https://boards.hellobee.com/ Pregnancy, Baby and Parenting blog, by Hellobee en Thu, 07 May 2026 22:44:19 +0000 https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home/page/2#post-2827266 Fri, 08 Jun 2018 09:56:34 +0000 Portboston 2827266@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>We are in a hot market. (Portland OR) Our first house we bought in 2013 when it was starting to heat up. We looked at something like 21 houses in 14 days. Put in 3 offers and our 3rd was accepted. Closed in about 40 days. We were in a month to month lease at that point.<br /> Fast forward to summer 2017, we started looking for a larger (forever) home. It took us 10 months and 4 offers this time. About 25 days from start of escrow to close. We took some extra time to paint and then moved in.</p> <p>Both purchases were in summer. The first one we offered in July and closed in August. Second one we offered in June and closed in July. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home/page/2#post-2827203 Fri, 08 Jun 2018 04:52:45 +0000 Becky 2827203@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>I’m in WNY in a small, popular town where houses in our price range often sell the day of the open house or before they officially go on the market (so all you see is a “Sold” sign because the realtors showed it before the”For Sale” sign went up). Houses that are priced right and on certain streets sell right away so people unfamiliar with the market get pushed out because they think they can wait a day or two to go see it. We were one of multiple bids on our house . We sat down with our realtor immediately after seeing the house so we could put the offer in right away (the other bidders did the same) and heard back the same night. I want to say time from offer to close was just over 60 days which is standard inNY state from what I gather. We learned from buying our first home not to think of the house as yours until you close because of the bank end. We bought in the winter which was good for us. The May-September is the busy time here and houses go flying. Our first home was a much longer process and we ended up buying in a less sought after neighborhood (we were looking in a city along with a lot of other first time home buyers and bought on the outskirts because we were priced out). Offer to close was more like 90 days (offered sometime in early March, moved in mid June). </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home/page/2#post-2827198 Fri, 08 Jun 2018 00:15:23 +0000 Littlebit7 2827198@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@nwm: this is a good point. I had it in my head that I needed to wait until inventory was high. Maybe we should start looking in earnest at the end of this fall but we then potentially wouldn’t close until 2019 which would in fact work in our favor </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home/page/2#post-2827189 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 20:32:05 +0000 lioneyes 2827189@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@littlebit7 walled you! </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827089 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 13:01:17 +0000 Alba4 2827089@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>We bought in Westchester County, NY 6 years ago. The market usually picks up in March. We started looking in the winter, found our house in April, and were in contract by May. We originally were supposed to close by late July, but due to August vacations and trying to organize schedules of the lawyers, we closed the second week of Aug. I had 3 weeks to do some work (refinishing floors, painting, electrical updates, cleaning) and we moved in at the end of August.</p> <p>If you have kids that are school age, you’ll want to be in contract by May (the latest) to ensure you are closed and moved in before school starts in Sept.</p> <p>Good luck! </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827076 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 11:54:04 +0000 Littlebit7 2827076@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@Anagram: I walled you </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827069 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 11:40:49 +0000 Clementine12 2827069@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>We saw a home go up in the neighborhood we wanted and found a realtor to show up that home even though we weren't ready to look yet. She showed us a few more as well. We ended up buying the first home we saw (I think our closing was 45 days?). At the sellers request, we rented it back to her for 2 months. So start to move in was 4ish months. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827047 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 10:19:04 +0000 muffinsmuffins 2827047@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@Littlebit7: I’ll say we compromised but 2 years later it doesn’t seem like it. We saw our house and passed on it initially as it wasn’t in the exact location we wanted and it was SO dated. We waited a few weeks and saw a bunch more but noooothing was coming up. Our realtor encouraged us to look at this one again and we mapped out our commutes, compared prices of houses in the area and comps of the original area we wanted that the realtor had been sending and decided to do it. We had also sold our house and were on a timeline. </p> <p>We were able to negotiate like 30k+ off asking as the house was way overpriced. It was built in 1969 and was the original owner, a little old widow. It was TACKY. But we’ve slowly picked away at it with painting, bathroom reno, updating as we can afford it. We still have a lot to work on and some days I get jealous of people with beautiful kitchens and basement suites but we are here for the long haul so we can wait until this expensive part of our lives is over with.</p> <p>Our realtor really helped us see the value of this home. We initially couldn’t see past the look and see that it was immaculately maintained over the years with all the major things done: roof, furnace and A/C, etc. Our commute is now amazing and home values have gone up by like 100k in 2 years in our area, so I have no regrets. