patrick.net

It was a learning process the entire way. It all started back in 2001 when I was looking to buy a small condo. My longtime local credit union literally laughed at me, and told me my debt to income was too high based on the massive amount of student loan debt I had.

(Now as far as I recollect, that was about the time that I stumbled onto Patrick’s site, back when it was nothing but a small blog.)

I was too naïve to go get a second opinion, so I simply put my mind towards paying down the student loan debt as quickly as I could. It wasn’t until a few years later that I realized that some of the debt was showing up twice.

By 2004 I was in a much better position finically. I almost bought a 20 acre parcel out in the sticks as an investment. It was an estate sale, and for about 24 hours I had an accepted offer. The seller then reneged, saying that their lawyer would not let them make the concessions I had requested.

In 2006 I was renting from someone who happened to work for a mortgage broker. I’ll never forget that she preapproved us for over half a million dollars. Something just didn’t seem right, so I double checked with my accountant. He informed me that I could only afford, at most $250,000 and even that would be stretching it.

By 2008 I was in a new area, new job and had most of the student loan debt paid off. We came across a nice house, built in 2003, with all of the bells and whistles you would expect from that era. Granite countertops, stainless steel appliances, master bath with Jacuzzi, etc. OR rather, it had those accoutrements at one point. The house had gone into foreclosure, and the prior owner ripped out the kitchen, smashed a few holes in the walls, and otherwise left the place as a shell of its former self. Still the asking price was so low that, had we taken out a 203(k) rehab loan we could have made it work.

Long story short, the listing agent had both sides of the deal so our offer, even though higher than the offer that was ultimately accepted, never saw the light of day, so far as I can tell. Now I can’t prove any wrong doing per se, but I did meet with the listing agent in person. I’ll never forget our first meeting. I asked him if he was the listing agent (even though he had to be, as his picture was on every ad, as well as on the sign in front of the house) and he says in a very defensive fashion “Why, who wants to know?”
The bottom line was he told me that “if you work with me, I can make it happen for you”. Now I probably should have just sucked it up and done this that, but he made my skin crawl literally. He was the embodiment of what most people here at patnet think of when they think of Realtors. Ugh. I still get nauseas thinking about the guy.

There was one more near miss that occourd in 2010. We had made an offer, but withdrew it based on our further research of the neighborhood. Turns out there was a toxic waste dump down the street, and the nice stream that ran through the back of the property originated up at said dump.

Now don’t think that these were the only homes we saw. These are just the near misses. Ones we made offers on but did not get for one reason or another.
We had been looking all the while, but most in our price range had a fatal flaw (bad location, failed septic, structual problems, too small, too old, etc.)

What did we learn over the years was quite a bit – here’s a TOP 10.

1) Know what’s in your credit report. Know what your credit score is.
2) know what you can afford – not just what the bank will lend you.
3) Make a budget and stick to it.
4) Be diligent. A few times, if we had done more research we might have been able to turn things in our favor.
5) Be aggressive. Don’t fall in love with something for the sake of it, but don’t let people push you around either. If you see something you really fancy as a fair deal, get after it before someone else does.
6) Find out the story. There is always a story behind why a given house is on the market. Try to find out as much as you can. Talk to neighbors. Google the sellers.
7) Be prepared to fail. It’s a cold cruel world out there. It's OK to walk away from a deal.
8) Have a good real estate attorney in advance. A good attorney is better than a great agent.
9) Only you can represent yourself – not your agent. We learned this one the hard way.
10) There is value out there, but it takes patience, persistence, and yes, luck.

Now the story of how we got the house we are now in could take up an entirely different post, as that was a saga in and of itself.

#housing