Found a house I want to buy

[Dr. Zaus]

the whole not driving to work thing... That's awesome.
So no woman/man to share the house with?

Babies don't take kindly to basements. (or rather, radon-fearing wives don't...)

 

[pontifex]

the whole not driving to work thing... That's awesome.
So no woman/man to share the house with?

Babies don't take kindly to basements. (or rather, radon-fearing wives don't...)

not yet

 

[BarkingGhostar]

Two words: home inspection

Two more words: site survey.

And two more words:
Title Protection

 

[BarkingGhostar]

I'll post photos if I end up buying it. I don't want to post my possible address on the forum.

2 bed, 1 bath, 1 acre, all appliances included (washer, dryer, fridge, oven, microwave, dishwasher, even a large ice chest). It's in excellent condition and I shouldn't have to do anything with it.

Will have inspection and all that done just to make sure all is good though.

Just use Bing's Maps for a Bird's Eye view and screen capture only the image.

 

[velillen]

I've been looking since about September of last year. only looked at maybe 7 or 8 total before this one. Someone else told me you'll know when its the one and like I said, when I walked in, I was like, wow, this house is amazing.

although it didn't help that most of the previous houses ended up being either total shit holes when I got there or weren't too bad but still needed a lot of work.

My father went with me on all of the viewings as he knows more about what to look for than I do. He really liked this one too.

haha sounds like exactly the same experience i had. Even down to having my dad come along! When i saw this house soon as i opened the front door i knew it was the house i wanted

 

[pontifex]

Just use Bing's Maps for a Bird's Eye view and screen capture only the image.

you won't be able to see anything that way. it's pretty much covered up by trees. even if it wasn't covered by tress, you still wouldn't be able to see any detail.

 

[Sureshot324]

A house for 149k? Damn, where I live there's next to nothing for under 300.

 

[Dr. Zaus]

Is that US or Canadian?

 

[yh125d]

Congrats...i spent ~6 months looking myself (well go out to 5-6 houses every 2-3 weeks) and when i found the house i bought you just sort of know its the one. Only advice i could say is have your parents or friends or someone else (or 2 or 3 people) come and look at it with you. Different perspectives are always nice and can make you realize things you hadnt seen before (like only 1 cable outlet in each room with it being on what i consider the walls you wouldnt put the tv lol).

Still congrats!

I actually have done the opposite as a test for myself, to see if I can do it all alone. I have no agent or anything, I searched for houses myself, went to showings myself, did the offer myself, went to the inspections myself, and won't even be telling my family I put an offer on a house til after closing.


I'm just a very independent person I guess

 

[pontifex]

Is that US or Canadian?

I think you are asking Sureshot, but mine is US

 

[Vic Vega]

...

 

[yh125d]

A house for 149k? Damn, where I live there's next to nothing for under 300.

I guess I shouldn't tell you then that I'm buying a nice, fully renovated top to bottom 1200sf 3/1.5/2 in a great neighborhood 30 minutes from the city for only $85k

 

[Squisher]

I'm waiting for the housing bubble to pop in my country, then a year or so to bottom before I buy.

What kind of backwards country do you live in that you haven't had the opportunity to have housing values cut in half? Come to Detroit, we're on the cutting edge of economic downturns.

I say that in jest, but we've actually seen somewhat of a housing recovery in the last six months here, probably in the neighborhood of 10-20%.


OP, you couldn't have picked a better time to buy. Oh, and by the way, take what think you'll need to set aside for furniture/appliances/etc. and double it.

 

[MadScientist]

Getting out of northern Bumfuck, WV. Marcellus shale gas well drilling is getting out of hand. Boom for those who own their mineral rights, but they are tearing up the land and roads, and polluting drinking water wells.

We just purchased a home in TN for $235K, between Maryville and Madisonville, brick & vinyl, 2200 sq ft, 3 bedrm, 2 bath on one level, 1 acre backs up to farm land, view of the smoky mtns (realtors like to push this), 1 year old on a cul-de-sac, granite counter tops in kitchen and baths, ss appliances, only 6 new homes on the lane. Lots of room between homes, didn't want to be in one of those bee hive developments.

Thought about moving to FL (summers are brutal) or AZ but TN has no state income tax; COL, real estate, and taxes are cheap; and just south enough for mild winters.

Spent hours on the net looking for homes at realtor.com, FSBO, realtor's sites, and foreclosures, narrowed it down to ~30 homes in TN and spent 4 days viewing them. Looked at 3 foreclosures, 3 FSBOs, and the rest from realtors.

Best resource sites if looking for foreclosures: https://www.biggerpockets.com/bank-reo.html and https://www.equator.com/index.cfm?event=findHome.findAHome

Home sales and prices in some areas of US have started to rise in late 2011 and in the first quarter of 2012. Check out http://www.city-data.com/ for data. Have we seen the bottom???

