Resources for Buyers

No house is worth financial ruin, which is why it is more important than ever that you get a good deal when you buy your next home.  As fiduciaries, we have to do whatever our clients ask as long as it's legal, but here are some guidelines we advise our clients on to ensure they are not getting into a bad spot financially.

The search for a new home begins with a discovery call where we'll explain what the home-buying process looks like and answer questions you may have.  During the discovery call, we will set up an MLS feed populated with homes you may like. Feedback on these initial properties is important and will help us find properties you would consider purchasing going forward.

Unless you're paying for your next home with cash, this is the most important step in the process of purchasing a home. Connecting with lenders early in the process will help you determine your budget, timeframe, and what kind of houses you look at to purchase. At the end of this process, you will have a pre-approval, meaning sellers will take your offers seriously.

Once you know how much home you can afford and how you will pay for it, we will begin the process of finding properties you like and touring them.  Using real-time feedback, we will narrow the search until we find a property you want to make an offer on.

Once we have found your perfect home, we will make an offer and open negotiations.  Sometimes this may mean making a full-price offer, while other times, it may mean making a partial offer or asking for concessions. Once you find the home you'd like to purchase, we will discuss your options for purchasing and how to get the best deal.

Once an offer is accepted, depending on what we've negotiated and bank requirements, we will go into what's known as the contingency period.  During this time, our transaction coordinator will schedule all required inspections and appraisals, and the bank will finalize your mortgage.

No house is worth financial ruin, which is why it is more important than ever that you get a good deal when you buy your next home.  As fiduciaries, we have to do whatever our clients ask as long as it's legal, but here are some guidelines we advise our clients on to ensure they are not getting into a bad spot financially.

Many lenders require home inspections before they will issue a mortgage, but not all loans have the same requirements.  At Payne Real Estate, we advise our clients never to skip the inspection. Home inspections are not cheap, usually in the $500-$1,000 range, but they can save you tens of thousands of dollars in the long run.  The cost of these inspections can often be negotiated as part of the deal, and generally is paid out of the proceeds of the sale at closing.

Zero or low-down-payment mortgages are great tools for veterans and first-time homebuyers, but when you aren't putting anything towards the purchase of your home, you have to choose your home wisely. To prevent yourself from getting into a sticky situation, if you have no money down, you should at least be considering homes that are listed for less than market value.

Realtors are great at moving houses for the most money, and one of the most common tactics they use is pricing a home well below market value to elicit an auction-style bidding war.  Nine times out of 10, the winner of a bidding war ends up overpaying for the house, and the overpayment creates a situation where they may not be in an equity situation for a decade. There are too many houses on the market in Middle Tennessee for a buyer to overpay for a specific one, and our overwhelming advice is don't engage in those situations.