Skip to main content

Must Be This Tall to Ride

Surely, you remember being a child at an amusement park when after having stood in line with your friends and family, waiting to get on a terrific ride, you discovered the sign that read, “you must be this tall to ride.”This Tall3.png

Not only was it disappointing, it was slightly embarrassing. You never want to go through that again.

A remarkably similar situation occurs when people are buying a home. After finding the right home and negotiating the contract, they find out that they don’t measure up financially.  It’s not something that anyone wants to go through if they have a choice.

Regardless of what you think you know, if you’re buying a home with a loan, you need to physically visit with a trusted mortgage professional before you get serious.

  • You’ll find out your credit score which will directly affect the mortgage rate you’ll pay.
  • You might discover blemishes on your credit that possibly can be corrected.
  • You’ll even get a pre-approval letter that you can submit with an offer which could dramatically affect your negotiations in the current competitive market.

Some rides don't turn out to be as good as you thought they were going to be.  A person certainly doesn’t want that disappointment with a lender. Contact me for a recommendation of trusted mortgage professional.


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Make Your Home Offer the Most Appealing

Sales in February 2023 were up 14.5% month over month and still down 22.6% year over year according to the NAR Housing Snapshot.   The median sales price dipped 0.2% to $363,000 and there are 2.6 months supply of homes on the market compared to 1.7 months a year ago. "Inventory levels are still at historic lows, and consequently, multiple offers are returning on a good number of properties." According to Lawrence Yun, Chief Economist for the National Association of REALTORS�. It is still important to have a strategy for potentially competing with other buyers on the house you want to buy.   The plan should include several available provisions and options, so that at the time of drafting the sales offer, you can consider exactly what to include based on the situation. Unless a person is paying cash, you need to be pre-approved by a trusted mortgage professional long before you start looking at homes.   Include the written pre-approval letter along ...

Getting Comfortable with the New Normal Mortgage Rates

The biggest shock to homebuyers is the soaring mortgage rates of 2022 that doubled in one year resulting in approximately 15 million mortgage ready buyers displaced from the market due to affordability issues. As of February 23, 2023, the 30-year fixed rate mortgage was at 6.5%.   While that is twice as high as it was on January 6, 2022, it is still lower than the 7.75% average rate since April 2, 1971, according to the Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey. When rates increase at a rapid pace like this, it takes time for the public to adjust and begin to accept it as the new normal. Prior to the housing bust that led to the Great Recession, the normal for mortgage rates was in the 6% range and existing home sales were over 6.5 million for three years.   From 2007 to 2014, home sales were closer to 5 million with 2008-2011 at just above 4 million annually. From January 17, 2008 to March 5, 2020, mortgage rates averaged 4.32%.   In this 12-year period...

Get Ready to Garage Sale

A well-planned garage or yard sale can give you extra space in your home, get rid of unused items and make some money but it needs some of the same considerations that any business needs to be successful.   Start early to research and plan Promotion is key Display items attractively Price items right Organize checkout Determine the date of your sale, remembering that there are exceptions, but Saturdays are generally the best day.   Experienced garage-salers believe that a well-planned one-day event will do as well as a multi-day event.   Serious purchasers will look for the "new" sale and most people don't come back multiple days. Recognize that the first day of the sale will have the most people.   Everyone will be looking for a bargain but some of them actually want to purchase things for them to resell at their own sales. Advertise in local newspapers and free online classified sites like Craigslist.   If several famili...