Now days you hear everywhere that house market is down and
it is a buyer’s market. However, good
houses go quick and not cheap(market price is lower but not free). I have
been shopping for a single family house over 1 year looking for that perfect
house and good price. At the beginning I
was very selective and did not rush waiting for the ideal house in my price
range.
Then with time I realized that there is no ideal house that
will have everything you want, at least if you have price limit and not willing
to pay more than you can afford or more then it worth what is not recommended,
that is what got us in such a bad market on the first place. My suggestion will be to concentrate on
location and most important and desirable features in the house and if you find
all or at least most of them in the house, next step is to get a good
price. If you can negotiate comfortable
price for you make a move do not wait.
By my experience, I see that good houses go quick even in
bad market, bad houses stay forever. I
lost 3 deals where 1 was close to asking price and 2 over asking price where
one was gone in 4 days. This shows that you need to act quickly even in slow
moving housing market and if you do like the house and see much activity on it
give a good price for it. Other option would
be for handy man is to buy and older house that has been on the market for
longer time and you can negotiated 10-20% down and do work yourself to make it
a desirable house to leave in.
My experience with short sales was not good either. If you are not willing to wait over 3-6 month,
it is not an option for you. Sometimes
you might save some money but even for good house there will bid high bids and
you will have to compete with other buyers bringing the price up and then waiting
to see if it will be approved or not. However if you have time and not in rush and
do not care if you lose the house you can low ball and see how it goes. Keep in mind that signed contract by seller
does not mean that you will have the house.
It has to go though bureaucratic bank clerk approval what might take
forever and never get approved. If short
sale owner has more than one property then your chances are even lower.
Looking for house for so long, I came across very useful resources that
might make your life easier and help you make better decision and save your
time, please see my next post.