First Time Home Buyer

I know, I'm sorry. It has been a while. It is the longest that I have gone without a post since I started. Don't fret, it isn't because I have given up. The reason behind the leave of absence is that Nabil and I have been house hunting. Eeek! This is not our first time however. No, no, no. We first looked for a place about two and a half years ago. We found a few places that we liked, but it just seemed like nothing would work out. We even put an offer on a townhouse, but the bank that owned the property never got back to us. We literally just never heard back. Eventually we had to stop looking because we had to either renew our lease at the apartment we lived in at the time, or get out. It probably ended up being for the best, because the housing market has continued to go down since then (which no one thought it would), so we are now able to afford a real house (said followed by a giddy "yippy")! This will be the first place that we live that doesn't have someone else living above, below or to the side. It's hard to image not having to consider the noise level of the TV at 11pm. Can you tell I'm excited?!

Anyway, we started looking for houses again at the end of last summer, so I guess it has been about six months although it feels like much longer. The last three months though we have been going balls to the wall. Our poor agents. Seriously. They are probably exhausted. We have been going through tour after tour, getting excited and then getting disappointed. I hope that it will end up being worth it because I can't wait until we get to turn the key and walk in to OUR HOUSE for the first time. However, at this point, I'm not sure we will ever get there. We are currently in the process of negotiating but because of a bad inspection, I'm thinking that we may have to walk away.

Through the process of purchasing a house, we have learned a lot. That is actually an understatement, and I think most homeowners would agree there is really nothing like buying your first house. So to those who are still on the brink, I impart my new found wisdom. Here are 8 things that I have learned from being a first time house hunter.

#1 - House hunting sucks!

I hate to say it, but it's true. It can be fun to look at pictures of houses and even go tour the houses in person, but for me the emotional roller coaster was not on my list of "fun things I want to do". House hunting is jam-packed full of getting super excited about a potential house and then having all your hopes and dreams crash to the floor in front of you. I always get so jealous of my friends that can do home improvement projects of their own, and it is exciting to think about the potential in each new house. I mean you have to picture yourself living in the house to see if it is a good fit. The shitty part comes when you find out that there is already an offer on the house, or someone just barely out bid your ceiling price. It's mentally exhausting, and it sucks. Enough said.

#2 - Find a good real estate agent and mortgage broker.
We picked our real estate agents, Mellisa and Carrie because one of their husbands played on Nabil's soccer team. It may not always be a good idea to go with a friend, but we wanted someone we could trust and would have our best interests at heart. Also, being first time home buyers, we wanted someone who would tell us if a house was more than we could handle. They have obviously seen way more than we have, so we wanted them to be very honest and open with us. Another good thing about our agents, is that they are two partners working as a team. That means if one of them is on vacation or sick, the other is available who has access to all of our past tours and knows what we want. To be honest, I was a little hesitant at first of working with two people, but it really worked seamlessly. I would highly recommend it.

#3 - Know why you are buying.

This one may seem obvious, but I think that it is worth thinking about. Think about why buying is better than the alternative. Owning a house is not the investment that it used to be. You are not guaranteed to get all or even some of your money back in 3+ years. For us, we wanted to be able to work on the little things. I like gardening and DIY home improvement projects. Since we've been renting it just seems like all that money, time and energy is going to benefit someone else. That isn't the only reason we were looking to buy, but it was a big one.

Also think about where will you be in 5 years. 10 years? Will the house suit all your needs for that long? What is your "must have" list? I think that it was a big advantage to us that we rented a house before looking to buy. There I things I would have NEVER thought about before. Things like looking to see if the backyard slopes towards the house. The rental that we live in right now does. Because of that, and because we live in Oregon and it is always raining, the basement has a constant stream of water running through it. All of our storage has to be on pallets to avoid any water damage. Also, while the windows in our rental are fairly new, they are cheap. They leak heat like crazy. The list could go on, but you get the idea. These are all fixable, but it's expensive and is something that is better to know sooner rather than later. Of course there are always going to be things that come up or things that were overlooked, but the more you look for at the beginning, the better.

