buying a house...need help

[mcveigh]

I'm buying a house this fall and was wondering if anyone had any advice or better some websites with good info on house buying?
I'm in the US in Florida, and am kinda freaked out by getting in this much debt!

today I talked to the realtor, and mortgage broker i'll probably use, I'd like to buy soon but am hesistant my parents recently bought a new house and had a nightmare of a time, turned out one of the people handling their paper work was addicted to painkillers :Q

Thanks people!

 

[RossMAN]

First Time Home Buyer's Guide

 

[Moonbeam]

Locarion location location. It might help to look an houses in the sf bay area and then buy where you are. They should look alot cheeper then.

 

[mcveigh]

RossMAN, already did that, man I love google!, best thing I saw was a guide from the gov't printing office

Moonbeam, My friend in seattle thinks I complain too much also

I'm worried about POINTS at closing, for those of you have bought a home what points did you have to pay?

 

[thedarkwolf]

I just had my bid on a
house accepted today. I found this site extremely usefull in looking for a house.

www.realtor.com

 

[mcveigh]

Congrats!!

and thanks

 

[Moonbeam]

To do points look at how long you will own and how soon you would recover your points by taking a pointless or lesser point higher interest loan. You can compare different loans on eloan.com or use a financial calculator.

 

[Stallion]

We bought down to get our intrest to 6.375. It cost about 5K if I remember right, it will take some time to make up that money but we wanted as low as intrest as possible.

 

[mcveigh]

bought down? that's a new one to me, but it sounds familar, what is it?

 

[Stallion]

The intrest rate was at 6.75% or something around there and by buying the intrest down to 6.375 it made our payment a little less.

 

[Tominator]

Get a book called House Smart . It's authored bt Bruce Williams.

He explains the home buying process in easy to understand terms. What to do and not to do. After talking to many after they bought, it was plain to me that they had no idea what they were doing. It's the biggest investment you will make in your whole life and I'm continually amazed how some folks go about buying property.

 

[RossMAN]

Want to read one of the best Hot Deals threads ever? Read through all the posts and it'll probably help explain and save you a lot of money.

 

[greazelns]

mcveigh,

It sounds like you are going to use a Broker for your loan. Be sure that this person looks everywhere for a loan and does not work with a few select banks. I got a loan 1/8 below the market because of this.

Also, look for a discount real estate broker. My wife teaches but in the summer she works for a discount broker who give back 50% of her commisions if you buy this them. That helps out a ton on your down payment.

Also, if you can, get a loan that is only 2x your earned income. This will prevent you from being "house poor".

Also, if you need money after you buy the house, you can have the seller pay your closing costs. To get them to agree with this, tell them that you will work out the price of the house (example: $100,000) and then tack on the closing costs ($2,000) so you are "buying" the house for $102,000. This way the seller helps you but it does not cost them a penny. If you need more information on that, let me know. It is real simple and though some people get a little "scared" when you say that, it you explain it like I did above, then you should have no problems.

 

[Raspewtin]

with current interst rates don't think of it as debt, think of it as building equity these rates are awesome. so don't pay too much down if you can help it, b/c at the interest you are paying your money can do better then 7% in investments today, so you don't want to tie it up in your house anyway.




<< Also, if you need money after you buy the house, you can have the seller pay your closing costs. >>




that's how it worked here, i thought it works this way automatically.