Home Buying Advice

In January my family and I are being transferred to Spokane, WA as my final duty assignment in the Army. We plan to settle there and are looking to buy a house. This will be our first house and we aren't quite sure where to start. I am eligible for the VA Home loan, so that's probably the raoute we'll take. Also, since we only live a few hours from there already we are planning a few recon trips to the area to make sure we can see stuff in person. Anyway, any advice, warnings, suggestions on buying a first home will be appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

Obligatory hotlink (don't we do this in all threads now?):

After working on my house for the past 6 years or so, I would offer this piece of advice: fixer-uppers suck. I can do all of the work, and actually enjoy most of it, but it is draining on you to constantly be replacing the POs crappy work and doing it again just to be livable. I would rather have bought a nice cookie-cutter McMansion and put my money and efforts into improvements instead of repairs. So why didn't I?

Bad Locations Suck more. I LOVE my location, love my street, love my neighborhood, love my neighbors, love my School District, love my commute, love my local ordinances, etc, etc, etc. No Homeowner's association. No postage stamp yards. No developments cut into an old corn-field with no trees or personality.

The golden rule always applies, LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION.

1st what is the market in Spokane? According to this link Wa. is doing OK, but that is a broad brush approach. You need fine brush info. http://www.philadelphiafed.org/research-and-data/regional-economy/indexes/coincident/

Every and I mean EVERY indicator I can find shows people are reacting normally in every aspect of their economic lives except for real estate. That can be a blessing to you as a buyer.

What he said, fixer uppers usually cost more than the house down the street that doesn't need work. A house needs to be extraordinarily special to warrant buying it if it needs work.

I stay on top of the data here: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Financier-Mortgage-Group/175145092540694

True it is weighted towards data that affects Texas, but an awful lot of the data is nationwide. If you scroll down to the "older posts" there's lots of graphs about nationwide economic news that might help you make up your minds.

If you aren't in areas like Las Vegas or other blighted zones then you need to seriously think about buying a home. Rates have already started to rise and house prices are rising in most of the country too. Be careful if you find you still live in an area that prices are still going the wrong way.

I have good friend who is a Realtor (and retired USMC) in Spokane if you dont have anyone yet.

Real estat is crazy now. Here in SoFla, over 70% of current sales are cash deals by investors snapping up foreclosures at bargain prices. Almost impossible for Joe Normal to get a mortgage.

cwh wrote: Real estat is crazy now. Here in SoFla, over 70% of current sales are cash deals by investors snapping up foreclosures at bargain prices. Almost impossible for Joe Normal to get a mortgage.

And the great and mighty Pres. Hope is trying to structure seriously discounted bulk sales of foreclosures to help out his investor friends.

monark192 wrote: I have good friend who is a Realtor (and retired USMC) in Spokane if you don't have anyone yet.

Yeah, that would be great to get his info. He might be able to point us at some good banks for getting the VA loan through as well. Thanks.

We figured that it is certainly the time to buy and we are already eliminating houses that need a lot of work from the mix. We also can't stand HOAs, so we are looking to the outskirts of town where we can get a little less neighborhood and a little more space (and hopefully a detached shop ).

Rent for 6 months then think buy

pinchvalve wrote: After working on my house for the past 6 years or so, I would offer this piece of advice: fixer-uppers suck. I can do all of the work, and actually enjoy most of it, but it is draining on you to constantly be replacing the POs crappy work and doing it again just to be livable. I would rather have bought a nice cookie-cutter McMansion and put my money and efforts into improvements instead of repairs. So why didn't I? Bad Locations Suck more. I LOVE my location, love my street, love my neighborhood, love my neighbors, love my School District, love my commute, love my local ordinances, etc, etc, etc. No Homeowner's association. No postage stamp yards. No developments cut into an old corn-field with no trees or personality. The golden rule always applies, LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION.

Are you my doppelganger? Same timeframe, same outcome (renovation overload, tired of messing with it, might have done better financially on a cookiecutter house closer in), same reasoning.

Only thing that is killing me now is that the money I have in my house will buy me a lot more house now, since the market is in such trouble. Oh well, timing has never been my long suit.

www.homepath.com is the fannie mae foreclosure website. lotsa cheap homes available these days, just gotta find the right location...

Like you, I bought my first (only) house at the end of my tour of active duty. Unfortunately, things happened, and I had to put the retirement on hold.

That said, here's some advice no one has mentioned yet: get someone to REALLY look over the houses you are interested in. If you can find an inspector you can trust, use him/her. If not, find someone who is good at home building/remodelling. When it comes time to narrow your list of "possibles" to 1 or 2 houses...yes, LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION. My house is centrally located in the city I settled in...near downtown, near shopping, but not so near to schools that I can hear the bell for start of classes. (Nearest school is about a mile away.) And visit your neighborhoods at night. Areas that seem nice during the day, can be home to roving packs of kids at night.

I went VA on my house, and it wasn't too bad. You will still need a few thousand for "upfront expenses", I would guess in the Spokane area a MINIMUM of $5,000 will be needed.

I went to college about 100 miles from Spokane. We used to make trips to Fairchild to stock up on food at the Commissary. Too bad you are not moving to Huntsville or you could buy my house that I am trying to sell.

do not buy near a river or even a stream. screw river. i bought a fixer upper and enjoy working on it with my dads help (retired carpenter) but it recently got flooded and now we get to do everything again, yay. and i agree about location. we were on a small dead end , quiet street it was great. oh and also one more piece of advice. make sure you have either a garage or at least a place to put one someday. thats my biggest regret .yards not big enough for one.

