Purchasing your first home

Buying a house is a dream to many people. But at the same time house hunting can be very fun and dreamy, going from it to signing your purchasing agreement may sound really scary. Today, I'd like to share my experience with you and hopefully chase these fears away.

Here you'll find a few tips and some lessons I've learned while searching for a house I could call home. Let's dive into it!

Defining a budget

As soon as my husband and I decided to buy our first house, we started to randomly look at what was available. We would stop at every house with an "Open House" sign in front of it, or every new construction we saw when running errands on the weekends. That was our first mistake.

When you're randomly looking at things, you'll end up seeing a little bit of everything (which may be good if you already know what you need/want/can afford). But if you don't know any of those things yet, you'll risk getting frustrated after seeing so many things you don't like or cannot afford.

So my first tip for you is: define your budget. 

Write down all your expenses and think about how much you have left each month and how much more you could spend monthly after getting your mortgage. That will help you come up with the total amount you can afford.

This conversation can also include planning how much you intend to save until you find the perfect house. Your down payment will also influence your monthly payments, so thinking about it now is very important.

Understanding what you'll be paying for

The second tip I'd like to give you is: find out what you'll be paying for. Mortgage payments may include some or all of these items:

• Principal and Interest;
• Property Taxes;
• Hazard Insurance;
• Mortgage Insurance;
• HOA fees.

Knowing this upfront will allow you to have all your questions ready when it's time to talk to your realtor or your bank. Buying a house is such a big move, so you should be empowered with all the knowledge you can, which takes us to our next topic.

Researching the market

Research. I cannot emphasize it enough. 

I believe research is so powerful, because it opens doors to subjects we wouldn't have heard of otherwise. It makes us more empowered, like I've already mentioned above, and prepared for which situations we may find.

First, I encourage you to research the financial market. Talk to more than one financing agency/bank. You'll find that they may offer different interest rates and different payment plans, for example. You'll also notice some of them may offer more competitive closing costs, or even dismiss it. 

Furthermore, researching banks and talking to different agents will help you make sure that your budget is realistic.

Then, when researching houses (online, with a realtor, or any other way you prefer), I suggest not locking your mind down to a specific neighborhood before seeing what's out there. Of course everyone wants to be close to work/family/school. But maybe there's a neighborhood not too far out that may be a better fit for you.

Lastly, I'd like to say that house hunting is not a cooking recipe. I hope these tips help you if you don't know where to start, but there's not one way or the correct way of doing it -- you can look at one house and know it's meant to be yours, or look at a hundred houses and still want to look some more.

So my final tip for you is: remember that this is an important decision and you need to feel confident about it.