Moving pains! (Home buying fun)
So I have found out how hard it is to look for homes. My wife and I have seen about 16-20 homes so far, we have now locked our sites on one that seems to have most of what we want. But it is a really good deal and I'm afraid that it will go “bye, bye” before we get enough scratch for the down payment.
I would post up pictures but I have an irrational fear that someone on the board will swoop in purchase it and then post the title in the thread with a nelson HAHA! The big negative is it is a corner lot, which means the garage is on one side (it’s a detached garage). But it has a HUGE yard and is priced super low.
Now for the meat of the thread, beside just calming my nerves so that I'm not biting my nails to the quick sitting here at work due to the stress of things hitting me.
1) Anyone got good suggestions about negotiations? I have searched Zillow.com and the home seems to be in the right spot as far as price, but the real gem I want is the seller to pay the closing costs. Anyone have sneaky suggestions on how to do this? I’m thinking offering 10k less than list and then once they counter I will go up like 5k then request closing cost paid by them.
2) Setting dates for all this crap. How can I make sure all this crap happens before Oct 1st? I have speaking with my loan person and she has run all the preliminary stuff and because I have giant brass balls for credit the loan should not be an issue but maybe the inspection might slow us down. Anyone here purchased a house with a FHA loan? How long did it take to close?
3) How should I throw a house-warming party? Which is better, pot-luck or some sort of Cocktail party?
Also on a funny note, I was surfing the interwebs looking for a home inspector and to get prices etc, the very first one I pull up I check the client referrals and low and behold there is GWJ's own Hemidal singing praises! I think I know which one I'm going for.. at least something was easy. 
Xfire: Pharacon
Tempest says: "A team hat doe snot communicate and talk to each other about what the next move will be is going to lose."
Mex is my hero = "f*ck it, I'll do it. WE'LL DO IT LIVE."
If you want to make your dates concrete, insert a "time is of the essence" clause into the contract. This means that failure to do X on the date stipulated is a material breach of contract.
Your real estate agent can not do this for you. In TX Realtors are not allowed to change their printed forms, beyond filling in the numbers, names, etc.
Therefore, you will probably need a lawyer to do this.
P.S. I'm not a lawyer YET, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express.
My suggestion: a "Stock The Bar" party. Have everyone who comes bring a different bottle of alcohol or wine. Makes for a great party, and you'll end up with booze to spare (depends on the party goers).
Xbox Live Gamercard - bennard
Beer For Ben
I'll be happy to help with the housewarming strategy... the important stuff (actually buying the house) is outside my professional expertise though. Let me know when you get to the fun part
dejanzie- "Let's say Stephen Hawking is after your new pc, and your porn is backed up- would you find it wrong to shoot him?"
LiquidMantis- "Hell no. I'd push over his wheelchair then teabag him while shouting, 'Here's your universe in a nutshell!'"
Just curious, how low is "Super low" there for a house?
You can't do this!
Of course I can, I'm Will Wright, bitch! - The Simpsons Game
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Xfire/Xbox Live: StylezXP
My brother in Nashville just got him newly built house that's been on the market for almost a year. He was able to get them to pay closing costs and also enough extra to buy appliances. The appliance money was agreed by the seller and not part of the loan. That way he wouldn't have to pay that additional cost over the life of the loan. People that are wanting to sell their houses are doing just about anything to get them sold.
Gamer Tag: Rantyr
Good luck!
*edit* Yeesh, Oct 1st. That's ambitious. Better get the ball rolling immediately.
XBLive: Ruckus
What is wrong with hookers and blow?
The man wears a bucket of KFC on his head. I wouldn't expect anything less. - Pred
That gets expensive if he has a lot of friends.
dejanzie- "Let's say Stephen Hawking is after your new pc, and your porn is backed up- would you find it wrong to shoot him?"
LiquidMantis- "Hell no. I'd push over his wheelchair then teabag him while shouting, 'Here's your universe in a nutshell!'"
