Gordon Long

First-Time Home Buyer Tips Pay Off All Debt and Build an Emergency Fund. Determine How Much House You Can Afford. Save a Down Payment. Save for Closing Costs. Get Preapproved for a Loan. Find a Home for Sale in Your Price Range. Research Neighborhoods for Best Fit. Attend Open Houses and Think Long Term. The steps to buying a house might seem complicated at first—particularly if you're a home buyer dipping a toe into real estate for the very first time. Between down payments, credit scores, mortgage rates (both fixed-rate and adjustable-rate), property taxes, interest rates, and closing the deal, it's easy to feel overwhelmed. There's so much at stake with a first home! Still, if you familiarize yourself with what it takes to buy your first home beforehand, it can help you navigate the real estate market with ease. So let's get started! In this step-by-step guide, you'll learn what it takes to buy your first home, from beginning to end. Whether it's your first time in the real estate market or you're an experienced homeowner who wants to brush up on your skills, this list has you covered.

There are two keys to ensure getting top dollar for your house: Preparing and marketing your home in the best ways possible to ensure maximum exposure and showings (more showings = more offers) Presenting detailed disclosures and inspections to eliminate any questions or hesitancies about the condition of your home (unanswered questions = less offers) Hire an experienced agent who knows your home, its value, the area, and comparable sales in the area. S/he will have a strategy for selling your home as quickly and for as much money as possible. Trust your agent and trust the process. The process works best when everyone communicates frequently, trusts each other and works together as a team. We can line up all of the homes we have sold and it is clear that the sellers who gave us larger budgets, more freedom to do what we thought would help sell their homes, and helped us with the work, made the greatest profit, the quickest.

The “forever” home buyer. Fast fact: Views their home as the foundation of their life. ... The urban dweller. ... The quick seller. ... The profiteer. ... The first time buyer.

got started when I was 30 ,picking up my first property in North Miami Beach , Florida. I'm 57now and these last 3 years have been surreal... I'm at 10 units now. Everyone around me was talking about "low interest rates" so I finally got tired of hearing that everyday and decided to entertain the thought of REI. I was doing dividend growth investing at the time (earning 3-4% yield), and when I ran cash flow numbers on investment properties in 2012, my jaw dropped... Those returns look astronomical now, but even back then they were incomprehensible to me... 10%+ CoC returns in the Bay Area! So, even as a newbie I knew it was too good to be true. When I think back to my life moves... B.S degree? That was worth it as it gave me the career and means to invest in REI. M.S. degree? Totally overrated, I think... I got that in 2009 but wish I would have used those tuition dollars to buy property, instead... or AAPL stock. I would be even further along than I am now. ROI was not worth it and it's unfortunate too many in the workforce drink the academia "higher education" kool aid...