Zillow is also a good resource, but I've found their zestimates on some homes that we viewed to be way off. I don't think they take into account home upgrades. http://www.zillow.com/

 

[SlowSpyder]

A house for 149k? Damn, where I live there's next to nothing for under 300.

I just bought a nice place (nice to me) for $101900. They were asking $94900, but I had let a few houses I wanted slip through my fingers because they received higher bids. I didn't want to miss this one, and I got it. I close at the end of April, really looking forward to it.

 

[pontifex]

I just bought a nice place (nice to me) for $101900. They were asking $94900, but I had let a few houses I wanted slip through my fingers because they received higher bids. I didn't want to miss this one, and I got it. I close at the end of April, really looking forward to it.

you couldn't make a higher bid or the other bids were higher than what you wanted to spend?

 

[Dr. Zaus]

get a housing inspector to look it over entirely, someone employed by you. The bank will make you pay for one anyway, but you'll rarely get the writeup.

 

[Childs]

A house for 149k? Damn, where I live there's next to nothing for under 300.

Yeah, under $300K around here is condo territory, and not new ones.

 

[alkemyst]

A house for 149k? Damn, where I live there's next to nothing for under 300.

Do you acknowledge your area or are just living with mom and dad and have no clue?

 

[Imp]

A house for 149k? Damn, where I live there's next to nothing for under 300.

Psh... $300k won't even get me a 1 bedroom condo in a better part of town - those start at $350k+ for 500 sq.ft.

What kind of backwards country do you live in that you haven't had the opportunity to have housing values cut in half? Come to Detroit, we're on the cutting edge of economic downturns.

I say that in jest, but we've actually seen somewhat of a housing recovery in the last six months here, probably in the neighborhood of 10-20%.

Say "hi" to Canada. Link below describes the situation in my city quite well. The blog is cherrypicking the worst cases, but the "norm" isn't much better. Neo-con federal government decided to allow 40 year, 0 down mortgages just about when the US market started crashing. They finally cut back to, IIRC, 30 year, 5% down - anything less than 20% down is insured by our version of Fannie Mae. Stats are saying that ~45% of people won't be able to pay their mortgages if the interest rate goes up 2%. Unemployment is actually increasing here too.

http://fmlistings.tumblr.com/

My first-hand experience: I do some structural engineering for custom homes. Few months back I did a job for a couple who bought a $1.5 million house, then gutted it and did $1 million worth of renoes. Apparently the hubby was in IT, wife was an accountant, so maybe $200k income?

 

[CrackRabbit]

Two words: home inspection

THIS, THIS, AND THIS.

A home inspection done by a good inspector will make or break a deal.

Had to back out of escrow on a place when the inspector found that the roof was pulling itself apart due to the slab shifting. Saved me a ton of money and headache in the long term.

 

[SlowSpyder]

you couldn't make a higher bid or the other bids were higher than what you wanted to spend?

They are not taking bids like an auction, a couple of the houses I looked at were forclosures. What the bank did was put them on the market with a fairly low price for two weeks, then on x date all offers had to be in. The houses were priced that they would definitely have offers. They did not reveal the offers or ask for higher bids, the highest offer simply got the house. I went conservative, over the asking price, but not as far as I could have gone and did not get the houses. So on this one I went a bit higher, $6k over their asking price, and got it. I paid what I think it was honestly worth where as before I tried too hard to get a steal, and was out bid.

 

[pontifex]

They are not taking bids like an auction, a couple of the houses I looked at were forclosures. What the bank did was put them on the market with a fairly low price for two weeks, then on x date all offers had to be in. The houses were priced that they would definitely have offers. They did not reveal the offers or ask for higher bids, the highest offer simply got the house. I went conservative, over the asking price, but not as far as I could have gone and did not get the houses. So on this one I went a bit higher, $6k over their asking price, and got it. I paid what I think it was honestly worth where as before I tried too hard to get a steal, and was out bid.

interesting. never heard of that before.

I guess normally if you went through a realtor, they would take your offer and if the seller didn't like it, they would come back and say no, but then you could make another offer if you wanted to.

I m going to offer 142k initially on this one. I can do 149k but if I can get it a little cheaper, that would obviously be nice.

Seems like they want to get move asap and form what I am told by the realtor, there as an elderly couple that looked at it but they need to sell their own house first. Otherwise I am the only person so far. I don't have a house to sell or anything like that so I have a head start there.

 

[clamum]

Sounds exciting, congrats dude!

 

[Mr. Lennon]

Once in awhile I start to get jealous about housing prices outside of Cali. I then remind myself...

I can drive a couple minutes to the beach...or an hour to the mountains.
I can experience snow on my own terms.
I have access to the best, most diverse dining in the world.
I never have a reason to be bored with the almost limitless entertainment options.

I have no problem paying a premium for just these few benefits alone.