- Bought a house through my realtor who was a long time friend, after I found all sorts of issues with the house, friend has cut off all contact with me (blocked me from WhatsApp, removed me from Facebook and Instagram)
- Is it okay to contact owner of neighboring condo?
- Has anyone used cheaplands.com to buy land?
- Being billed for something by new owners despite not knowing it didn't work before moving out.
- Will our closing date be impacted by a roof claim the Seller is filing?
- mortgage process after commitment
- Am I being ripped off?
- Strategy for offer in a competitive market?
- Termite Prevention Treatment - Worth it?
- Neighbor throwing things over his fence onto our property
- Made a cash offer and lost to a different offer with the same amount: Should I fire my agent?
- Buying my first house. What should I know?
- Why might a seller have chosen a lower offer than ours to sell for?
- How little to get into a 100k condo?
- Condo Fees
- Mixed income housing
- Anyone have experience selling a home with i-beams
- Looking for guidance on how to handle the professional relationship between a builder and realtor
- Should we buy a new house now or in 5 years?
- Sellers keep wanting extension on deciding
- Polished concrete flooring?
- Experience with Homestyle Renovation loan?
- Which Suburbs ?
| Posted: 22 Nov 2020 10:02 AM PST This might be a long one. Also I don't know if I'm really looking for advice since there's not much I can do since the house is mine now, so maybe I'm just venting. My long time friend who I was stationed with at one point recommended a really nice area in Texas. After I flew out there she showed me around, I was pretty dead set on the area It was very green, very calm and I felt it would be a good way for me to start fresh. I was ashamed from being medically discharged from the military for mental health issues so I felt like moving out of California to a place more affordable would be ideal. I don't know anybody in Texas but, at least I'll know my realtor friend. She's married and has a family. Who knows, maybe they'll have some kind of gathering and I'll be able to make friends. At least I'll know someone in Texas I thought to myself. Things just seemed kind of odd like for example she lived 3 hours away from the town I was looking at houses. So I told her it didn't make much sense if I see a house I really liked but you couldn't see until the weekend because you're 3 hours away. By then someone else could have already submit an offer. When I told her if she could refer me to someone a bit closer she took offense to it. When I send her a link to a house I was interested in she would ignore it and she'd say "I told you I am picking a house for you and you just move in there.." At one point she got upset about me requesting a video tour of a house. The second house I requested a video tour and she got upset because she told me I was costing her money. I guess she would have to pay someone to drive to the house and record the interior because she lived too far away. I told her that I would personally pay her to get a video of the interior of the house if it was an issue. When I was close to submitting an offer on a house I decided not to and that made her upset. She told me "when I wrote to the realtor you are submitting and offer for you to move with your dog and that yard would be good for dogs I look like a liar for saying nevermind." This made me wonder, are you more concerned about yourself and who you network with, or are you trying to help me find the right home? we finally came across a house that seemed decent. Since there was a storm coming, my realtor and the seller's realtor seemed in a rush to get an inspector out there before the storm hit she said "Going to see who is the fastest available inspector since we only have a few days to get it done." She then told me who to send the money to and I did. When I noticed that the pest inspector didn't go up into the attic, I questioned my realtor about this and she said "Home inspector told me verbally he didnt see any pest evidence either so when the pest inspector went I knew the report was going to be good so the house is good. (I ended up finding tons of rat droppings up in the attic and numerous holes in the insulation where the mice must have been nesting) After the home inspection I asked her if we could get an inspector that focuses on The front yard and back (I wanted to make sure the sprinklers, fence and all that were in decent) she responded with "inspector for the front and back yard? That's not even a thing" When I was looking at home insurance I was dealing with an insurance broker and when I got a quote I sent it to my realtor to look it over and give me advice and she responds with the "Really? And you dont want me.to tell.you to fuck off?" After talking to her she was getting upset that I would contact her daily and if I had any questions I would go directly to her. I was doing that cause I thought I trusted her because I knew her for a long time? But she basically told me that that's not her job. Her job is just to find me a house. Fair enough. After looking over the inspection paperwork there