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Hrekires t1_j3ou974 wrote

  1. Became a dual-income, no kids couple
  2. Gave up my apartment in the city to move into a relatively inexpensive apartment in Jersey together
  3. No vacations and limited luxury spending for a couple years while saving as much as we could
  4. Set our budget at something we'd be able to afford on a single income so that we wouldn't be in dire straights if one of us lost our job, took a paycut, or decided to become a stay-at-home parent someday (our happy-medium was 60-70 year-old houses in middle class towns that were move-in ready but dated)
  5. Looked at houses in towns we wanted to move to in order to figure out where we could find something that met our needs and was in our price range
  6. Made sure we had enough saved for a 3.5% down payment, closing costs, and moving expenses
  7. Found a real estate agent
  8. Got preapproved by a bank
  9. Started looking at houses and putting in offers
  10. Eventually had an offer get accepted and not fall apart during the legal review or home inspection periods
  11. Closed on the house and became a homeowner
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stickman07738 t1_j3qiyrb wrote

Excellent list, I would add -

Develop criteria for what you want in a home so that you can give your realtor specific instruction as some realtors will try to over sell you. Besides the number of bedrooms, baths, location - what are other items are must have!

For me they were as follows:

  • No major fix up as I am handy but not skilled enough to do it myself
  • Good school district - easier to sell as you will resell it
  • No double yellow-line - indicates high traffic area- tougher to resell
  • No corner property
  • No sump pump or drainage issue (This one is tough but doable as you will need to look at history of the area)
  • No HOA

PS: I personally would also save more than the 3.5% down payments, as you will need to furnishings, paint, minor repairs... I saved 20% to avoid the PMI (how - no vacations, took lunch to work, only ate out 1-3x per year (birthday, anniversary).

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nicehuman16 t1_j3sb5f1 wrote

I also have the “no yellow lines” criteria. I fell for it on my first house.

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nicehuman16 t1_j3sb7df wrote

I also have the “no yellow lines” criteria. I fell for it on my first house.

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Hrekires t1_j3r1yp7 wrote

I know you can't predict the market, but buying with a 3.5% down payment and paying PMI for a couple years rather than waiting until we'd saved up 20% was probably the smartest thing we did. It's a pretty massive difference when you're looking at ~$400k houses and not one that could have been made up for in a few years by brown bagging lunch to work.

We bought in 2018 and then refinanced to get rid of PMI when prices peaked in 2020... if we'd stayed in our apartment and kept saving money, I literally wouldn't be able to afford to buy the house I'm living in today.

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