Is Now the Time to Buy My Dream Home?

So with houses on the market and no end of the housing slowdown in site, you are probably asking yourself, is now the time to buy your dream home?

My answer is Yes! But only if you don’t have a home to sell. If you are renting, now is the time to get that home. Mortgage rates are again at an all time low and with so much inventory on the market you should have no problem scoring a good deal on a very nice home. Many people are getting desperate to unload that home they have had on the market for a while. My advice is to never make an offer at the current asking price. I would undercut the offer by 10% or possibly more based on your area and see how much the seller is willing to negotiate. At this point you have nothing to lose and the seller probably realizes that he is going to have to take a loss at some point. Coming in under will also help you if the housing market continues to decline after your purchase since you want to make sure that you don’t lose the equity in the home right after you purchase it.

If you currently have a home that you need to sell, one interesting thing I am seeing is how creative new home builders are getting. A builder by me is offering a 70k options incentive. This means that if I buy a home, I can get 70k worth of upgrades free. Here is where the twist is. 20k of that would be put into a fund to pay your current mortgage if you can’t sell your home. So for example if your current mortgage is $1000 per month, you would have 20 payments covered so you are not financially strapped with 2 mortgages. Sounds great? Well the catch is that if you sell your home in 2 months, you forfeit the rest. So in my example you would lose $18,000. I guess you really don’t lose it since it was never yours in the first place, but you could have used it for options on your new home to help keep the purchase cost down. Also don’t forget any utility bills that you will still need to pay as well as property taxes and insurance if those aren’t included in your mortgage payment. I am curious if they force you to use their realtor to sell your house, as you could put your home on the market at a high price just to burn up the 20k. The sales rep wasn’t sure how the process worked when I asked about it. There are some homes in my neighborhood that have been on the market for over 2 years now, and with a recession possibly on its way, I would be leery that $20,000 wouldn’t be enough my existing home in case I couldn’t sell it.

It is amazing even in this current mortgage crunch that builders are still trying to push you into a home you probably can’t afford. Be smart and try not to live beyond your means since no one knows what the future holds and financial security is definitely worth more than an extravagant home, in my eyes anyway.

---

NOTE: For posts that contain bonuses, be sure to read the post for bonus expiration dates. Links may work but the bonus may have expired.

---

Other Posts You May Be Interested In:

$100 OptionsXpress Promo – 2010 [Promotion Bonus] There is a new OptionsXpress promo where you can get $100 when opening a new account. You need to...