House hunting advice

Does anyone have any advice on house hunting? Can you recommend some good places to look in Nassau, specifically good school districts. Also, anyone know anything about Mother/Daughter houses? That's what we are in the market for and are just starting to look.

Any help is appreciated. Thanks!

Re: House hunting advice

We are havinga house built in FL, but the one thing I have learned from looking at the models is ask lots and lots of questions.

when was the house built, whats the square footage, are their any deed restrictions (depending on the neighborhood their may be deed restrictions)

For looking at houses ask questions like when was their a last inspection, when was the last time the electricity wires were done, how many owners were their before you, how much land do you have, are their deed restrictions, can you have a fence (some areas you are not allowed to have a fence)

Always ask lots and lots of questions. IF the owners are not their this is something a former co-worker of mine told me she did, the floor was carpeted and she went into a closet or a corner somewhere and lifted the carpet to see what was underneath (this way it was something to take into consideration is it hardwood floors, what is their condition, etc..)

Re: House hunting advice

I am currently looking in Merrick, Bellmore.. they have GREAT school disctricts!

Re: House hunting advice

I am not looking for a house anytime soon...but I happen to work for an insurance company who insures lots of tenant-occupied homes, and I order the inspections....the reports basically outline important things...you might want to ask how close is the fire department, how accessible is the house if you did have a frie? What kind of electrical wiring? When utlities were updated, acreage, is there any vandalism.malicious mischief in the area, the age of the roofm the building? Finding these things out will also help when you go for your Homeowners Insurance...you;ll also want to know if there is burglar alarms (and if they are connected to police station), if there is a Carbon Monoxide Detectors, smoke detectors (and if they are wired to the fire dept or just battery-operated....Hope this helps!

Re: House hunting advice

I currently live at home with my parents in Wantagh, which also has great school district.

Re: House hunting advice

garden city, manhasset, east williston(wheatley)

every once and a while Newsday posts school report cards with how well the students are doing

Re: House hunting advice

I just bought a house with an apartment. I was able to raise my price on a house because that extra income really helps..J

ericho is known as one of the best school districts in Nassau. Syosset, Garden City, Manhasset, and Oyster Bay are all very good as well.

Re: House hunting advice

I am in the process of buying a house in South Bellmore right now (totally overwhelming and moving so fast!). The school districts there are suppose to be really good. All the girls above mentioned some other really good towns as well Jericho, Syosset, Manhasset, Garden City, etc.

As far as tips on house hunting, I can tell you what we did. We are from Queens and weren't very familiar with Nassau. On Sundays, we'd pick a town that on paper seemed to suit our most important needs (for us it was good school districts and less than 45 min communte on a local train to NYC). We drove around the neighborhood to get a feel for it (we'd print out maps frlom mapquest and stuff - so we wouldn't get lost). What was very important besides the paper qualities was things like what is in the town and if I got the feeling I would fit in. Then go to a lot of open houses in various price ranges to get a feel for what you get for these prices. You learn a lot about what you like and what you don't like and eventually can come up with a list of must haves for your house. We did the some towns on the North Shore than a bunch on the South shore and a few in between. We would up always coming back to South Bellmore!!!

Talk to friends and family and see what they know. Also talk to a lot of the girls on this site. They can give you a lot of info on their experiences and also honest opinions on towns and school systems. There have been quite a few girls who have been extremely helpful to me (they know who they are ).

Biggest word of advice is don't get discouraged. DH and I thought we had a decent budget and then what we saw people were asking for that amount of money it was insane!!! Then finally we found the house that seemed perfect for us. Of course it has it's flaws -every house does - but we can live with them and eventually get them fixed to our liking.

Good Luck and if you want to ever chat FM me....

Re: House hunting advice

I started out with getting listings off the internet or from our realtors and then would do a drive by of the home & neighborhood. If I liked what I saw, I then made an appointment to view the home (I didn't want to waste my time, or the realtor's, viewing every home). 9 times out of 10 the home/neighborhood wasn't to our liking. You'll never find everything you want (unless you have an unlimited budget), so be prepared to make a sacrifice(s). You just have to determine where you're willing to budge...location? age of the home? size of the home or property? You have to ask yourself 'What can be changed? And what can't?'


Here's some websites that you may find useful (I logged a lot of time on them! ) :
Newsday's 'Find Out About Your Community'
Newsday's 'Recent Home Sales' (Useful tool in finding out what homes sold for on a particular street.)
Domania - Home Price Check by Location (similar to the Newsday 'recent home sales', but national.)
ePodunk.com - Offers community information (national)

Find out about soft money in a particular zip code/community (good indicator of the wealth of an area/philanthropy.):
opensecrets.org - Individual and Soft Money Contributors
opensecrets.org - more info. on soft money (by state or zip)

School Data:
Suffolk County Schools 2000-2001 info
Nassau County Schools 2000-2001 info
NY State District Stats for 98-99

Re: House hunting advice

We just bought a house in massapequa part, in massapequa #23 school district, really great disctrict. It was the only house we could find that wasn't totally overpriced (they all are, just in comparison to the sh*t we were seeing) and didn't need to have every room redone!

Re: House hunting advice

We just bought a house in North Massapequa. Massapequa has great school districts as well. The area is also really nice. Our house is also a Mother Daughter, and we plan on renting out the top floor once we pain and get new carpet. Anyone know of someone looking for an apt.?

Re: House hunting advice

try to find a realtor who will work for the buyer...not the seller..

be careful about the newsday report card...usually they are accurate...but this year they screwed up big time for the school I work for (ie...had 86%passing a tes when it was 99%!!!)

also I know there is a mother/daughter house for sale in greenlawn...harborfields SD...I think its listed at $625K


edited to say...try to go to as many open houses as possible...and don't jump at the first house (unless you know its a great deal)

Re: House hunting advice

great questions & advice ladies!

we found our house on january 26th & closed on february 26th- it was definitely a crazy month! but it usually doesn't happen that quickly at all-
be patient & don't get discouraged.

best thing we did was hire a buyer's agent. worked for us, not the seller. he was also a good friend of ours & a great agent.