were so much stuff wrong with the house but what amazed me more was the things that my realtor was negotiating. She said if we go easy on them they might leave the appliances behind. Rather than fixing major things, she was more concerned about the sliding door track being dirty and that it should be clean. It's like she was just doing the bare minimum to make sure the VA would approve it. I blame myself for putting too much trust in my friend/realtor. I know she can't tell me what to do but, maybe she would recommend I don't follow through due to all the issues with the house or something but she seemed determined to just make the sale If I'm being honest I should have been more involved with this but with the fires in California and other stressors it was hard to focus on all of this 100%. The plan was to drive there in a van with all my stuff to do the final walkthrough myself but the van ended up breaking down So I towed it back and instead I condense as much as I could and took my car but I wasn't able to get there to close so I did it all over the mail. We did the final walkthrough over WhatsApp. She was basically just regurgitating the same stuff over the initial walk-through video that I had seen before. The day I got there I went up in the attic and sure enough there was tons of rat droppings and holes in the insulation where I'm assuming rats used to be. I guess I'm more upset at myself for not pressing my realtor friend to get the pest inspector to go up there or to even hire another one because surely he would have found all those rat droppings and the condition of the insulation and that would have at least put us in a better position and would have given us some leverage to negotiate. once I told my realtor friend all this she Said to just throw some mouse traps up there and then she replied back with the very canned response stating that the inspector did not know the seller and the inspectors know what they're doing. She also told me how negative I am. I would admit, I am a pretty negative person but I saw nothing wrong with realizing a house might be near a busy street or a school which means excessive traffic. I get pretty bad anxiety and loud noises mess with me so that's why I wanted to make sure I found something in a quiet area. Anyway, after I showed her pictures and video of the issues She blocked me from everything and haven't heard from her since. Also my insurance broker told me that due to the condition of the roof and some missing gas component? That The home insurance I have won't be able to insure me and I have until the end of the month to find someone else. It was all just so bizarre. The funny thing is I still have all the WhatsApp conversations, and audio messages of all these exchanges so, it's just been stressful That's basically it. It's been quite the experience. Thanks for reading. [link] [comments] |
| Is it okay to contact owner of neighboring condo? Posted: 21 Nov 2020 09:17 PM PST I'm closing on a condo I'm expecting to live in the next 10 years or so but there are some issues I've come across. For example, the top floor had leaking issues which seems to be fixed according to the board minutes. I have the contact info of all the unit owners in a document from my agent and was wondering if it would be okay to contact the neighbor of the unit I'm purchasing to ask about how they like living there and whether the leaking issue has been resolved. I want to do my due diligence, but I feel asking these questions could be intrusive or go against the neighbor's self interest. For example, if the neighbor is thinking of selling, they may not wish to reveal anything negative. What do you think? [link] [comments] |
| Has anyone used cheaplands.com to buy land? Posted: 22 Nov 2020 07:27 AM PST I'm wondering if some of the things I'm seeing are starting to be red flags. Most of thier properties do not include photos of the property, just what looks to be like whatever they could photograph from the nearest street using Google Maps. Second, all their social media has been inactive since 2019. I don't know of any operating business that just abandons all of their social media pages. Thirdly, I've noticed the same couple of reviews written in broken English copy and pasted on a couple of websites. My scam radar is not broken right? I shouldn't give them any money because I'm sure I'll never see any property, right? [link] [comments] |
| Being billed for something by new owners despite not knowing it didn't work before moving out. Posted: 22 Nov 2020 10:22 AM PST Not sure if this is the right place so please let me know if not. The house is in Colorado for reference. We sold our house and the realtor advertised that there was a pet-safe underground fence installed. We hadn't used it in 1.5 years because one of our dogs would run past it and the other dog was too scared to go out with the collar on. To the best of our knowledge the system worked. Upon the closing of the house the new buyers moved in and realized the underground wire is broken, but the actual system works. They are trying to send us a bill to replace the system. Can they do that? [link] [comments] |