Those home inspectors were really good. Husband and wife team, work the site, take pictures and write up the report and burn it to a disc on site. If you go around with them during the inspection (some people do, some don't... I did) they're more than happy to explain everything. The first house we looked at we really liked but we missed some signs that post-inspection should have been obvious, but a lot of times you'll get wrapped up in the "idea" of your house, and not be able to step back and make objective observations.
We used them on two houses, the first we backed out on and the second we bought.
Xbox Live | Steam | Last.fm
OK, I might have done something really stupid or it might be what I need to spur me on to buy a house as I have noticed my wife and I dinning out and not sticking to the budget.
I have given notice for my apartment, now this means that i f I do not secure a house by the 1st of Oct, I will be officially homeless. Good news is on of my wife's friends offered her couch if worse comes to worse, but I have a good feeling that we will be able to hit our budget goals only thing I'm worried about is of course escrow length.
PS: cooking and eating at home blows.. except when it is my wife's turn to cook because she actually makes yummy food.
Xfire: Pharacon
Tempest says: "A team hat doe snot communicate and talk to each other about what the next move will be is going to lose."
Mex is my hero = "f*ck it, I'll do it. WE'LL DO IT LIVE."
Ha! another update! We went out Saturday and found the best home EVER! I put an offer in on it, but someone else has too. But after finding out the other offer was put in the night before I requested to speak with the sellers agent so I can get more information to house. Then after talking to him for about 30 minutes about tiny things, IE what wood is the flooring, stairs where is the dry/washer hook up HOA dues crap like that I spring on him and say OK what do you feel about X amount of dollars. He smiled!
So using that I put in a offer which I think is more than the other offer. I took about 5k off the price. Now I get to wait to hear back from my agent to see what happens. I hope I get this home it is god like in location and the house itself.
Xfire: Pharacon
Tempest says: "A team hat doe snot communicate and talk to each other about what the next move will be is going to lose."
Mex is my hero = "f*ck it, I'll do it. WE'LL DO IT LIVE."
Ok yet an another update!
I found a house, I offered on said house... THEY ACCEPTED!!!!!! In the mean time my paycheck came in and I hit my goal with 100 dollars to spare! So moving forward I just did a mountain of paper work and my loan officer says all is ok on that front. So I can get my loan going and finished hopefully within 30 days I got inspection this Sunday and Appraisal scheduled for sometime in the near future.
Currently on my things to do list: Shop around for house insurance.
Also some pictures for the folks playing along at home:
Backyard
Patio in the backyard, doors lead to the LAN room
Dinning room
Front room
Front of the house
Fun tub in my new bathroom
Super Uber Kitchen
The Lan room, server closet and quick stop
Living room
More master bath goodness
Xfire: Pharacon
Tempest says: "A team hat doe snot communicate and talk to each other about what the next move will be is going to lose."
Mex is my hero = "f*ck it, I'll do it. WE'LL DO IT LIVE."
Congrats Pharacon!
The house looks great, I hope the inspection and rest of the process goes smoothly for you.
Edit: The only problem I see is that the LAN room has windows to the outside, so when it gets to be 10am and you're still playing, you'll have to deal with that pesky sun thing.
Fletcher wrote:
Seriously? That house is gorgeous. Congrats!
Fedaykin98 wrote:
wordsmythe wrote:
Fine looking place, dude. Congrats!
Certis beat me to it. - Elysium
That's only really a problem if the window faces east. And even if it does, he can just buy some blackout shades or something.
And congrats Pharacon, that house is gorgeous.
Duoae wrote:
merphle wrote:
Steam ID
*Legion* wrote:
PSN: BoogleGWJ
Too much light to be a LAN room. Those two big non-light-obscuring doors.
Fedaykin98 wrote:
wordsmythe wrote:
*Legion* wrote:
PSN: BoogleGWJ
Congrats! Very fine house indeed. Makes me realize even more that I have to move out of SoCal if I ever want to live in a decent house that doesn't cost the better part of a million dollars.
