Buying
Information For Home Buyers
Gordon Miller is an expert at efficiently locating properties that match your criteria, negotiating the best price, guiding you through the due diligence process and overseeing a smooth closing. While there is much minutiae involved in each step, below you’ll find a general outline of the steps involved in purchasing a home. If you have any questions about this process please contact us at 281-723-2575. We are happy to provide information without pressure or obligation.
Determine your Objectives:
The reason for your real estate purchase is one of the first things we’ll discuss. Are you looking for more space, a bigger yard, or a different part of town? Are you a first time home buyer or just looking to reduce your monthly expenses? If you are new to the area, what are you looking for in a neighborhood? Often, the most important thing to determine is how long to you plan to own your home. Once we get a feel for what is motivating your real estate purchase, we can better help you locate a property that matches your personal and financial objectives.
Obtain Financing:
Financing is one of the most important steps in the purchase process but is often overlooked. In order to avoid the frustration of falling in love with a home and not being able to complete the purchase, we encourage our Buyers to start the financing process before they start seriously searching for homes. A pre-qualification letter dramatically improves the appearance of an offer to purchase. In fact, most sellers in today’s market will not respond to an offer which lacks a pre-qualification letter from a reputable lender. We have relationships with experienced mortgage professionals who have proven themselves to be responsive, ethical, and possess extensive knowledge of loan products and the underwriting process. In our experience, the difference between a novice loan originator and a seasoned professional is the ability to anticipate underwriting glitches before they become major issues late in the escrow period. It’s no secret that lending guidelines are more restrictive and cumbersome than they were a few years ago but the right loan pro can navigate the process with ease and provide much needed piece of mind during the days and weeks prior to closing.
Find homes with GE-Miller.com and start touring property!
Our home search tool makes it easy to quickly identify your favorite neighborhoods and listings. Once you have a list of what you want to see, contact Gordon and the excitement of touring homes begins! While portions of North Houston remain a buyer’s market, many neighborhoods lack available inventory and new, well priced homes may be sold in a matter of days or even hours. Knowing about these properties before others find them through manual searches means we can deliver your offer to the seller before other buyers are even aware of the listing.
Make an offer:
Once you’ve found the right home it’s time to write an offer to purchase. A huge part of our team’s expertise lies in pricing properties. We’ll sit down with you to review similar active, pending and sold properties, evaluate the general condition of the property, and discuss current market conditions in order to determine an offer price and negotiating strategy. Other variables such as closing date, inspection and financing contingencies will be discussed and written into the purchase contract. Once the offer is written to your satisfaction we will deliver the offer to the seller and await the response. Typically a response from the Seller is expected within 24 hours.
Escrow and Due Diligence:
Once your offer is accepted your earnest money will be deposited into an escrow account and the due diligence process begins. We’ll work with you to hire inspectors, review the title history, survey, neighborhood covenants and deed restrictions. Home owner’s insurance quotes should also be obtained at this time. Once the inspections are complete we will evaluate these reports with you and determine whether repair bids from contractors and repair concessions from the Seller should be pursued. If the condition of the property terms of the contract are acceptable to you we will proceed to closing!
Closing:
In a typical 30-40 day escrow period you will close about 2 weeks after the due diligence and inspection process has been completed. During these weeks we will be monitoring the loan underwriting process to ensure final loan approval will be obtained in a timely manner. 2-3 days prior to closing you should contact utility companies and direct them to transfer utilities into your name on the day of closing. The day of closing we will perform a final walkthrough of the property to ensure the condition of the property is acceptable and in accordance with the terms of the contract. At the closing table we’ll review your settlement figures and the escrow officer will explain in detail each document you’ll be signing. When all documents are signed and the funds have been transferred to the Seller, you’re officially a home owner!