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827045 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 10:13:50 +0000 Anagram 2827045@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>Also, our closing was fast--4 weeks. But the closing kind of depends on a few factors: How quickly the seller returns documents, how quickly the buyer returns documents, how quickly the attorneys complete documents, and how quickly the mortgage companies complete their end. I was hugely pregnant and my husband can be a little bit of a ball breaker, so he was calling all involved parties basically daily, and we got it closed in 4 weeks, just 3 days before I had our oldest DD. We were moved in and had the nursery set up by the time she came. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827044 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 10:13:45 +0000 Littlebit7 2827044@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@Anagram: I’m going to reply to you once I don’t have kids crawling al over me. I was hoping you’d chime in! </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827043 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 10:11:36 +0000 Anagram 2827043@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@Littlebit7: exciting! I feel like I could write a book about buying in our area, and I've only done it once! But we've been kind of looking to buy again the past year (always looking, never finding haha), and I keep learning more quirks about our little town. But tell me more about what you are looking to buy--condo in an elevator building/parking? Condo in a smaller building/no parking? Rowhouse/brownstone?</p> <p>Because of Hoboken's flood plains map (the FEMA map), there's a lot of particular information you want to brush up on if you are considering a rowhouse. There were some laws passed in 2017 that have really negatively affected people that are planning to buy and renovate a row house. Those same laws would affect condo buildings that have any ground floor level housing--like, livable space, not retail or parking.</p> <p>When we bought 6 years ago, it was about the same as now in terms of a hot market. There were bidding wars on everything/anything priced well and in semi decent shape. We aggressively looked for 5-6 months, bid on probably 8 places that we lost in bidding wars. It becomes tempting after a point to go insane and do anything it takes to get the top bid, but my husband was really good at coaching me to keep our heads and keep the overall financial picture in the forefront. Things that are staged nicely go for way more than they are worth (from the buyer's perspective). So if it doesn't appraise, then the buyer has to come up with the cash to make up the difference, or they will back out after appraisal and everyone has to go back to the drawing board. That happened a few times in our house hunting process--we'd lose a bidding war and then be contacted 2 weeks later after it didn't appraise and the winners backed out. But once we knew it wasn't appraising, we didn't want it either. One of those places sold two years later for way less than the high bid in the bidding war we got caught up in. So then I was really glad we didn't get it. Check out the condo docs carefully and look for trends. Some HOA boards are spend-happy, and some are so stingy they don't keep up the maintenance of their buildings. And a surprising amount of buildings in town have litigation pending, which makes it really hard to secure a loan through any of the big institutions. A realtor will try to steer you into a "boutique mortgage company" and that almost always comes at higher rates. You can request all the condo docs during attorney review.</p> <p>Also, negotiate a deal with any realtor you sign on with that if you find a "For sale by owner" who doesn't want to have any realtors involved, you are free to bid on that. Some buildings have a "for sale by owner" trend, and if you find the place yourself (say, through the FB mommies group, or by word of mouth), I don't think you should have to pay your realtor. In NJ, we have the attorney review period (most other states don't have this) and you have to pay your attorney anyway, so you do not need a realtor in a FSBO situation. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827042 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 10:10:17 +0000 catgirl 2827042@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>We are currently under contract on a house and to be honest we compromised on a lot. More than I ever thought we would have to but our budget simply wasn't going to get us everything we want. The market we're in is crazy. Houses go quickly, for over asking, with lots of people waiving inspection (which is crazy to me and not something I would consider). </p> <p>We're moving back to our home state and DH has been up there for a couple of months already. We started looking at the end of March, offered on a house in early April that we were outbid on, offered on a house mid May that we were outbid on, and finally offered on a house Memorial Day weekend that was accepted. We offered without me even seeing it - DH, our realtor, and my mom and stepdad went to the showing. We are scheduled to close at the end of July, but only because the sellers are building a house and need to finish it. Our mortgage broker was confident in a 30 day close if that was on the table. </p> <p>Our realistic options were:<br /> 1.) a really nice house with a lot of yard, in a not so great town with pretty bad schools, low taxes, and a longer commute for DH.<br /> 2.) a nice house with small lot, in a great neighborhood within an okay city, schools that were a mix of great to okay,, high taxes, good commute<br /> 3.) nice house on a medium lot but on a fairly busy road, in a great town, amazing schools, mid level taxes, good commute. </p> <p>We went with option 3. I never imagined being on a busy road, in fact we were trying not to avoid a busy road. But the backyard is way bigger than we expected. And while the road is busy it's doable and so convenient to everything we care about. Also we never thought we would be able to get in such an amazing school district, so that was a bonus. </p> <p>I don't know how long we plan to stay, at least 5 years but possibly until our kids are done with school. We will see. