A gift for buyers: Real-estate pros stuff your stocking with advice

December Buying Advice: Here are the best tips for making a smart home purchase, from agents, investors and other experts.

By Melinda Fulmer of MSN Real Estate

 

© Moodboard/Corbis

Sound advice is always a smart gift. In this holiday edition of Buying Advice, we've asked real-estate agents, investors and other housing pros around the country to give us their best tips for making a smart home purchase, and we've included a couple of our own favorites. (Bing: Checklist for first-time homebuyers)

We'll also review the latest housing statistics and what they mean for the fledgling real-estate recovery and look at 10 surprising factors that could cause your mortgage application to be rejected.

The top 10 buying tips
1. Create – and keep — a good credit score. All lenders use a credit score to help them understand what kind of risk you would be as a borrower. Pull a copy of your credit history and FICO score. The better the score, the better the interest rate you will be offered. To get the best mortgage deals, you need a score above 760, says Ilyce R. Glink, publisher of ThinkGlink.com and author of "Buy, Close, Move In!" Once you have it there, don't jeopardize it with bad financial decisions. (For more on this, keep reading.)
2. Find a good agent. Don't just use a friend or family member, or someone you run into regularly at your kid's school. Do some research, says Melissa Anderson, an agent with Coldwell Banker Homestead Group in Harrisburg, Pa.
"The best advice is to look for a highly respected buyers agent," she says. Ask your family and friends for recommendations and then meet with several agents. "Find someone that you feel comfortable with, feel you can trust and that has experience in the areas you are searching for your home."
Alicia Trevino, president and CEO of Century 21 Fine Homes & Estates in Dallas, also advises working with an agent who has a lot of experience with distressed properties, including short sales, as they make up a good portion of available homes.
Just be sure the agent sells real estate full time, so he can respond quickly. Ask the agent for the names of buyers he has helped in the past six months, Anderson says. If the agent can't come up with several, you should keep looking.
3. Set a budget and get preapproved by a lender. "It is important to know what you can afford and what a comfortable monthly payment would be," says Dallas Croft of ERA Oakcrest Realty in Winchester, Va. Some homebuyers learn the hard way that they can qualify for more than they can comfortably afford to pay, says Amber Arwine, an online mortgage broker with Guaranteed Rate in Chicago. "Getting a preapproval before starting shopping for a home is also a must," she adds. That way, when you see a house you like, you're ready. And we do mean preapproved, which means submitting pay stubs and tax returns, not prequalified, which is more of a cursory estimate.
4. Check out the neighborhood just as carefully as you check out the house. "Once you find a house that you really like, drive by that house at several times during the day and during different days of the week to really gauge the type of neighborhood you are buying into," says Jennifer Darby Metzger, of ERA Justin Realty in Rutherford, N.J.
5. Be ready to pull the trigger when you see the perfect home. The supply of for-sale housing is limited in many parts of the country, and that means good houses go quickly.
Buyers need to be ready to sign when they see a keeper, which means having their financing in order, says Tony Geraci of Century 21 HomeStar in Highland Heights, Ohio. Likewise, don't "overnegotiate."
"Sometimes we're so busy worrying about getting a 'good deal' or negotiating small deal points that we miss the opportunity to buy the house we want," says Bill Lublin of Century 21 Advantage Gold in Philadelphia.
6. Don't be penny-wise and pound-foolish. Spend the money on any and all inspections that are suggested in the primary home inspection -- and for heaven's sake, don't forget to get an inspection before you buy. Some buyers skip this step, because the house looks OK and because they figure they are getting a home warranty, so why worry? But often this doesn't cover all of the property's problems. "The amount you could end up spending in the long run because of a defect you didn't know about is far greater than the expense of having a professional come out and take a look before you buy," says Raylene Lewis of Century 21 Beal in College Station, Texas.
7. Buy the cake, not the icing. You can change the paint, paper, carpet and fixtures fairly easily, but you can't readily change the home's layout, size of the rooms or location. Look past the cosmetics to the bones of the house. And think about resale. While a one-bedroom home may fit you just fine, how easy will it be to sell five years from now? Likewise, will that extremely busy street be a turn-off for others?
8. Get on the same page with your spouse. So many times, couples have a hard time agreeing on a house because they're not exactly sure what they want, says Jessica Riffle Edwards of Coldwell Banker Sea Coast Advantage in Wilmington, N.C. "Know your must-haves and would-like-to-haves early in the process," she says. Both spouses should sit down and make their own lists and then get together and see what they agree on and where they differ and talk this through. This will save a lot of time and arguments down the road.

9. Know the landscape. Once a home that looks interesting comes up on the multiple listing service, you and your agent need to do some research. How many homes are on the market in the blocks around it? How long have they been on the market? What condition are they in? What's in escrow? What have houses nearby sold for in the past 90 days? These questions will help buyers recognize a good deal when they see it, says Doug Clark of SpikeTV's reality show “Flip Men.”