| Will our closing date be impacted by a roof claim the Seller is filing? Posted: 22 Nov 2020 08:59 AM PST Buying a home in Texas and our home inspector was able to identify some roof defects due to hail and wind. He also verified several other homeowners had gotten their roofs replaced in the last 2-3 years. He recalled a storm 2 years ago. Called a few Roofers in the area and they recommended a claim be filed by the Seller. They also noted a storm in July of this year. Wondering if anyones ever dealt with this. Is it likely we will be unable to close until this is resolved and re-inspected? [link] [comments] |
| mortgage process after commitment Posted: 22 Nov 2020 05:26 AM PST i received mortgage commitment, i sent all the required conditions to underwriting 1-3 days to hear back from underwriting? if they accept all my conditions is that when i get the closing disclosure? and then the final closing disclosure? Is it usually 1 month after getting mortgage commitment to get to closing/final CD (granted i fulfill all the conditions asap) [link] [comments] |
| Posted: 21 Nov 2020 06:04 PM PST Hey r/RealEstate My wife and I are currently looking to buy our first home and literally just started looking a week ago so we're rookies. We've found a house that we love.. checks every box: pool, modern looking interior, and in our price range.. The home was clearly flipped (220k closing in March, relisted for 495k). Any suggestions on what to look for to tell whether the flippers were cheap and we are making a terrible mistake? I'm already skeptical due to the difference in price and it seems like the general sentiment of the sub is that flippers are bad, but I generally don't know what to look for or how to tell. Our agent has been telling us that the sellers have redone the entire house and invested in the items that are really important even though we might not appreciate them (roof, siding, sewer line). This house has been on the market for over a month when most listings are going in 1-2 weeks right now in the area which raises red flags as well. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated! [link] [comments] |
| Strategy for offer in a competitive market? Posted: 22 Nov 2020 09:26 AM PST House we're interested in in competitive market: - We drove by the day before showing and 2 other cars had already thought to do the same thing just to see the exterior - The whole day is filled with appointments and there are tons of cars outside with people waiting to see the house - The house is in a good neighborhood with great schooling ratings so lots of families showing up - Based on other houses in the area, this house will be under contract in the next 2-3 days max. Offer options:
It's certain this house will have multiple offers. Don't want to submit above price unless we know for sure its going there but also don't want to lose out on the house. Should we just put in the asking price and hope for a counter? UPDATE: We just got word back. The sellers have received multiple offers and they want the highest and best offer. I'm guessing no counters are to be expected? The sellers prefer the following: - Preferred leaseback - No appraisal contingency We can accommodate the leaseback so that's no issue. The Appraisal contingency, I'm not so sure on. My lender says with our almost 40-50% down, they do not require an appraisal at all. That means we just go based on the numbers and that's that? [link] [comments] |
| Termite Prevention Treatment - Worth it? Posted: 22 Nov 2020 10:23 AM PST I'm under contract on a 4plex property in Texas (Houston Area) and just had the inspections completed. The termite inspector's report read that there were signs of a previous termite infestation but it looks like the property was treated and there were no current signs of termites. With that said, I'm not sure how to feel about it or how to proceed... Would it be better to hire someone to do termite prevention measures or maybe hire a termite inspector annually to keep an eye on things? I'm also wary since people have horror stories of inspectors claiming termites are gone but then suddenly homeowners find them everywhere in the walls where inspectors can't see. Advice appreciated. [link] [comments] |
| Neighbor throwing things over his fence onto our property Posted: 22 Nov 2020 10:01 AM PST Just moved into a flag lot in a good neighborhood. A flag lot means our house is behind a neighbor's house. This neighbor has a very nice house and inground pool which he clearly knows how to maintain well. His yard is very manicured. Our property is directly behind his with a strip of woods which provides privacy from an adjacent neighbor. We like the natural wild wooded strip for privacy. I saw the inground pool neighbor toss at least three things over his fence into the woods. I'm not sure what it is yet. Maybe it's just a rock or two and maybe he's been doing that for 20 years or so (that's how long the previous owner had lived at the property too. I picked up some garbage in that area when we first moved in but I'm not sure if it was the previous owner's, his or both. Maybe he doesn't see it as a big deal but, even if it is not trash, I am concerned about being hit in the head by one of his projectiles! Because unlike the previous neighbors, I've been doing pruning and utilizing the area even though we want to maintain the wooded aspect. Advice? [link] [comments] |
