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We got pre approved in June, found a house at the end of July, and closed mid September. It was a buyer's market so we were able to take our time and see our favorite houses a couple of times before deciding. We were living in an apartment and went month to month for August and September because our lease was up at the end of July. The apartment manager knew we were looking and didn't have any issues with us going over our lease by two months.

We got preapproved and started looking casually in July and got more serious in September. We made an offer on a short sale that was accepted in late October and we closed in Dec.

Looking now won't do you much good because houses you like aren't likely to be available by the time you're ready to buy. I would say now is a good time to go ahead and get ore approved and find a realtor. Have the realtor set you up for daily emails to see what is coming on the market within your parameters so you can get a realistic sense of what you can afford. And then three month out from when you are ready to move start looking seriously.

We knew what area we were interested in and had a price range and must haves that we agreed to before looking. We kept an eye on the listings and went and looked at a few we were interested in around February. We found a certain layout of a house we liked in a certain subdivision but didn't love what was on the market. But DH got the ball rolling to get pre-approved by our credit union and started letting lenders duke it out on Lending Tree. We set up email alerts on new listings and one night in early March we saw a listing for the right floor plan in an ideal location so I went to the open house, knew it was right, had DH see it the next day, and THEN we found a realtor to write up the offer. (We got a referral from a friend). It was probably the easiest money she made all year because we found the house first. We made an offer St. Patrick's Day, had keys in late April. Spent a month doing some minor renovations since we were renting until June anyway and moved in early June. Our offer was competitive because we didn't have any contingencies like selling a house first and we were pre-approved so it went pretty fast. Our closing was delayed only because we used a VA loan and we had to use their appraiser who couldn't get out there for 2 weeks.

It took us over a year. We stayed low on our budget (and missed when the market bottomed out-- we could've gotten a lot more house if we had upped our price range initially!) and we were in escrow with an approved short-sale. It ended up falling through the day before we were supposed to close, so we took a small break and found our current house after a few months.

I think it depends on your market and location specifically.

With our first house, it took us 6 months of actively looking and making offers before we were successful in getting a house. Before that we had spent 3-4 months researching the areas, mortgage options and putting together a budget. I highly recommend you find a mortgage lender you like and trust - they love to tell you "oh you can afford that" but its important for you to know what you are comfortable affording first.

With our new house - we were pre-approved and started looking in Dec - closed on the house Feb 28. Not as competitive of a market at that time of year.

I don't think it hurts to look casually and go to open houses when you have time since you can get a feel for how far your money goes in various neighborhoods, as well as see what you like and don't like about homes.

We looked very casually for about a year and then seriously for a month (eg. Seeing with a realtor and not just going into open houses) before finding our home.

I think so much of the timeframe depends on how picky you are with finding a home that has what you want, how picky you are about specific neighborhoods, school districts, etc.

It took us over 2 years of actively looking to find out home, but we saw plenty of great homes in that time - just not great for us homes.

Never too early to pull a copy of your credit report and make sure it's clean and your scores are decent/work on them if you need to.

You could always start going to open houses just to start getting a sense of what you can expect to get for $X.

Both times I started looking at the areas I was interested in and seeing what houses were going for approx 6 months before. I didn't contact a realtor and start touring houses until I would've been ready to make an offer. No point in getting your heart set on a house that won't be there for you when you're finally ready.

We got preapproved in mid-july, and used the next 4 weeks to visit 18 houses and put down 6 offers. In our location, the market moves extremely fast, and we have to be willing to put down an offer the day off viewing. Do we have offers were turned down. And three were accepted all around the same time, the two of them were backup Offers where we were the next in line, essentially. We were under contract after a month, and closing the deal took the standard 30 days. There were there were some hiccups at the end that scared us and could have pushed out our timeline. I thought that we moved at a good pace, but we probably couldn't have moved any faster. It was basically 60 days from our initial meeting with the mortgage lender to having the house keys in our hand.

Factors affecting this time line: our market is extremely fast we don't have children so we have a flexible house viewing, we had two weeks off of work with which to look at houses, and our house buying was not contingent on selling a house (we lived in an apt prior.)

You should start looking now! It's never too early to start educating yourself. We started looking about 1 year out and when our house came on the market we knew it was the one and pounced!

I think you should start going around to open houses now. For me that was the best way to see what you can get for how much in what area, without any pressure. We went to a whole bunch of open houses, put in one offer, which we did not get (and are now really glad we didn't) and decided we were better off renting for a few more years. Our market is silly right now- places sell for above the asking price before the open house! We did end up buying because the owner of our rental decided to sell but we still like going to open houses to see what's available in our neighborhood.

We went from preapproved to closing in about a month! Put an offer on the first house we looked at. Not a timeline I would recommend and it isn't our forever house or forever city so that made it a bit easier.

If you're undecided between two areas now would be the time to do the research and soul searching and narrow down to one location.

in our experience we were buying in 2009 when there was an $8k credit. By the end of august we decided to contact our realtor (family friend) and do all the preliminary pre approvals. We had been living in an apt in the area for the past year so we were familiar with the neighborhoods and had been keeping an eye on the market for a few months. We looked at houses all through September and almost gave up until a house dropped in price right into our budget. we made an offer at the end of september and closed in mid november.

6 years later, we're quickly outgrowing our house and looking to move again. This past march our realtor came out and assessed our house and we came up with a time line to help us get it listed next March. The problem I'm finding is the type of house I want to move into is nearly impossible to find in our neighborhood in our budget. Almost everything is Ranchers and Splits with only 3 bedrooms and needs tons of updating. so we're also at an impasse of looking outside our current area.

It took us 7 months between starting the process and actually getting an offer on a house accepted. Some of our delays were:
- Switched our real estate agent (after he cost us the first house we put an offer in on)
- Switched the towns we were looking in
- Switched lender bank
- Once we finally had our ducks in a row, we had to make three more offers before finally getting a house

We need to move in by May; so we started look the Aug before, closed by March I think and had 2 months to renovate.

We started looking in December, put an offer in in January, it fell through in February and we put another offer in on a place in March... we were supposed to close in June but it has been delayed because of construction issues. So... you have to be prepared for a lot of hiccups and it can be stressful. I would definitely talk to your landlord about your flexibility on your housing. We sold our house and now we are moving into temporary housing for a month, which is a complete pain in the bum.