I totally had writers block, so I turned to my favorite Facebook moms group, “South Hills Working Moms”, and asked if anyone had questions about Real Estate that I could answer. Here are the questions and my hopefully helpful answers:
Q: When should someone engage a Realtor to purchase a home?
A: If you don’t want to spin your wheels endlessly searching totally inaccurate national websites you should engage a Realtor as soon as you begin to contemplate whether buying a house is for you or not. I say the same phrase over and over and over….you can’t make any decision without FACTS. Contact a Realtor, let them advise you on who to contact for a mortgage pre-approval. No one should ever be looking at houses without a pre-approval. Once you have a pre-approval, let a Realtor set you up in a REAL TIME search so that you have accurate info. It takes us no time at all to set you up, it’s easy on our end so don’t feel like it’s “wasting our time” because you don’t even know if you want to move. Sometimes it takes seeing a special house pop up to light your fire. A buyer’s agent services are at no cost to a buyer, so you have NOTHING to lose and everything to gain by finding someone to help you navigate the process.
Q. When should someone engage a Realtor to sell a home?
A. Immediately! A good Realtor (me of course) will come to your house, no obligation and no cost, and walk through with you and give you suggestions on what to do in order to get your home ready to sell. We will show you comparable sold listings for your home and help you to understand what the value of your house is, and go over numbers with you so that you can see what your net proceeds would be after all the fees etc. The process will be laid out for you along with a timeline. By the time a good agent leaves your home, you should have a very solid base of information in order to make your decision. It’s ok to have a couple different agents come take a look. It’s important that you “click” with your Realtor. If you don’t trust them and like them, it won’t work well.
Q. Moving out of town? How to pick a long distance realtor…finding trust over email?
A. I’ve done this many times for people, all over the world, not just out of town. Realtors have a good and strong network everywhere. We have specialized websites and Facebook groups that we all communicate with each other in. I know agents in cities all over the country, and especially all over Pennsylvania. If I know Jane Doe needs to have someone help her find a house in Philadelphia for instance, I reach out to my referral network and I INTERVIEW THEM, search their professional history, do a lot of background research on them and then I make the connection. For this service that Realtor generally pays me a referral fee, so I am motivated to make sure the person I hook you up with is the BEST. If you don’t click, I’ll find you someone else. So basically if you want to find a good Realtor somewhere else, ask a Realtor you know here to help you find the perfect match.
Q. Being stuck in your “starter house” for too long and needing more space but unable to afford any of the fancy “flipped” houses that are for sale, and not having technical skills to buy a crappy one and fix it up:
A. I LOVE THIS QUESTION because it’s filled with opportunities for me to clarify some things. First of all, being able to “afford” a new house….For a conventional loan you only need 3% down to purchase a house, and you can ask seller to pay up to 3% in closing cost assistance. For an FHA loan you only need 3.5% down and you can ask seller to pay up to 6% in closing cost assistance. So in terms of cash you need, it might be much less than you are assuming. ALSO, if you’ve owned your house for a long time you of course have a lot of equity you can turn around and use to purchase the next home. ASK A MORTGAGE PERSON FOR HELP before deciding you can’t do it without actually checking. I can give lots of recommendations for every type of buyer and personality. Secondly, do you KNOW you can’t afford a new house or are you just assuming? Sometimes flips are terrible. Sometimes it’s so much better to buy an inexpenseive and dated home and just tear out carpet, paint, and add new lighting. Anyone can make those changes and they make a huge and inexpensive impact.
Life it too short to be stuck in a home you don’t love. If you don’t love it, move. You are not a tree. (I love that quote!).
The Girl, the Homes, the Stories 