Keep Your List Realistic

Buying a house! When you first think about this you start to think of everything that you could possible want in a home. You start to look and your list extremely short.  Not enough houses that fit the bill? Do you have a list of must have’s a mile long? Are they realistic? Are they keeping you from your first home purchase? Lets review.

Let us start with the simple fact that you must be able to afford whatever house you find yourself wanting.  Going through and making sure you only look at houses within your price range should be your first priority. What good is having a house if you can’t afford anything else, right? Avoid disappointment if you can.

Do you know what kind of area you want to live in? A community with yards? Townhouse? Condo? This will help you narrow your list or create a few more to add to your list. No one wants nosy neighbors or loud neighbors. If you want a house with a picket fence – do not settle for gated townhouse living.

Commute – are you willing to drive or no? Sometimes this alone can make or break what you look at. DO you want to be able to walk to work? Think of what type of area this would be. You may want small town living, but find your drive time to work is 45 minutes to make this possible. Do you care to have a longer drive for peace and quiet?

View - Do you want to have buildings to look at or trees? Mountains or shopping centers? Don't forget to think about cars coming and going and foot traffic. This place may have a view that is only beautiful when school is in session and there are no kids walking to and from.

These couple of things can be helpful in narrowing your search even though they seem like pretty broad topics.