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827040 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 10:05:14 +0000 Mrs D 2827040@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>House #1: Started looking in May, made 10 offers on houses, under contract once - sellers backed out, defeated by cash offers 4 times for less money than we were offering. Ultimately signed our contract the first week in October, closed on our house the first week in November. (and got engaged the same day!!!!)</p> <p>House #2: Started looking in December (sold our existing home in 12 hours on Jan 13th), made 3 offers on 3 diff houses before finding our house at the end of January, closed the end of February.</p> <p>Both times - very hot sellers markets. Small niche location, specific requirements. The only reason we got our second house so fast was because it was a total fixer upper - literally. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827039 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 10:05:03 +0000 nwm 2827039@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>Our experience was with Philadelphia suburbs not NYC suburbs, but I imagine a lot of it is the same.... What we saw was that a lot of the competition was focused around the February - June season, and since you don't own a house you need to sell, you may be able to get a much better deal if you look in July/August (when things are really dead) or October/November. The inventory is lower but so are the prices and the competition. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827037 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:55:28 +0000 DesertDreams88 2827037@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>Hot sellers market here. We bought 4 years ago and my friends are buying now. Most houses sell within a couple days on the market, and have multiple offers. We had to be ready to see houses often and put down an offer the night we saw them. From offer to close, it is usually 4 weeks, but can be up to 6 weeks. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827035 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:52:12 +0000 looch 2827035@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@Littlebit7: I had to make my peace with the fact that the structure is not what makes a home, it is the people in it.</p> <p>We also had a large down payment, that seemed to make a difference in our ability to make an offer. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827034 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:50:16 +0000 Pollywog 2827034@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>We are abnormal, but we were in a very hot market outside of Washington, DC with very specific criteria. We knew there were very few houses that met our criteria. </p> <p>We emailed our Realtor on a Thursday . Looked through listings that week. Found one, visited on the next Thursday, put in an offer on Saturday morning, offer accepted Saturday night, closed 28 days later. It was super fast.</p> <p>What made ours go so fast is that I didn't waste time looking at houses I wouldn't buy. If it didn't meet all of our criteria it was a no go. I checked out the neighborhood on google maps and vetoed a lot of houses because I didn't like the neighborhood or the commute didn't work. I also didn't bother with open houses, I liked to go by myself. </p> <p>We had our real estate agent, title attorney, and mortgage broker all picked out before we started and were pre-approved. And a huge down payment saved. That saved a ton of time and made our offer competitive . </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827033 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:47:12 +0000 Littlebit7 2827033@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@looch: this sounds like what we will end up doing! </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827032 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:46:49 +0000 Littlebit7 2827032@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@yerpie110: I walled you! </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827029 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:42:39 +0000 yerpie110 2827029@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@Littlebit7: Haha, my town is a little over 1.5 square miles. Inventory is so low and so hot, but if you have a good realtor, you'll ultimately find success! Can I ask which town you are looking at? </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827027 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:39:48 +0000 Littlebit7 2827027@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@yerpie110: haha yes we aren’t really interested in other places except a town that is a square mile ha </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827024 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:36:09 +0000 looch 2827024@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>We bought 5 years ago and I feel like we had to compromise. The part of the county that we live in is expensive and I didn't want to be house poor, so we deliberately bought something that we could handle on one income. The house style isn't what I want and it's a lot older than what I wanted as well, but for what I wanted to pay, it is what was available. </p> <p>We plan to stay through my son being in the 8th grade, then we will take another look and determine where we need to be. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827022 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:34:55 +0000 Sams Mom 2827022@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>Our housing market is really hot right now. If a house is priced right it's on the market for less than a day right now.</p> <p>Our first house we bought, we looked at on a Saturday and put in an offer that day. They countered and we countered twice and they accepted a final offer on that monday. We did a 15 or 20 day closing because it was a cash offer. </p> <p>When we sold that home 2 1/2 years later we listed it and sold it within 2 weeks (we had a 3 person bidding war). We had already put an offer in on the new house we were buying and it was accepted after countering their counter offer. We did a 45 day closing on it because we weren't sure how fast our house would sell and it was new construction and not quite done yet. