Home Buying: Time to Buy (Finally!)

Week 4 in our Home Buying series is here, and it is finally time to buy a home. We’ve learned about real estate agents, we’ve talked about how to prepare your finances ahead of time, and been over how a mortgage works. Now, you’re ready to make an offer.

Making an offer is essentially you saying to the seller (usually through your real estate agent) “I’d like to buy your home for this price.” There can be back and forth negotiations, but if your offer is accepted then you’ve bought a home! Except you haven’t yet, not quite. The home becomes yours at closing and the time between your offer being accepted and closing can be weeks, or even months. Here’s what happens during that time.

– Have a home inspection completed, to identify potential issues with the home.
– Have an appraisal completed to confirm the purchase price is reasonable.
– Complete the loan underwriting process to finalize the mortgage loan.
– Complete a title search to the seller has the right to sell the home to you.
– Shop for and buy homeowner’s insurance.
– Establish an escrow account for various items you need to prepay.

The good news is that the closing agent, your lender, and your real estate agent can help you with many of these.  A few days before closing check the final numbers in your Closing Disclosure and take a walk through to make sure the home is in the condition you expect.

And then, finally, closing. All you have to do is read and sign many, many documents. You’ll need to bring a check for the down payment and closing costs and it’s a good idea to bring a photo ID as well.

And then you are finally a home owner. Congratulations!

(You can learn more about the process in the full article here.)