Tired of renting yet?

For many years prior to entering the real estate market and purchasing my first home, I was a renter.

Weren’t most of us at one point or another?

During this time a friend of mine told me they had been house hunting for a new home and found a nice home they would be purchasing and invited me to their house warming party.

I began to think about this seriously – after all my friend didn’t make more money than I, nor did they have anything I didn’t have.

I also realized that every month I was paying rent I was also paying the mortgage for someone else.  This really isn’t a terrible thing to do, since we all have to start somewhere and renting is the most convenient and easiest method of  starting out.

The person who’s mortgage I was paying as a renter had most likely also been renter at some point, hadn’t they?

I wondered – “Maybe I should look into buying a home”… And I did!

I began to research what it took to buy a home by calling a few real estate agents and reading some on-line articles.

Realize of course, this was over 20 years ago and at that time, the internet wasn’t really used to search homes for sale.  and most agents didn’t even have a website.

Interestingly enough, the real estate agents I spoke with also didn’t help me much with obtaining financing. They did however offer to show me houses – an unlimited number and in any price range I wanted!

So for the next few weeks, off we went:  a real estate agent, Jessie and myself to look at homes for sale.  We looked at all manner of homes in all ranges of prices with several different real estate agents.

In fact, that first month we worked with 3 real estate agents in 3 different cities that were very close together!

Boy, were we “green” or what?

After 45 days of searching, and not finding any homes in which we were interested,  we were just about to give up when Jessie made contact with another real estate agent.

She suggested we meet, which we did and interestingly enough she said; “I’m not showing you any homes until we know what you can afford, where you want to live and want you want in a new home“.

“Say what”? !?  “Not showing us homes”?

Well, we were both shocked and confused to hear she wasn’t going to waste our time driving us around to show us homes we didn’t know if we could afford.

Well this was an interesting concept and a new twist and we figured, “Ok, she’s the professional.  Let’s try it her way”.

She sent us to a loan officer she worked closely with, and had us fill out an application to get “pre-qualified“.

Once the application process was completed, the loan officer gave us our “Pre-qualified” letter to take back to our agent which we did.

We handed over the letter, and our agent began to show us information about homes that were within our budget to purchase.

What was most amazing to us was: she was showing us homes that not only fit our budget but also were in several different towns and cities.  She also listened to what we liked and didn’t like about each of the homes and helped us to narrow down our criteria.

She had us pick out our 5 favorite and she made appointments for us to view the homes.

After viewing 3 of the homes, we opted to purchase the 4th and from that moment on I was a home owner.

Why am I telling you this?

Many of us begin our adult lives as renters.  Many us believe we haven’t the financial means or the credit to purchase a home and so we continue to rent for years and years.

The bottom line is unless you ask the right person who is able to help you learn and obtain the information needed, you don’t know if you can afford to purchase a new home.

Here are a few things for renters to consider:

• If you are renting a home for let’s say $1000.00 – $1200.00 a month, chances are you can afford to purchase a home.
• The price for purchasing a home with this amount of mortgage is roughly $170,000.  Not bad for a 1st home!
• The monthly payment on this home with no money down and seller paying some or all of the closing costs would be approximately $1100-$1200 per month.
• If you purchase a home before April 30th you may be eligible to take advantage of the  $8000 in a tax credit to help!

Doesn’t this sound affordable now?

Btw, when we went to sell our first home and upgrade – Guess who we contacted?  Yep. the agent that helped us to find our first home and educate us in the process.

Buyers and Renters, when you’re ready to purchase a Panama City home or condo, contact me directly (850) 774-6582 for the latest information and pricing on any of the Panama City homes sale.

Owners, put my technology to work for you.  If you are interested in selling your home or condo, contact me today (850) 774-6582 for a free no obligation Home value report.

Jennifer Mackay
850-774-6582
Panama City Real Estate | Florida

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