Home buying thread

Owning is definitely not cheaper than renting in most parts of the county, for comparable-sized structures, but the payoff to owning is that you(in theory) eventually get a chunk of your money back when you sell. With renting you just walk away with nothing to show for it.

I don't see how anyone could ever think renting is cheaper or even equal to owning a home. I know I'm just starting out but the amount we have to pay is so crazy for a new house.

Depends on your market. I am renting a home now for 3-4 months to be closer to work during our busy season when I might have to work 7 days a week at 14 hours a day and don't want to commute. For the rent I pay to live in a nice area you could buy a house that would be in the top 10% of homes here. The house at the end of the street just went up for sale for $2.9 million. I'm lucky in that my company picks up the tab or I wouldn't do it.

You either get into something like I am in or you live in the ghetto. There is no middle ground with rentals here unlike owning a home.

Had to deal with some bitch of an agent on a house today. We loved the house and it looked great, listed for $250k. Left the place and within 5 minutes the agent informed me it was actually a value range listing of $250-300 and she just got a really strong offer so I'd need to put In a bid on the high side within a few hours. Told her no thanks and she kept calling me back. Wouldn't disclose what the offer was, basically trying to create a bidding war. I didn't understand how she could have an offer immediately after I left too.

People have probably dealt with this before, but so far this was the only scumbag agent I've met yet.

As I said before it's the American dream to own a home and have that white picket fence. I don't mind owning a home and having the stability and knowing I don't ever have to move again is just one of many benefits.

But, coming into a brand new city, and not knowing anything about the are, is daunting. Plus, all of the expenses of owning a new home.

In the end we will probably end up buying because I couldn't stand paying rent on a place I could have just bought, or rather afforded to buy. Having the down payment in the bank instead of towards the house was a nice thought as well. Lol

Noodleface_sl said:

Had to deal with some bitch of an agent on a house today. We loved the house and it looked great, listed for $250k. Left the place and within 5 minutes the agent informed me it was actually a value range listing of $250-300 and she just got a really strong offer so I'd need to put In a bid on the high side within a few hours. Told her no thanks and she kept calling me back. Wouldn't disclose what the offer was, basically trying to create a bidding war. I didn't understand how she could have an offer immediately after I left too.

People have probably dealt with this before, but so far this was the only scumbag agent I've met yet.

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Why are they calling you and not your realtor? That is one of the benefits of having an agent yourself.

Eyashusa_sl said:

Why are they calling you and not your realtor? That is one of the benefits of having an agent yourself.

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It was very strange, I even gave her my realtor's number and name but she chose to contact me. I told my realtor and he intervened. I really honestly think she was trying to pull some fast shit on me

Noodle,

I have a realtor I like but 90% I have met are scum. Do you not have your own Realtor? It is there job to do the negotiating for you and your Realtor will probably have access to information in any offer that may have come in, another realtor should never even contact you only your realtor. If your Realtor is not doing this fire them and get another. I had to fire 3 Realtor and now I have a woman we use and will be loyal to her for any buying or selling I do until she retires. You will know pretty quickly if you have a good Realtor. Plus remember you do not have to pay them the seller pays both realtors, though they may negotiate price because of it.

Edit: Just read above response should have typed faster

dolaan_sl said:

Noodle,

I have a realtor I like but 90% I have met are scum. Do you not have your own Realtor? It is there job to do the negotiating for you and your Realtor will probably have access to information in any offer that may have come in, another realtor should never even contact you only your realtor. If your Realtor is not doing this fire them and get another. I had to fire 3 Realtor and now I have a woman we use and will be loyal to her for any buying or selling I do until she retires. You will know pretty quickly if you have a good Realtor. Plus remember you do not have to pay them the seller pays both realtors, though they may negotiate price because of it.

Edit: Just read above response should have typed faster

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About the offer. He said the selling agent would absolutely not disclose the "strong offer" she received. He said it smelled of bullshit and I went with my instincts on it. Even though we loved the house we weren't going to play her game.


We're currently on the fence with a house. Brand new raised ranch (still being finished). Hardwood floors through out, large master bathroom. The basement is actually completely finished, which you usually don't see on new construction. They're asking $244k which is the right price and the nicest house we've seen. Wife has an issue with the yard as it is smaller (yard sizes in this city are small). I tried to tell her it was a good size but she's complaining that we can't fit a pool. I've tried to tell her we don't want a pool, but she insists it is integral for the upbringing of our future children. I already know how it will go: Get the pool, used for one year, no one wants to do the work on it so I will have to take care of it while no one ever uses it again.

dolaan_sl said:

Noodle,
I have a realtor I like but 90% I have met are scum. Do you not have your own Realtor? It is there job to do the negotiating for you and your Realtor will probably have access to information in any offer that may have come in, another realtor should never even contact you only your realtor. If your Realtor is not doing this fire them and get another. I had to fire 3 Realtor and now I have a woman we use and will be loyal to her for any buying or selling I do until she retires. You will know pretty quickly if you have a good Realtor. Plus remember you do not have to pay them the seller pays both realtors, though they may negotiate price because of it.

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I've had 2 realtors as my buying agents and 1 realtor as my selling agent. I also dealt with the 3 realtors on the other side of each transaction. Only 3 of those realtors seemed professionally competent, and only one of those three seemed to care a little bit about what happened to my wife and me. So I tend to agree with the viewpoint that 90% are scum. I also hate playing thewhisper down the lanegame that seems to occur as questions and answers are communicated, and I would much rather communicate directly with the buyer/seller, even if it means some hard feelings.