| Made a cash offer and lost to a different offer with the same amount: Should I fire my agent? Posted: 22 Nov 2020 09:42 AM PST I wanted to buy a condo and was told that someone was going to put an offer the same day with a short deadline (1 or 2 hours). The other person made the offer. As I was preparing my own offer with the same kind of deadline, my buyer agent told the seller agent to wait for my offer. I made a cash offer with the following conditions: In the meanwhile, my agent had told the buyer's agent that to wait for my offer. What ended up happening is the other buyer improved their own offer. Which my agent told me right before I was going to send my offer. In the end, our two offers had the same amount and were both cash. I don't understand why the seller didn't chose to work with me since my offer was high and cash from the beginning. I feel like there are many things our agent could have done to sell out offer better. What do you think? With the same guy, I had already lost another property to a finance offer with a 3k tp 5k difference but my offer was cash. [link] [comments] |
| Buying my first house. What should I know? Posted: 22 Nov 2020 09:41 AM PST My girlfriend and I have one picked out and we're in the process of getting a rural development loan on a (very small but affordable) house. How can I avoid getting screwed over? It's in good condition from the pictures and it has a nice garage with a bit of property to go with it. It's my first time doing this so any advice is awesome. [link] [comments] |
| Why might a seller have chosen a lower offer than ours to sell for? Posted: 22 Nov 2020 09:39 AM PST I'm absolutely baffled as to why this happened and really annoyed. We made an offer significantly above asking, as did multiple bidders. Agent decided to use best and final offer to conclude the sale. Which is very usual in the market here to start with. We're first time buyers with approval and deposit etc. in cash and also had our solicitor lined up to get the job done quickly so there were no issues there. We made our best and final offer and were told the sellers went with another offer. Now two months later on the property price register I can see the property sold for 6k less than our final offer. I would have assumed best and final was looking for the highest offer? The only thing I can think of is that the other buyer was a cash buyer, but really even that shouldn't have affected the sale this much? Trying to figure it out so it doesn't happen to us again. Ironically, my parents had the same kind of messing with this particular estate agency 25 years ago where they refused their offer and sold for less. We later found out it was because my mother made it, apparently the agent wouldn't deal with women, the person who bought told us later that she had to get a male friend to deal with the agent for her as they wouldn't deal with her properly which sounds insane, but true, she bought it for 20k less than my parents had offered. (We know because my parents later bought a different house on the same street and know our neighbor well) Anyone heard of this kind of ridiculous stuff still happening in 2020? Or what other reasons could there be for this kind of decision? [link] [comments] |
| How little to get into a 100k condo? Posted: 21 Nov 2020 04:31 PM PST My daughter is given the chance to buy the condo she has been renting. But she doesnt have a lot of cash, say $3000 plus we could give her $2000. The condo may sell on the open market for $107k, but without a realtor, perhaps she could get if for less, or something like $107k minus $4k in seller credits. She is a 26 year old, good credit, no other payments. Stable job. She would be a first time owner. In Ohio. How much would she have to have realistically in order to close on the house? Should we pursue local lenders? [link] [comments] |
| Posted: 22 Nov 2020 08:27 AM PST Any have input on condo fees across the country? I'm near D.C. and I found a unit in Bethesda. The unit was built in 1962 and the condo fee is $1,311.42 per month for a 2br. Now I can only think of two reasons, one they're doing something with the money (which could be interpreted however you want) or two it's a "special" place for housing. Everything I posted is public info. Either way this doesn't seem normal [link] [comments] |
| Posted: 22 Nov 2020 08:00 AM PST I am interested to hear about people's experience living/owning in a mixed income community. I am interested in purchasing a market rate townhome that is part of a mixed income housing community (50% market rate, 20% affordable, 30% low income). What are the pros/cons? How are special assessments handled? Do market rate owners end up paying more than others when it comes to assessments or do the subsidies cover the difference? Any experience would be helpful. The townhomes were built in 2007, current owner purchased the townhome in 2013 and is asking for about $200k more than what he paid. The townhome is selling slightly below comps for similar size townhomes, but that could be due to the mixed income housing situation. To one side of the townhome would be a market rate owner, to the other side would be low income renter (which apparently the wait list for housing is 10-15+ years). [link] [comments] |
