The Process of Buying your New Home
Buyer is Loan Pre-Approved
So you've decided it's time to buy a home. You've outlined the important things you'd like in your home and found a great agent to work with you.
Time to hit the streets and start searching right?
Not quite yet.
There's a really important step that needs to be taken before you begin looking for you perfect home.
First, Get Pre-Approved for a mortgage.
I very frequently hear from new clients "Oh, I know I can get a loan. No problem. I've got great credit and I know my income is enough for what I'm looking for." Well, when they finally find their perfect home and get started on the loan approval process they discover...hiccupps. Here are a few common ones:
-There's an old medical collection account that you paid off but hasn't been updated with the credit beaureaus and you no longer credit qualify. It'll be at least 30 days before everything's patched up.
-You find the perfect house that 5 couples love too. You've got 24 hours to get your offer on the table but no pre-approval letter in sight. No seller in San Francisco these days will take your offer seriously without a pre-approval letter and your offer goes out the window.
-While you make $100k a year, you write off approximatley $15k in business expenses and didn't realize that banks now view your qualifying income as $85k and now your dream house is outside your price range.
These are just a few of the complications that can trip up the process. The more information you have up front, the better. You don't want to be disappointed by looking at homes that turn out to be outside your rice range. You might also discover that you are able to look up in price without too much of a stretch after all. Either way, it's good to know all your optinos before you're too far along in the process.
If you're ready to get started on your home search in San Francisco, I'm here to make the process smoother for you!