Let’s say you decide it’s time to buy. You call up your trusted lender and they says, “good news, based on your financial health you are approved up to $100,000.” Now when you get this approval what you’re really getting qualified for is a monthly payment amount. Specifically, how much you can afford to spend each month on your house payment. For the sake of simplicity we will assume monthly house payments are comprised of principle (P) and interest (I). So in keeping with our example, you just got approved for a $100,000 home loan and interest rates are at 5%. You’re monthly payment (P+I) would be $537 a month. Of that first $537 home payment, $417 would be your interest payment and the balance would go to principle. So what if interest rates went up to 5.5%. Remember you are approved for a monthly payment which corresponds to a total loan amount. If interest rats are 5.5% the maximum loan you could get to maintain your $537 payment would be $94,500. With the 0.5% increase in interest rate your purchasing power just went from a $100,000 house to a $94,500 house. So what if interest rates go up to 6%. In order to maintain you $537 payment your loan would be for $89,500. Your purchasing power just dropped from $100,000 to $89,500. In the beginning I told you what I didn’t do, make loans, what I do is sell houses. Let me tell you there is a big difference between and $89,500 house and a $100,000 house.

Here is a pretty good rule of thumb. Every 0.5% increase in the interest rate reduces your purchasing power by $5000. I hope this gives you a better understanding of the way increasing interest rates can cripple your home buying power. If you’d like more details on this topic give me a call.