OG_slinger, you also get to have more of your check thanks to no state income check!
But today I found a special pain thanks to (almost) owning a home. I thought it was a cute that my wife was going on and on about colors in this room and that, borrowing books from the library about interior decorating and reading chunks of them to me while I was playing games.
That special pain is antique shopping. I have been ALL over Houston today up and down the Heights, Montrose and along the freeway looking at ancient grandma dinning sets and weirdly shaped statues. But it was kinda fun all in all as there was a naughty antique store run by this old codger on Montrose with fun naked lady pictures and the "reek of wrongness" in the hippy anti-war themed antique shop.
But hands down the best place is the Antique super store off 290 and the 610. It is a giant yellow warehouse stuffed FULL of cool stuff. There are some antique buys I don't think I will be able to sell my wife.
Pair of 6000 pound lions sculpted from white marble.
One 13 foot tall marble and polished wood mermaid with nipples.
Classic beer neon signs.
Semi-erotic speakeasy bar picture.
Suit of armor
Large marble bust of some angry German guy
Bear skin rug
1960 portal TV that looks great for computer case
Xfire: Pharacon
Tempest says: "A team hat doe snot communicate and talk to each other about what the next move will be is going to lose."
Mex is my hero = "f*ck it, I'll do it. WE'LL DO IT LIVE."
Congrats on the new house! Tonight marks one week since we moved into our house and we're still all giggly inside during the awesome honeymoon period. We're working hard on getting everything unpacked and in place for the housewarming throwdown in a few weeks - it will be on August 30th for the ASU vs. LSU showdown. We're both ASU alumni so we thought it'd be a good theme, and we're hoping to do a "stock the bar" type approach as well.
Stuff's still too scattered about for updated pics, but this thread has a few of the ones we took while checking it out, placing the offer, etc.
Hope the rest of the paperwork/process/whatever goes smoothly for you!
ArrMatey - BM Hunter
That's awesome. It's an amazing thing signing all that mortgage paperwork for the first time.
Gamertag: GWJ Rabbit | Last.fm | Twitter
"In other news, Miyamoto pissed on my head, and gave me a forecast of rain." - *Le
The house looks great Pharacon.
Steam ID: DistantSound
That is an awesome looking house Pharacon.
Thinks about his crappy apartment..... Yup I still hate you Pharacon.
But I just got the full time position from the internship I have been working. (with a nice pay raise)
So hopefully in about 5 years I will be able to buy my own place too.
Once again congrats Pharacon.
It looks wonderful, but I noted a distinct lack of concubine's chambers. Surely you must rectify this situation.
Rock Band Name Generator!... too funny to merely be coincidence.
"Truly, this mishap has set back the swamp sciences several years." - H.P. Lovesauce, lamenting a tragedy.
That is a pretty badass house. That you have a LAN room makes me immensely jealous.
Congrats dude!
"We're taught from a young age how to dodge rock hard objects moving at incredible rates of speed while simultaneously beating folks half to death with sticks. We do this for fun." -kung fu grip
http://blog.digital-lifeline.ca
Wow nice place Pharacon! I too just recently purchased a place. It's substantially smaller than my old one (and yours, apparently) but with a business to run, a girlfriend away at college and big plans to move in the next 5 years we wanted a place with good investment value. Here's some shots:
We're pretty stoked about the kitchen and the basement in particular. Looking forward to putting in a killer home theatre!
You can't do this!
Of course I can, I'm Will Wright, bitch! - The Simpsons Game
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Xfire/Xbox Live: StylezXP
I really like the floors, Stylez. The house looks really nice.
Fletcher wrote:
Congrats! I'm so jealous, that house looks so awesome compared to my 60's vintage one story brick ranch which just lost a ton of value because Detroit is swirling down the toilet.
tell your wife she can decorate the house any way she likes as long as you get to put this stuff in the LAN room.
also congrats, Stylez. Also a lovely looking place.
Steam Community ID: LastExile[gwj]
Ironclad Online: lastexile