WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING FOR?
When you are ready to start browsing listings and look at pictures, you need to keep in mind what you are looking for. There are many beautiful homes out there. We all love to look at nice houses and sometimes can get carried away with “what if” and “wouldn’t that be nice.”
If you haven’t already, you need to decide on your “wants and needs”. Only once you know what you’re looking for, can you find it. There are hundreds of homes for sale at any given moment and if you don’t narrow your search, you will spend countless hours becoming overwhelmed, exhausted, and frustrated.
60 MINUTES AT A TIME
Looking at pictures, waiting for pages to load, and hitting “next page” too many times will tire you out. After looking at 50 houses, you tend to forget what the first 20 looked like. The best advice you can receive here is to keep your browsing to one-hour-long sessions. If you notice yourself getting tired, bored or frustrated, take a break. It may seem like silly advice, but if you are serious about finding your new home, the last thing you want is to get frustrated with the process. Stay focused on your goals.
RULE THEM OUT OR SAVE THEM
As mentioned, there are hundreds of homes for sale at any given moment. There is no humanly way possible to research and tour them all. For this reason, your goal when browsing homes should be to rule them out as quickly as possible. Most home buyers tend to scan pictures of homes and rule them out based on looks. There is nothing wrong with this method, however you should keep a few facts in mind. First, the pictures you are looking at were taken by the Seller’s Agent. Real Estate Agents in general are not professional photographers and may not take the best pictures. Just because the picture is ugly doesn’t mean the house is ugly. Second, don’t judge a book by its cover. If a home is in a certain price range but the exterior doesn’t match other nicer homes in the same range, chances are the interior has been refinished and updated. It may be worth taking a closer look.
Keep in mind your goal: rule them out. If you can unequivocally rule a home out of your search by looking at the ad online, do it. There are many homes out there to choose from. Don’t waste your time with ones you don’t like.
Conversely, when you like a home and you think you’d want to at least get more information on it, write down it’s MLS number and/or street address and town. Your Buyer’s Agent will need this information to look up tax information, put together a CMA (Comparable Market Analysis that estimates a home’s value), and do some background investigation of the home.
STAY IN YOUR PRICE RANGE
We all love house hunting. Looking at beautiful homes can be quite enjoyable. However, this is dangerous too. When you are searching for your new home, you do not want to discourage yourself. The analogy here would be car shopping. Don’t go test driving a Ferrari if you can only afford a Honda. Honda’s are good cars, but if you fall in love with the Ferrari, you will never be truly happy with your Honda.
Stay with homes in your price range and find the ones you like. When you go to tour them, you may find you can get a nicer home than you originally thought you could.
Tune in Tomorrow for Part 2.
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