Buying a home may be a bit more difficult today as financing has become more of a struggle than in recent years. But if you have the money and plan on staying in a home for the next three-five years or more, this is the time to buy as property prices haven’t been at these levels since 2004.
The key to getting a good deal is to make sure you’ve done some research and have a good handle on property prices in the area of your home search. Getting a discount on an overpriced home isn’t getting a deal. Make sure that the home is priced for today’s market before beginning negotiations. You can get online valuation data from a variety of sources but the best way to get a handle on the market is to visit as many homes as possible. That’s when you truly begin to get a sense of what’s available for the money.
Set aside a Sunday afternoon to visit Open Houses. Take notes regarding square footage, bedrooms, baths, etc. You’ll quickly start to see that some home sellers are more realistic than others when it comes to pricing their homes to sell. These are the ones that you’re most likely to be able to negotiate with successfully.
For added savings review information about buyer rebates in your area.
We all know that the first step in selling our home is to advertise. You can accomplish that task by setting up “for sale” signs posting flyers everywhere you can. You can also take advantage of a flat fee MLS listing service to get the word out to the realtors and everyone who is in the market to purchase a home that yours is available. But what is your next step? After your home is officially being advertised as for sale, do you just sit back and wait for someone to give you money?
Unfortunately the answer is no, you now need to get your home into tip-top shape and hold an open house. By holding a regular series of open house events you can bring traffic into your home, the more traffic the greater the possibility of someone purchasing your home. Many people are looking for homes to buy and are not using a buyers agent and these people will specially visit open house events instead of trying to schedule a private showing. Â
Next time, we will specially look at the steps you should take in order to host a successful open house but for right now you need to pick a date for your showing and start cleaning. People are coming to your home for the purpose of seeing the house and not your stuff, put everything you can away and clean everything your will be leaving out. Â