1) If you don't know the area then renting for 6 months is good advice.

2) unless you live in an area that has been hit with a lot of people problems then foreclosures should be your home of last resort. I've personally never seen a foreclosure that was a people problem and not a house problem and I've been doing this since 1974. I know it's different in some parts of the country but I have no idea about Spokane. Do you?

Foreclosures are usually as-is where-is which means an inspection will do you no good. You have to buy it regardless. In many if the house is damaged after you contract you still have to close. Also most foreclosures are in a bid process so the highest bidder gets the house. If there's special financing arranged for the foreclosure then RUN! That means the price is wrong or the condition/area is so bad you can't get regular financing.

3) With VA you can get $1 move-in. The kicker is that all VA loans require the seller to pay a portion of the Buyers closing costs so the price will be higher. If you want $1 move in you can roll the rest of your costs into the loan, but you must write the contract as if the seller is paying the costs.

Buying a major fixer-upper which was the cheapest house in an awesome and desirable neighborhood was the best thing my wife and I ever did. Yes, it was a huge amount of work. But we got to live in a zip code where the median house price was pushing 7 figures for 1/4 of that, and after 10 years we sold and banked 1.4x what we paid for the house - after paying off the note. We moved to a much bigger and better major fixer-upper in an even better location than house #1. We only had the money and confidence and skills as a result of house #1.

So if you have the skills or inclination to see past the ugly and take on something that requires work, you can score.

check local codes about garage building. Finding a big one is tough, just make sure it's OK to build what you want.

Drive a little, save a lot.

Don;t sweat the small stuff. Ugly paint and carpet is easy. Same for landscaping, barring large trees. Kitchens and bathrooms can be remodeled on a very modest budget if you stay away from granite, whirlpool tubs , and "professional" grade appliances. The oak cabinets at Home Depot are nice and rather inexpensive. They have a 20% off sale every 6 months or so.

Personally, renovations suck the most for the kids. Having had a home builder as a father, and having performed numerous renovations, renovations are plain terrible.

In fact, we don't touch renovations anymore. You get more bang for the buck BUILDING a brand new house than renovating an old one. Yes, there are exceptions (we flipped a couple of townhouses for 100% profit over and above the initial purchase and reno costs) but still not worth the aggravation. Especially if you have any sort of "busy" life, doing reno's properly will take more time and more effort than you realistically will be willing/able to put in (all things considered).

It's sort of the difference between buying a used race car and building a new race car, except its exactly flipped. Building is the way to go (and new houses, if done properly, are amazing).

Working a part time job is probably less stressful, and in the has the same ROI except you didn't have to do any of the E36 M3ty work (and renovations are the E36 M3tiest of all E36 M3ty work let me tell you).

Also keep in mind that new homes have to be built to very different energy efficiency standards than even a few years ago. A new home can save you a LOT of money in utility bills vs a home even 10 years old.

cwh wrote: Real estat is crazy now. Here in SoFla, over 70% of current sales are cash deals by investors snapping up foreclosures at bargain prices. Almost impossible for Joe Normal to get a mortgage.

My sister found this in the Bay area as well, except that the listing agents are brokering cash deals with investors before the listings hit the MLS, so even if you had a loan and were willing to pay more, you can't.

I agree about reno work. I am currently in the midst of a major remodel/addition on my g/f's house. We're not even close to half-way finished and already approaching burnout. And when I'm done, I get to do some major repair work on MY house. Yay...

Whatever amount the mortgage company approves you for, try to spend half of it. Having a tiny mortgage payment you can really afford is a comfortable feeling.

+1 one on the garage issue. We have some friends who bought a house with a big lot on a dead-end street with plans to put up a nice shop. Until the local code officials nixed the plans. Now they are waiting for the market to recover a bit while saving up to sell and move. And their cars (save one in the 1-car garage) have to live outside.

integraguy wrote: I went VA on my house, and it wasn't too bad. You will still need a few thousand for "upfront expenses", I would guess in the Spokane area a MINIMUM of $5,000 will be needed.

A properly structured VA deal shouldn't involve any buyer's money for the purchase - a traditional VA No No. There will of course be moving expenses, things you want to do to the house after move in, bigger tv, etc.

I don't know how this applies to Spokane, but the Seattle area just had home sales shoot up 26+%.

Unfortunately home prices were at a 7 year low.

Was this one of the areas that property values dipped? Are there that many distressed property owners there? I don't know.

Try this service with the listings of foreclosed homes for sale. It provides information on homes and properties for homebuyers

Find a reputable inspector. They are worth their weight in gold. My parents trusted the guy who allegedly inspected this house and.... Ugh. I hope he doesn't need my reference to get into heaven.

Thanks for all of the advice everyone! We nailed down a good, reputable real-estate agent yesterday (who also used to be in construction, so he can talk smartly about the quality of the house itself) and began the approval process on a VA loan through USAA -- so an honest bank as well. We're going to be making a few recon trips to Spokane over the next month or so to check things out since we currently live only 5 hours away in Olympia. So far, so good.

I'm trying to talk my wife into THIS ONE...check out the surprise in the back yard.