| Anyone have experience selling a home with i-beams Posted: 21 Nov 2020 06:47 PM PST We had to replace the drywall in our basement (just bought a house) when we realized the walls were bowed. Drywall removal revealed 3 of the 4 foundation walls are bowed and need i-beams. This is obviously a worse nightmare, and our inspector didn't find anything in the house that indicated foundation problems. It sucks, but we're going to make repairs salvage the value of the home. We do live in a highly desirable town 10 minutes from a major city, so a home typically gets 8-10 bids. Does anyone know what it's like to sell a home with i-beams? Anyone sell a home with i-beams in a desirable town/neighborhood? What was it like? The home we purchased doubled in value in 20 years, so we bought it because we thought it would be a good investment (i.e, investing in location), and we had no idea there were foundation issues. Just hoping to get some advice/perspective. Edit: we're putting in 15 i-beams to repair unexpected foundation issues. Just wanted some support & perspective, and sort of desperate for perspective, tbh. Thank you for your patience. [link] [comments] |
| Looking for guidance on how to handle the professional relationship between a builder and realtor Posted: 22 Nov 2020 05:13 AM PST I find myself in an odd situation and not sure what to make of all of the noise. I am looking for some opinions or guidance on how to navigate through this situation between my realtor and my builder. Hopefully, I have posted this in the correct area. My wife and I recently decided to look for a new home. We had a realtor available to help look at house, when one become available over the past months. During our search, the realtor suggested that we look into building versus buying. I have always wanted to build a home for my family, but I thought it would be outside my reach. My wife supported the idea. I started to call builders in my area to get quotes. I was really excited. One critical item you need when building a house is land. We did not have it yet. At this current time, it is extremely difficult to find land outside of a subdivision in my area. Most builders are so busy right now, that unless we were ready to sign on the dotted line for a build, then we were not getting a call back. On my first round, I contacted five builders. There was only one that started to work with me to get a quote, even though we did not have the land. Quite honestly, we needed to know what a house would cost, so we would know how much we could spend on land of our budget. The builder's representative seemed fantastic to work with. We were very much aligned on building a quality home, while keeping our costs under control. This house is very simple; with very few extravagant items. We met a few times to work out details of the build. A few weeks later, we had our first quote. They gave me some leads for land, which unfortunately did not work out. However, during this time, I did contact several people that did own large amounts of land in my area. I was looking for anything that they may not have listed, but may be interested in selling. I struck absolute gold on one piece of property. I have walked it, but my wife has not. I really like this land. I let the builder know about the property and they instantly went to work on the soil samples and plat drawings. That is the setup, now this is where the smooth waters started getting rough... The realtor we had been using checked in on us the other day. I let her know that we had been in touch with a builder and our current status. She insisted that she should be a part of this process. She told us that we needed to have a representative on our side, when dealing with a builder. She told us that it would not change the quoted price of the house. Without thinking through the situation and feeling that we had somehow done this incorrectly. I asked the builder at what point do we introduce a realtor to this build. The response caught me off guard. The builder took a different tone with me. They were frustrated and let me know that this could be a deal breaker. They said that a realtor fee was not built into the quote and that the realtor should have actually presented themselves at the start. The builder took responsibility for not asking about a realtor at the onset of our discussions. Our realtor contacted the builder and offered to take a reduced fee, due to the confusion. The builder will not accept the reduced offer. The builder, who has been around for 30 years, is saying that the process was not followed properly. I see both sides of this very clearly. My wife is convinced that we need a realtor to represent our interests. She is ready to move on to keep pursuing other builders (contacting them properly through a realtor), if this one does not