5 Questions to ask yourself when purchasing a New Home

While you are looking at homes and once you make an offer on a home, there are some questions you should be asking yourself to help keep common sense involved in the decision making process:

This list is in now way complete. I invite you to add more questions in the comment section.

Here are five IMPORTANT questions to ask yourself:

1. Does the home work for you and does it meet your NEEDS
Remember the difference between wants and needs?
2. Do the numbers work for you?
Can you really afford this home?
3.  What sacrifices are you making to get this home?
It helps to think specifically about what you might be giving up for this particular home.
4.Will the home meet your needs for the near future?

Will your family be growing?  Are the kids going away to college?

5. Will you still want to mow that big back yard in a few years?

If you know that you are the type of person who easily becomes emotional in your decision making process, it might be a good idea to carry a note card with these four questions on it to remind you while you are looking!

Remember to strike a balance between emotions and common sense in your home buying process. It will help you enjoy your home that much more once you actually move in.

How to find Motivated Sellers for Lease Options

What Makes a Motivated Seller

There are, of course, different circumstances and situations in the lives of people that motivate them to need to sell their home.  This can include a job transfer, bankruptcy, foreclosure, divorce or upgrading to a bigger home -- any number of reasons.  However, the circumstances of the sellers may also be affected by the state of the two vying economic real estate markets – buyers and sellers – which also affect seller’s motivations.  For real estate investors it is crucial to buy homes from truly motivated sellers -- sellers who have an extra urgency, usually financial, however, not always.  You can’t get a good deal from a seller that is not motivated, because, they will have no reason to negotiate any part of a transaction.

There are different degrees of motivated sellers and different reasons sellers need to sell their homes, but overall there are two basic categories of motivated sellers:

1.         Desperate and distressed (bad debt) – someone in trouble financially, behind on payments, going in a bad direction, lost their job, divorced, foreclosure, etc or

2.         Not desperate or distressed (good debt) – someone not in trouble financially, not behind on payments, but motivated for other reasons: possibility have two house payments, inherited a home, burned out landlords, job transfers, etc.

Most real estate investors only go after #1 above, but there is also huge profit potential with sellers that fall in #2.  All of the lease option sellers should fall into number 2, because these sellers are safer for a lease option buyer.