Finding a home you love and making an offer

It’s an exciting time while you’re looking at homes, seeking just the right one for you and your family. Every time you walk through another door, you feel that thrill of "maybe this is the one" as you check it against your list of must-haves.  After a while, you narrow down the candidates to the few houses you liked best. Choosing a home is an enormous decision, and you want to get it right.

And now it’s down to one house, that special place that seems to be just waiting for your furniture to become your new home. You’ve arrived at the next big step – making an offer. Like many other steps, it sounds simple, doesn’t it? You offer a certain price for the house, and if the sellers agree, it’s yours. 

Except that’s not usually the way it happens. An offer is almost never about just price. So many other factors are part of the negotiation between buyer and seller, and this is one place where you definitely will benefit from having a REALTOR® on your side. For one thing, a professional agent knows the neighborhood, has seen comparable houses, and can give you a good idea of what a fair price is. Also – and this is important - you are emotionally involved in wanting to buy this house. You need someone who can keep calm and see the process as the business transaction it is.

What else is there beside price? How about when you need to get into the house? Or how quickly the sellers want to move out? Are there things about the house that need repair or replacement, and do they need to be done before you’ll buy it or will you take an allowance against the price and fix them later? Do you have another house you need to sell before you can close on this one? Are the window treatments included? The list goes on. You will cover all of these issues with your real estate agent as you come up with your offer.

One last step before you make your offer. Remember that preapproval letter you got before you started looking at houses? Pull it out again and make sure you are still in the ballpark of what you can borrow, taking in to account how much cash you have for a downpayment and closing costs. A preapproval is not a loan commitment, but it’s a good indication of what you can expect to borrow. 

Now you’re ready to read the offer document carefully. Be sure you understand everything before you sign including all the other terms of your offer as well as the price. If you are offering less than the listing price be sure to stay in close touch with your REALTOR® as it’s common to have back-and-forth negotiations in a short time before you and the sellers agree on all the terms.

Sign on the line, cross your fingers, and wait for that phone call that announces, "You got it!"

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