How to Guide for First Time House Buyers

As you prepare to buy your first home, there is a lot to learn. Often, people spend more time chosing which LCD TV to buy than they will on their new home. Sure, they may look at many homes before making a buying decision, but how much studying did they do about that particular house before they bought that real estate?

When buying a TV, you do your homework, read reviews, visit chat forums and compare models.

Then you narrow it down and choose the model with the attributes you need at the cost you want to pay.

With houses, the comparison is not so simple. There are no comparisons that you may download from the Internet preloaded with data to help you compare two specific houses side-by-side. Even if they were out there, it may show basics – taxes, lot size, etc., but you would still need to do your own comparison to make sure the information is correct AND to review dozens of attributes inside the house.

First, educate yourself on the home purchase procedures. Visit www.HomeBuyersGuide.com and download the free guide that talks about the house purchasing procedures. Read through the guide – a 100 page PDF – a wonderful guide for buying a house.

Next, decide on your location. If you’re purchasing Commack real estate, for example, be ready to compare several homes. Don’t just walk through, look around and then try to remember the details days and weeks later. Prepare checklists (samples are included in the guide you can download) that you should take to every house you visit. Make notes of the number of bedrooms, the size of the rooms, the layout of the kitchen, appliances and more. Look at the property. Is it appealing?

Does it have to be redone? These are questions that you not only need to ask, but also need to track.

You can set up a spreadsheet using Excel-were you simply set-up a chart on a piece of paper with a ruler. Down the left side, create a list of all of the attributes that you can find in the house. If you want a master bedroom plus 3 more, list those.

Drop columns going down the page, one for each house.

Taking notes in the corresponding box for each home so you can sit back after looking at many homes and make a good comparison.

One of the ways that home purchase get themselves in trouble – particularly first-time home buyers – is that they fall in love with the home and oversight the issues.

These issues start popping up on the week that you move-in and, at that point, it’s usually too late to deal with them.

How do you avoid these problems? Well, with new construction you can have less problems. Why? Because the house is new. What usually runs better, a brand-new car or a 12-year-old car? The answer is obvious. All problems can of course occur with a new car, they’re far more likely with the used. The same thing applies to houses. The older the home is, the more likely that you can have issues. New homes, while priced slightly higher, can usually have far fewer problems.

For example, with Manorwood Estates in Commack New York, a small development with energy Star certified houses, all houses are newly built. You may examine during construction to make sure that things are going as anticipated. Once completed, these houses – built to energy Star specifications – will have little issues if any. If they do, you’re still in contact with the builder who is given a warranty on the home. As issues arise, contact the builder who can quickly correct them for you.

Don’t underestimate the value of the warranties, including warranties on the appliances. If you move into a used home with a 20-year-old refrigerator and that refrigerator rapidly dies, your only solution is to go buy a new refrigerator. If your house has a new refrigerator with a warranty, it should be repaired at no cost to you.

As you go forward, educate yourself. Read the guide. Create checklists of questions and features and bring them with you to every house you look at. Write down everything. In the end, it can aid you objectively identify the ideal house for you and your family.