work out. Here is where I am looking for some thoughts or suggestions. This builder that we were working with has put in some time to get information about the land that we came across. While she may not get the business for the build, I feel it would be respectful to see the land purchase through, so she does get some commission for her time. I do want to secure this awesome piece of land and I think she has the experience get this done efficiently. My wife understands my thinking, but does not agree with keeping this builder involved at any level. She feels that the builder has not reacted well to this whole situation with the realtor. My primary focus is to get this land. The seller has shot me a great price; we have not found any red flags. Once I have the land secured; I will not feel that I need to move so quickly with a builder for fear of losing the opportunity to purchase the land. Is there any recommendations on how to salvage the relationship between the realtor and the builder at this point? Should I even try? I take ownership for not mentioning the realtor to the builder beforehand (it was not done intentionally, just my own ignorance to the process). Should I be concerned about who gets commission of the land purchase? I am sure that I can find numerous threads of whether or not to involve a realtor with the build at all, so I will not ask that question. I just need an outside perspective from somewhere that is not in the middle of this to help me see things more clearly. Unfortunately, I do not have that in my social network. At any rate, thanks for taking a minute to read through this. At the very least, I found it therapeutic to write it out. [link] [comments] |
| Should we buy a new house now or in 5 years? Posted: 21 Nov 2020 07:08 PM PST We're being gifted $100k unexpectedly. The original plan was to buy a nicer house in 5 years when I go back to work (I'm a stay-at-home mom). We can easily afford our monthly payments of $1500. If we put the $100k and our equity of $58k into a down payment on a $400k house, the monthly payments should be exactly the same ($1500) if we switch from a 20-yr loan to a 30-yr. So basically the question boils down to: is now a good time to buy a more expensive house with the interest rates being so low or should we stick with our original plan? P.S. The $100k must be used on a new house and can't go into refinancing or even savings/investments. It's a stipulation of the gift. P.P.S. I already posted on r/personalfinance, just looking for a bigger sample size on responses. [link] [comments] |
| Sellers keep wanting extension on deciding Posted: 21 Nov 2020 07:39 PM PST Tulsa, OK area. Sellers listed on Wednesday. I offered on Wednesday (full asking, no concessions, only inspection contingency) with deadline of noon Friday. Friday their agent says "this is a great offer but they want some more time to think on it, can we have until 5pm Saturday with the same offer?" We resubmit the same offer with 5pm Saturday (today) deadline, as they asked, along with agreeing to some new personalized preferences they expressed about additional things they want to take with them that would normally stay with the house. Fine. They came back this evening with "We had 8 showings today and received 2 more offers and 1 additional is preparing an offer, can we have until 5pm Sunday to contemplate? Again, yours is a super strong offer!" My agent said the comps already have the asking price at top dollar and he would help me offer more if I want, but that it'd be ill-advised in his opinion. We literally resubmitted the exact same offer, again, with the revised deadline. What is going on here? They're not countering my offer or asking for best-and-final, they keep asking me to submit the same offer and give them more time. Their agent even said something to my agent about "I don't know what more they could want" re the sellers, so it doesn't sound like this is something their agent is recommending. What is going on?? [link] [comments] |
| Posted: 21 Nov 2020 10:25 PM PST Building a home and was set on wanting polished concrete, reading about how hard it can be on the joints. We absolutely love the aesthetic, live in a moderate climate so wouldn't get too cold. How bad is it really on the joints? Would some nice house slippers help? [link] [comments] |
| Experience with Homestyle Renovation loan? Posted: 21 Nov 2020 04:48 PM PST My partner and I have been looking at move-in ready places for months with no luck. We've now found a property in our desired neighborhood, but it would be a full reno. (The place is already gutted, so not even livable right now.) We've been looking into Homestyle Renovation loans. Does anyone have experience with them? Interested to learn more about timeline, interest rates, pitfalls to avoid. With Covid, it sounds like these are harder to get but not impossible. TIA! [link] [comments] |
| Posted: 21 Nov 2020 11:52 PM PST Which Suburbs in the USA can you buy a good size house in the $300k range and also be within a 20-30 minute drive to a major international airport that's the key [link] [comments] |
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