Many first time home buyers report that they are both nervous and excited at the same time. This is normal because there are mixed feelings of being nervous and being excited are all rolled into the same exerience. There are no secrets to the process that you need to go through to get a home. {Even though it is unfamiliar to you, there are really no secrets to the process of buying a home}. It is a big deal, and no one will blame you if you are nervous but try to focus on being excited.

Get Pre-Approved: Get Qualified

First, you will want to get a copy of your credit report – even if you have to pay for it. The first thing you want to be sure of is that your credit report contains no incorrect information or other errors. Here are the things that  you will need to get pre-qualified or pre-approved:

• Gather your financial information – 30 days of pay stubs, 2 months of bank statements, last quarterly IRA and 401K statements, last year’s W2′s.
• Research Loan Programs, FHA Mortgages, First Time Home Buyer Programs
• Find a Mortgage Company or Lender to work with – list of questions to ask Loan Officer
• Meet with your lender to find out what your price range is.
• Determine your monthly payment comfort level.

Shopping For A Home With A Real Estate Agent

The first thing you will want to do is find a real estate agent and you can easily find one online or through friends.

The most common ways to search for a home are by price range and location. The agent should set you up on some sort of automated email system that will send you new listings every day. Also, check out PropertyNut.com.

Once you have picked out all of the homes that you would like to visit, it is then time to go and take a tour of each one. Take notes about each home you visit. Trust us on this; you won’t remember the specifics otherwise once you visited more than about 5 homes.

Characteristics to consider in a home.

Once you get it down to the house that you like the best out of all of them, then it is time to write an offer with your agent’s help.

If your offer is accepted, your agent can help you make sure that appropriate inspections are scheduled and completed.

Getting Approved For A Mortgage From Your Mortgage Company

Now is the time to make sure that you are pre-approved with your lender and not just pre-qualified. If you haven’t already, provide your loan officer with 30 days worth of pay stubs, your last two months of bank statements, your last quarterly statements from your IRA/401K’s if applicable, W2′s, maybe your tax returns, and any other information your loan officer might ask for.

Homeowners Insurance For Your New Home

After working with the lender, now it is time to work with the insurance company to get homeowners insurance. The date of effectiveness on your policy should be the day that you close on your new home and you then own it. Make sure that you get a couple of quotes as there are going to be differences in what you are charged.

Closing On Your New Home

Talk to your Loan Officer and Real Estate Agent to make sure everything is on track to close on time about 1 week in advance.  Just before it comes time to sign the final paperwork you need to do a walk through.

If you follow these steps as a guide, you should not come across too many mysteries or surprises in your home buying experience.

About 20% of the real estate marketplace out there is comprised of “for sale by owner” listings, and there are many homebuyers out there wondering if they really do need a real estate agent to help them buy a ‘home for sale by owner’.

Not only are real estate agents not needed to buy any home using this process, they could actually hinder the entire process by trying to get both the buyer and seller to commit to paying a commission to the real estate agent for getting involved, no matter what job they might perform, prompting the following steps to help guide a potential home buyer who wants to use this process:.

Determine Your Budget:
The first step in any home buying process is determining how much you can afford, and do not over extend yourself. So here are the procedure for FSBOS

Get Pre-Approved:
Now that you know the general price range that you can afford, you’ll want to get pre-approved so that you can move forward in the home buying process, with the lender will guiding you through the process for your area.

Search For Homes:
This part is the simple and fun part.

Contact the Owner Directly:
Unlike homes represented by an agent, there’s no middleman to interfere with you from getting directly in touch with the house seller.

Get a Valuation Report of the Home:

Either before or after you see the home, get a good appraisal by calling a local appraiser to do the job.

Hire an Attorney:
For a couple of  hundred dollars, a quality real estate attorney will provide you with all the advice and counsel you’ll need if that makes you feel more comfortable, however, it might be cheaper by paying the real estate agent commission in the first place.

Make an Offer:
After you’ve seen the home firsthand and have a property valuation report, you’re ready to present the seller with an offer.

Lock in Your Mortgage Rate:
When you know that the seller is entertaining your offer, you’ll want to shop around for the lowest mortgage rate visiting local banks and contact mortgage brokers to price compare, and get a 30 day or 60 day “lock in” period is most common.

Get the Home Inspected:
The next step is hiring a quality home inspector who will go through the home – from foundation to attic – and see what condition the home is in, and this will cost $300-$600 and the inspection will take around 2 hours, after which you’ll get an inspection report outlining any mechanical or structural problems that the home might have.

Close the Deal:
Your mortgage lender will now help you with coordinating any financing and any title or escrow provisions and will provide payment to the seller after making sure that all local, state and federal real estate regulations and rules have been satisfied, after which the seller will sign over the deed of the home and, now you are the owner of the new home.