Purchasing a property

 Purchasing a home should be a wonderful experience, but sometimes it can be a real nightmare. My job is to make sure your experience is as smooth and as seamless as possible. It should be a fun and exciting experience, and I want it to be. The more enjoyable your experience, the more reason to refer me to your friends and family.

Many people believe the first step is to find a home. This is a good start; however, problem there is that a lot of people don't know exactly what they can afford.   So, the first step for us is to get you a loan approval.

 If you do not have a loan approval, please go to the partners page of this website and select a lender.  Have them get you started on the process of getting your loan approved.  They will let you know exactly what you can afford based upon your income, down payment, debt, and years of the loans.  These four factors will determine your interest rate.

While the loan approval is being worked on, we will get together either face-to-face or via email and discuss what you are looking for in a home.   Let me know what part of town you want to live in.   What do you want in a home? How many bedrooms, bathrooms, square feet. How many garage spaces if necessary? Do you want something traditional, modern, cottage or a ranch style home?  Do you want a town-home or condo?   Are you wanting to be near a particular school?  How about living in a master planned community versus a non-restricted area of town?  Do you want a fixer upper to save a little cash and design your own way?  Let me get a feel for what you want in your home. 

I show properties as early as 9am to 8pm Monday through Friday, and flexible hours on the weekends. The goal is to find you a place to call home as quickly as possible with all the best due diligence taken before you place an offer on a house.  I will start sending you links to properties on HAR.com that are actively being sold. I'll ask you to narrow down the listings to your top 5-8 for us to view immediately.  We can go out either same day or within a day or two.  We do this because the real estate market in Houston moves fast most days. A home there in the morning may be under contract be the next day.

 We're making progress, we've found you a home. I will pull recent comparable houses that have sold over the last 90-180 days in the same subdivision or within a 2-5 mile radius. Based on the comps, you will decide upon an offer for the house. There are some negotiations going back and forth, but it doesn't take long to wrap up. Earnest money is usually 1% of the sales price. There will also be an Option Period for you to take care of inspections of the property.  Most Option Periods are 7-14 days and on occasion extended, depending on the on the outcome of the inspection. There is a fee involved that will be credited to your closing cost.  It could range between $150-500.00, it can be more.  Survey, who pays for it?  Hopefully the seller has a good copy of the previous survey that has not been copyrighted. If they do not have a survey you can use, be prepared to buy one.  range from $450-1000.00, depending on the property. Do you want the seller to contribute to your closing cost? This will allow you to come to closing with less money or more money to put down. Decide when you want to close. Keep in mind everyone wants to close at end of month, try not to do the same. 

 Once the seller has said they agree to all the terms on the contract, I will have you execute the contract, and collect checks for earnest money and option fee. Both checks must be turned in immediately to the title company so they can get started on the title commitment, and prepared for closing.  If a lender is involved you will sign a Third Party Addendum relating to your financing with dates you will need to have a final approval of the loan including the appraisal.  If you do not stay on time with these items, you can lose your earnest money.  I will be assist you and make sure lender stays on time as well.  There may be other addendums you will need to sign: Lead Base Paint Disclosure (depending if home was built prior to 1978), HOA Addendum, Sellers Disclosure, MUD Notice Disclosure, etc.

Please go to the Partners section of this website and select an inspector or inspectors. Set up appointments as fast as possible to inspect the property.  You will need to decide if you want a Wood Destroying Insect Inspection (aka Termite Inspection).  Do you want extra inspections done by specialist; plumbers, roofers, a/c professionals, electricians, foundation repair company, etc?  You want inspections done in a timely fashion so that we can get with the sellers and negotiate what items you may want addressed.  Other options are to reduce price of home in compensation for repairs, get money from sellers for repairs after closing or if no agreement is reached there is one last option: execute a Termination of the Contract, execute a Release of Earnest and only lose the Option Fee. 

Here you and I are staying in contact with the lender and making sure everything is on track.  Let them know they can order the appraisal since option period is over. Get you in contact with utility companies and start moving over utilities.  Contact movers, try to stay away from end of month again and weekends. Movers generally charge more for weekends and end of month because of high demand.  Hopefully the lender is on top of their game along with the Escrow Officer and your closing statement is correct within at least 3 days prior to closing. 

Try to set up after 10am so that we can walk through the house prior to closing.  We want to make sure everything is as you agreed in the contract.  Be at closing at least 10-15 minutes early just in case they can get you in early.  Make sure to have your Cashier's Check ready for the closing the day before closing or morning of closing.  You may have the option to have your funds wired to the title company, but safer to bring in a check.  Closing should take 15 minutes to an hour, depending on documents. You'll sign a stack of documents that you will need to go over with the Escrow Officer, review the survey if applicable, and then wait for lender to wire funds to the title company so that the sellers can collect their funds, finalizing the transaction. Once funds have been received, the keys can be given to you, and you're officially a homeowner. CONGRATULATIONS! 

Tell all your friends and family of your great experience.