10. Don't get emotional. Don't stretch your budget just because you love a home. Think like an investor and tell yourself, "There will be others out there for me." It's kind of like dating, Clark says: You need to know what else is available, rather than falling in love with the first one.
"We see more than 100 homes for every one we buy," he says.

Phillip King, Suffolk Realtor, Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage, 5018 Express Dr. S Ronkonkoma, New York, http://www.philliprking.com, phillip.king@cbmoves.com, 516-241-6264, 631-588-9090, Real Estate Long Island, Long Island Real Estate, Homes For Sale Long Island, Long Island Homes, NY Real Estate License, Long Island Condos, Houses For Sale Long Island, Suffolk Real Estate, Long Island Home, Long Island House, Long Island NY Homes, Suffolk Houses For Sale, Condos For Sale Long Island, Suffolk County Condo, Long Island Houses, Houses For Sale, Brookhaven Township, Islip Township, Ronkonkoma, Village of, Holbrook, Lake Grove, Holtsville, Farmingville, Selden, Centereach, Sayville, Bohemia, Blue Point, Bayport, Oakdale, Patchogue, Medford, Bellport, Brookhaven, Mastic, Shirley, Manorville, Center Moriches, Moriches, East Moriches, Eastport, Miller Place, Mount Sinai, Shoreham, Wading River, Ridge, Rocky Point, Coram, Middle Island, Yaphank, Babylon, Bayshore, Smithtown, Nesconset, Hauppauge, Residential, Resale’s, New Construction, Builders, Investors, First-time Buyer, Vacation Homes, Short Sales, Listing Agent, Buyers Agent, How to

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Homebuyers Make Lifestyle Options Priority

by Phoebe Chongchua

The adage when it comes to real estate has been "location, location, location." A recent survey, though, shows that lifestyle options are a priority. These include health and safety, access to cultural activities, and family-friendly neighborhoods.
Of course, location is still important, but today's buyers are looking for a sense of belonging in a community as well as creating a desirable lifestyle with the home they buy.
More than 1,000 homeowners and future home buyers were surveyed for the Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate LLC and the Meredith Corp report. The respondents indicated that how satisfied they'll be with the purchase of a new home may depend significantly on the home's surrounding community. About 84 percent of those surveyed were homeowners and an additional 10 percent had plans to buy within three years.
Here are some of the results. The survey found the following lifestyle options are top priorities for buyers.

• Ease of commuting by car: 38%
• Access to health and safety services: 34%
• Family-friendly neighborhood: 33%
• Availability of retail stores: 32%
• Access to cultural activities: 21%
• Public transportation access: 19%
• Nightlife and restaurant access: 18%
• Golf-friendly area–access to golf courses: 6%

If you're a seller what should all this mean to you? It's an opportunity to target buyers based on their interest. Just like businesses need to know who their target market is so that they can build a brand and solicit to those consumers, so too, for sellers.
If you're selling your home and you know that the above priorities can influence buyers, it only makes sense to play up the lifestyle options that apply to your home.
Often sellers focus predominantly on their home and the upgrades and amenities. While those features are very important, remember that practically any home can be remodeled. If you're in an excellent location with easy freeway access, on a low traffic street in a friendly neighborhood, surrounded by retail stores and hot dining spots, it's time to play it up. Those features aren't always easy to find.
Promote your lifestyle features with not only creative writing in the Multiple Listing Service detailed section, but also in ads with photos. You should also try using video of your home and the surrounding area. These days marketing goes beyond the MLS and glossy flyers. An archived video on the Internet doesn't get tossed in the trash like a piece of paper often does.
Showcasing your home on social media sites and giving a taste of the neighborhood in a well-produced video can be a fantastic marketing tool. However, don't use a poorly shot video; that may hurt you more than help you. Hiring a videographer or even a video journalist to tell a story about the area is well worth the money you'll spend. This style of storytelling can greatly increase interest in your home and, ultimately, the sales price.
Another option is to use footage (link or embed the video) from local retail outlets and post it on your social sites so that you can showcase some of the fun, nearby entertainment establishments. Create an album on your social sites so that all these photos, videos, links to articles are housed in it and then share it with friends. Don't make this album about you and your family in the home. Instead, make it like a review of the area. You are showcasing, through pictures, videos and words, the great places that you enjoyed while living in your home. Putting all these items online gives you greater exposure as people forward them to others.
Reality TV is popular for a reason; it takes people along for the journey, exposing life as it really is. Showcasing your home, neighborhood, and nearby restaurants allows potential buyers an opportunity to imagine the things that they would do if they lived in your home. We are becoming a very visual society and because so many properties are viewed first, and sometimes only, via the Internet, it's worth making what buyers see online valuable and persuasive. Seeing all that your home and its surrounding area has to offer in a video is as close as they get to actually experiencing it. The next step is literally stepping into your home for a closer look.
A little extra effort and promotion to highlight what's important to buyers may get you the sale faster and the price you're hoping for.

Published: July 22, 2011

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