#4 - Learn to compromise
We had our "must have" list of things when we first started looking. I'm sure our agents were rolling on the ground laughing after we left their office from our "beginning the house hunt" meeting. We knew we wanted to have a mini-fixer, and we thought that we were being realistic but we ended up having to compromise on a few things. We would have loved to have more than one bathroom and have a basement for storage, but in reality our first time home buyer budget didn't allow for everything. My best advise is to have a "must have" list, but be willing to negotiate with yourself. We may not have a second bath, but we have a HUMONGOUS backyard. We don't have a basement or garage, but we have a fireplace, and a very cozy sunken living room. In the end you have to feel at home and be excited about the house, but you also have to keep and open mind and be realistic.


#5 - Do your homework

Never underestimate the power of doing your homework! This process doesn't happen overnight. It takes time and energy. Look at everything! And I don't just mean look at everything in your budget. Take a look all over the map. Go to open houses that are way over your budget; although; I would not recommend telling the listing agent that your actual budget is lower. The first few times we did that, and we were met with a condescending attitude. I really think though that seeing houses in such a range helped us to know how to spot a good value.

Get to know the good and bad areas of town. Sometimes there are little pockets in an area that you may not have considered but could be exactly what you are looking for. When we were searching, Nabil and I would spend a Saturday afternoon just driving around the city finding neighborhoods and areas that we liked, and areas that we wanted to stay away from. There were a few areas of the city that we thought were great, and are known for being very popular for young families, but the commute to and from work would have been an extra 20-30 minutes. To me that's not worth it.


#6 - Prepare for the worst
Nabil makes fun of me a little bit for this one. He thinks I am going to turn into a Doomsday Prepper. But really, buying a house is scary. It's especially scary having seen the market crash and thousands of people losing their homes. It's true that some of this could have been prevented. You should know that it isn't smart to buy more than you can afford. In fact you should be able to budget in some savings. You never know when a pipe is going to burst. That being said, shit happens. You can prepare for the worst all day and night, but at some point it doesn't do any good to keep stressing out. I am a master at stressing myself out and over analyzing everything, but in the end, it is a risk. Life happens. Prepare for the worst, but don't drive yourself crazy.

#7 - Know when to tune out the input

When it comes to buying a house, EVERYONE is going to offer advise. It gets old quick. After a while, I had to just tune it all out. Like most parents, my parents tried to be helpful, and they were, but they just don't quit. I must have heard the exact same thing from each parent about 20 times. I just had to keep telling myself that they mean well. Then there are those people that think it's funny to say "oh the joys of home ownership". The next time I hear that I may slap that snide smile off their face. Yes, there were more than a few times I had to hone my inner teenager. You know when you keep saying "uh-huh" and "ya, of course", while you really have no idea what they just said. It turns out that little girl with the tude hasn't died off. She is alive and well. ...and very useful.

That's not to say I didn't ask or want advise from people. I did! I asked almost everyone I know including parents, coworkers, friends, our agents, etc. I'm the kind of person that wants to hear all the horror stories, the "I wish I would have..." stories, and the "I'm glad I did..." tidbits. I want to hear it all, but then I want to decide for myself. I mean, I think that Nabil and I are smart people. We do our research, and in the end it is our house. We're the ones that have to live in it every day. Everyone else may think it is a money-sucking, whore house, but we have to love it, and if that's the case, it will be a money-sucking, whore home.

#8 - Know when to walk away
We actually learned this the hard way during our first round of looking for houses (and potentially a second time). It can be so exciting when you finally find that house where you can see yourself living, starting a family, and  where you can generally feel at home. There are so many times in the process where I had to consciously stop myself from trying to picture fun DIY home improvement projects because it is heartbreaking when something doesn't work out. When you finally find a good fit, you want it to work out more than anything. Sometimes however, you have to walk away. There is a limit to every budget, and it is different with every buyer. Unless the home you are looking at is brand new, there are going to be things that come up during the inspection, but you have to learn where the line is rather than getting in over your head with a new sewer line that you really can't afford, or in our case, a crawl space that doesn't meet clearance and has a small stream running through the corner. Often the seller will fix major issues that come up before closing especially if they badly want to sell their property, but if they aren't willing to budge, it is important to know what is too much to handle.

So that's it. First time home buying is full of ups and downs, but fingers crossed, it will all be worth it when if we get those keys!

Until next time...

Update: Nabil and I moved in to our first house not too long ago. You can check out the tour of the house here. It was definitely a lot of time, effort, and energy that went into purchasing the house, but I think that it was all worth it. Now we have a place of our very own, that we can make feel like our own. A place that we can call home for a long time. A place where our kid(s) will call home for the first part of their life. We have a lot of work ahead of us, but we are very excited about it because it is all OURS!