My wife and I are looking at buying our first home. Anyone have any advice to a first time home buyer? We are looking at a FHA loan due to the low percentage down.
lightsareout Where are some places to look online for a loan? I know of like quickenloans but i've read nothing but bad reviews on them. [/quote said:Do a Google search for home mortgages. There will be plenty of things that pop up. It is very easy, but time consuming to see what loan rates, fees and terms are for each company. Some sites have you enter information and will return 4 or 5 companies. The questions asked should be generic in nature, don't give SSN, DOB, etc. If you find a site asking for that, leave and continue the search. ONCE you have that background, you can contact people at your local bank and credit union. While I have only gotten one mortgage in my town, I can't really say it was better or worse. If you have a problem, then being local will really help you.
When you find a couple of mortgage companies that you like in terms of rates and fees, you can do a search to the BBB, internet forums to see how their customer care is.
As for finding out what property values are, or should roughly be, you can use Zillow.com or other sites like that. These are good for general property values. Zillow features a way to look at all homes in the area that have closed in the past year. This is the real way to determine what prices should be using Price per square/ft. It is exactly the same info that a Realtor can give you. It will also give you homes listed for sale, the asking prices, and links to their realtors. Then, there is a section that the website gives their "estimate" of value. Many times, they are very inaccurate. But the other info provided is very good.
Sorry, but "only 3% extra" is a lot when you are talking hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Sales contracts can easily be found on the internet, just make sure that is applies to the state that you are located.