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827020 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:33:39 +0000 hellobeeboston 2827020@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@Littlebit7: I would plan on compromising now with a hot market with little inventory.....</p> <p>in our process of looking at so many homes we were able to widdle down what we HAD to have, vs what would have been nice... also take into consideration the cost of a renovation to fix up or add on. </p> <p>We went for the house at the end of a cul-de-sac in a great neighborhood in a desired town with a huge flat yard, even though it didn't have everything we wanted inside. We knew we could ADD the things we wanted, and there wasn't a ton of work to do immediately.... </p> <p>Location was big for me, flat yard was big for DH... 4 bedrooms was a big one, but we could live with 3, luckily our house had 4 . We wanted 2 full baths, but this house only had one (we have plans to add another, septic was already zoned to add another).... The kitchen wasn't exactly what we wanted, but we took down the wall, and added a big island a year after we moved in. Didn't have a screened porch, but we just added that this year...... oh man the list is endless. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827019 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:29:37 +0000 MrsSCB 2827019@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>It can really vary a LOT. For us, we started actively looking, with a realtor, in February. We saw between five and eight houses every week. We made an offer that was accepted at the beginning of April. We closed on June 1, which was the maximum length closing, and we're now renting back to the sellers until the end of July, which is also the max allowed rent-back. A lot of this will depend on whether you're in a buyer or seller-friendly market. Our market is VERY competitive, and VERY good for sellers. So we made a lot of concessions to the sellers of our home, but it was worth it for us.</p> <p>Also, we met with several realtors in person before deciding on one. I actually found her because someone recommended her on Nextdoor. And we LOVED her. She was a huge help, so I definitely recommend both getting a realtor and shopping around for one. Ask friends, ask local websites, look at reviews, etc. Your realtor can make a big difference! </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827018 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:27:32 +0000 yerpie110 2827018@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>We live in a town in NJ right next to the GWB, and our market is hot hot hot. We were only looking in this one specific town and homes would be posted one day on NJMLS and before we could even schedule a time to visit within the next 2-3 days, it would be under contract already. We looked for approx six months before we finally found a house that ticked enough of the boxes, visited the day it was posted, put in a strong, above asking offer that evening, and we STILL almost lost it! </p> <p>What made us pull the trigger was that it wasn't the perfect house, but it was close enough and had all of our non-negotiables (except 1 that was manageable) and almost all of our "wants". After looking for so long, I knew that I would have to make a compromise somewhere (or wait another 5+ years and have more money), and this home came the closest. </p> <p>If you have a broader range of towns in NJ, that would help. We were limited as we wanted to stay in the same town and were not interested in moving anywhere else. </p> <p>Good luck! </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827016 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 09:18:33 +0000 Littlebit7 2827016@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>@muffinsmuffins: these are good points. I think this is a 10 year home. Both kids through middle<br /> school. But maybe longer depending. We want to stay close to nyc. That is pretty nonnegotiable.<br /> @lioneyes: I’m going to wall you for a recc. I think buyers pay half of commissions here but I could be wrong.<br /> @hilary: thank you. This is helpful information and good advice. </p> <p>I can forsee a big problem with the lack of inventory. There are seriously probably less than 6 places on the market now with the number of bedrooms we’d want within 25% of what we’d want to pay. So I can just envision myself saying ...wellll...we should just wait a bit longer to see what comes on the market. At some point do you just settle and force yourself to take the plunge ? I’m not of the mindset that i need the perfect place that ticks every single box...but for those that have had to compromise on things during the home buying process..what made you pull the trigger? </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827006 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 08:41:51 +0000 snowjewelz 2827006@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>I'm in a popular NY suburb, bought 5 years ago but we bought during "slow" time. We started looking Sept, finalized end of Jan I think, closed beginning of March, completely gutted/renovated and moved in end of May. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2827000 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 08:17:36 +0000 hilary 2827000@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>Only thing I'd add is all of our homes (we've owned 3 different primary homes and also have 3 duplex/rentals) have in the contract a 48 hour prior to closing walk through. This allows us to validate anything in a request to remedy was actually completed (one time it wasn't and renegotiated to get $ at closing to get the repair done ourselves) and also make sure the move out process is well underway. </p> https://boards.hellobee.com/topic/for-those-who-have-bought-a-home#post-2826989 Thu, 07 Jun 2018 07:41:15 +0000 skinnycow 2826989@https://boards.hellobee.com/ <p>It really depends on how motivated the seller is. We also bought in a seller's market and we needed to get in a house as soon as possible. We were moving from across state so we didn't do a ton of looking around - just looked online and then saw 3-4 houses one weekend. We put an offer in on our house 7/8 and closed on 7/31 (I remember exact dates because I found out I was pregnant the day we put an offer in). Both us/sellers wanted to move quickly. </p>