But realtors seem to be a necessary evil because their involvement acts as a liability screen between you and the other buyer/seller. If you are selling and don't need to market the house, you could just use an attorney. That is probably the best option.

By the way, if you are selling, staging is a waste and only matters to complete idiot buyers. Empty and clean the house, that's all.

Any advice on how to have a home that we are renting ready to show while we are still living here? I've got three kids, two cats and a dog so it is never perfectly clean and I can't see a way to remove the excess clutter before we move out. I would like to be able to show it if we end up buying before our lease it over, but just have absolutely no idea how to get it to a point where people can walk through it. I wouldn't rent my house in the state its in now - dings in the walls, carpets not cleaned, drawers and closets full on crap.

Just ask for 24-48 hour notice before a showing so you can clean? Otherwise it would be impossible and I doubt your landlord is going to want to show the place when it looks like shit and you haven't had time to clean it up.

Right now we are having to de-clutter, and throw stuff away, and clean our house as we still will be living in it while we try and sell it. Should be on the market sometime this month. Kind of nervous about it... but we have a great realtor, so I'm not worried.

Lindz,

That is tough. I just moved into my new house a month ago and did not even attempt to sell my current one first, because:
1) I have 4 dogs and work about 30 min away so anytime someone wants to show the house my wife or I would have to run back to get the dogs and go around the neighborhood,
2) Did not want any sale to be contingent
3) wanted to have the house in perfect move in condition prior to sale. I painted every wall, changed kitchen counter-tops, redid bathroom. In this neighborhood that is what people want but they will pay a premium. It is an upscale city neighborhood and a lot of Doctors, Lawyers, and professionals.

I put my house on the market friday so hopefully it sells fast and according to my realtor I should have no problem, but paying 2 mortgages is certainly not ideal.

Houses near us are selling in under 30 days still... this the Chicago suburbs and this neighborhood was built in the 60s. Probably doesn't matter for you in New York but hey, good vibes can't hurt!

Two houses on our street were straight out of the 1970s and they sold in February (even in the shitty weather we've been having) after coming on the market in the middle of January. We laughed about the one house because the For Sale sign said, "LIVING ROOM!" on it... like that was a big selling point or something.

We're finding houses selling nearly instantly in MA (in my area). I mean we're seeing a house and offers are being put in right under us. So far we've had a whole bunch that we wanted to p ut in an offer and were shut down. It's kind of depressing.

That said... we've seen some shit man. We have seen some shit. Yesterday we had the "it's beautiful, has under the deck great storage, fully finished downstairs, carpet throughout!" We go there and I have trouble describing what we saw was disgusting. House was built in 2007. Went upstairs and it looked so awesome. Went into a kids room and the carpet was completely removed and smelled like cat piss really bad. Then we went to the basement. Filled with feral cats, including one that just gave birth to a whole bunch. The smell was nauseating and we had to leave. Went out back to check the under-the-deck-storage... there was a door that was partially open with a chain on it. Peaked inside and it looked like a homeless person lived inside and there were 6 bowls of cat food. Clearly feeding strays in the neighborhood. Asking $260k for a ruined house. Fuck. That.

One of the first houses we looked at was described like that. I remember we met our realtor at the house and he showed us the listing history. The house had been on the market for like 3 years and had been reduced over $300k to its current price. We decided to check it out anyways since we were there.

House reeked of cigarette smoke. Entire upstairs was an addition that had been put on but it was so bad and uneven that door frames were like that episode of the Simpsons where they rebuilt Flanders' house... you had to "step up" into every bedroom because of how terrible it was built. Basement was almost identical to what you described minus the cats. Just shit everywhere.

lindz_sl said:

Any advice on how to have a home that we are renting ready to show while we are still living here? I've got three kids, two cats and a dog so it is never perfectly clean and I can't see a way to remove the excess clutter before we move out. I would like to be able to show it if we end up buying before our lease it over, but just have absolutely no idea how to get it to a point where people can walk through it. I wouldn't rent my house in the state its in now - dings in the walls, carpets not cleaned, drawers and closets full on crap.

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We just sold our town home 8 months ago. During the lead up time we just had to work with the showing people. We basically said that we needed at least 24 hours notice. They could still check with us to see if it was ok, but it was almost a firm no. Outside of that, we just had to keep our home in a condition that in less than 24 hours we could get it showing ready.

Of course, we only had a single dog. For us it usually involved a quick declutter and vacuum / dusting / sweeping.

Before the showing we stored a bunch of junk at my mother-in-laws house. This allowed us to have emptier closets, etc. We also did a once over of the house to do some simple patching of the drywall. Once that was done we took a magic eraser and got rid of all of the scuffs we could. It would also be a good idea to get a professional steam clean on the floors. We got that done for under $1k and they move all your stuff for you.

Steam cleaning the carpets can probably be big if you're trying to sell fast. The amount of houses I've seen with dingy, shit-stained carpets in the past few weeks is astounding. Also, a little air freshener goes a long way. Some of these houses smell like their children roll around in shit and vomit and then slam into the walls all day. That part might actually be true.

Opinions on homes with wells? One home I'm going to take a look at this weekend has well water instead of city water, which I haven't had experience with so far. I'm going to do some reading before we go take a look but would love some insight from anyone with experience.