House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

Ok ladies, first I want to say thank you for your good vibes! They have been working so keep em comin!

DH and I found a home we like in the perfect location. It needs some upgrades so we are hoping to be able to make a low offer and get it for the price we want. There are just so many serendipitous things with the house. For instance, the other day I was doing a 'drive by' and just before I got there my realtor claled and said he was just leaving..he went to check it out before we made an appointment ot see it. I told him i was right near there so he called the owners and they said sure come on in. Turns out the owners are a husband and wife...two retired teachers.

We went to look at the house this weekend and Brad liked it as much as I do...if not more. But for the right price. We decided we would wait it out and see if their agent contacted ours. Sure enough he contacted our realtor today and said they would be dropping the price. Our agent told us to get a pre approval for the most amount of money we would be willing to pay. We contacted our broker. He thenc alled back to say that the realtor called again because the owning couple wanted himt o see what we thought because we 'remind them of how they were' when they purchased their first home. Our agent gets the impression that they want to sell to us and would be willing to really drop the price. The tricky part is that our condo isnt sold by any stretch of the imagination. it's only been listed for 12 days! We contacted the mortgage broker to see if we could get approved for the mortgage even keeping our current home. Contrary to what we though we got the pre approval!

Now here is my question. We are really nervous to make an offer and have to pay both mortgages. The realtor is confident our home will sell quickly but we cant be sure. Is it common to make an offer contigent on the sale of our current home? I mean I know you CAN do that but have you ladies done it? how does it work? Help!!

Thanks girls!!

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

If you can't afford it for a while I wouldn't do it. Its a tough market and you never know.

But otherwise it sounds perfect... where is it?

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

I find myself in a different home buying situation... we fell in love with a house that our realtor showed us that was WAY over what we wanted to spend. We can afford more than what we wanted to spend but we both felt to go for something where our lifestyle wont be affected drastically. Well....now we need to make the choice to just go for it and take on a bigger mortgage then we wanted for a perfect house or be more conservative, save a bit more, and then if the house is still there when we are truly ready then it was meant to be.

My thoughts, on your situation and mine, is to not do anything until you are totally comfortable and confident that you can do it. If you are having doubts about having not sold your condo before getting into the house then wait. Realtors are struggling because no one is buying right now so they want you to buy. Our guy is painting every good scenario of just going for it but he wont be paying my mortgage so you have to listen to what is good for you.

If you and your DH feel comfortable signing a contract contingent on your condo selling and the seller is ok with that, then go for it....if not, then wait a month or so and see what happens.

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

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Posted by MLAngelo

If you can't afford it for a while I wouldn't do it. Its a tough market and you never know.

But otherwise it sounds perfect... where is it?

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I agree - did you hear the news about sale of existing homes that came down last week? It's good news if you are a buyer, bad news if you are a seller.

Think about how long you could actually pay for 2 places. Could you find a tenant for the condo? Are you allowed to rent it out?

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

I would never hold 2 mortgages. With a house things break all the time. You will need that cash all the time even if you think the house is in perfect condition.

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

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Posted by alli3131

I would never hold 2 mortgages. With a house things break all the time. You will need that cash all the time even if you think the house is in perfect condition.

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ITA. i think it would cause a lot of stress to have 2 mortgages. you really don't know how long your condo will be on the market for. its a really tough market for sellers right now.

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

Can you rent out your condo?

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

I think it depends on how fast the people in the house wanna be out...

with the house we bought, there was actually another offer, but the other people had to sell their house before closing could happen...so they chose our offer instead cuz we were able to just move right in.

i mean you can always try...if they like you they might go ahead with it. and if they dont take the offer you guys can just try and do the 2 mortgages.
closing will prob take 2 months and you dont pay your first months mortgage for another month or two after that! so say you got about 4 months to play with kinda thing.

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

I normally would say that I would feel uncomfortable with two mortgages but I know when I purchased my co-op it took 6 months to close! and it had nothing to do with the co-op board, we were approved by them within a few days. The process just seemed to drag on and on with getting the loan approval and the closing scheduled. My friend went through the same exact thing when purchasing her house. It's tricky because you don't want to get stuck with two mortgages but you also don't want to be without a place to live because you sold the condo and it is taking forever to close, KWIM? If the house is definitely 'the one' for you guys I would consider making an offer after I looked closely at my finances and housing markets where I live now.

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

ITA with a lot of the people here. I think if you can rent and have enough for a down payment that is probably your best option. If renting is a possibility, list it as 'rent with option to buy', this way you can get rid of it if the renters want to buy it eventually.

If you can afford two mortgages, then you should buy the house, but you never know how long you might have to carry both mortgages. You should def find out how soon the people need to sell? Do you have some time? Does it have to be immediate?

The best advice I think I can offer is to keep in mind 'There is always another house'. When I was looking for houses or even for reception halls, photographers, etc, I kept repeating this to myself so when I got really excited about something if it did not work out I knew that something else, maybe better was just around the corner. Good Luck!

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

i agree with jess! we put the offer in on our house in late feb/early march, didn't close until april and didn't have to may our first month until june so you have a few months before you really have to pay for the new house! so if you can swing even like 4 months paying both mortgages you have about 8 months or so to play with...

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

Thanks ladies. After DH's father goes to take a look at the house tomorrow (he is in construction) we will probably be making an offer contingent upon the sale of our condo. We will include a time limit and a kick out clause. basically if they accept it will just bide us more time to save and hope that this sells. If it doesnt before the time limit is up, we can decide if we have enough of a cushion to carry 2 mortgages! Keep your fingers crossed!

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

Lauren, I really don't know a lot about house buying but I feel like I know you from meeting you and reading all of your posts. I think having to pay two mortgages and the stress of not knowing when the condo will sell might be too much to handle.

Personally, I would worry when the condo would sell, if it will sell for the price you need it to sell for, how the closing will go due to the sellers, etc. I don't think I would be able to bear the weight of a double mortgage, even if financially we could handle it for a while.

Good luck!!!

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

banks are not very willing and happy at this time to lend to anyone especially condos/coops wait until it sells and you have a real closing date not something that is going to be pushed off for months because the banks take thier sweet time. I was scheduled to close in feb did not close till july the sellers of my coop were stuck with 2 mortgages bc of all my delays dont chance it

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

I personally wouldn't do it. I have the type of personality that would be waaaaaaay too stressed out having to deal with making two mortgage payments.

There's no telling when your co-op is going to sell (I hope it's quickly) and I wouldn't want to take the chance of having it sit on the market for so long.

Also, keep in mind that the seller may not want to do a contract with a contingency clause.

Good luck with whatever your decision is though.

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

I know how tempting it must be to make an offer, but the anxiety that is going to go along with this will prob be unbearable for you... I personally wouldnt want to take the chance- I would wait until I had an accepted, in contract offer on the condo before bidding on a house... There are sooo many 'the one' houses out there... kinda like wedding dress shopping... if all of us had shopped around forever, we prob would have fell in love with 10 more dresses and said they were all 'the one' JMO... good luck with whatever you decide to do!

Re: House Purchasing Question..LONG> sorry.

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Posted by MrsDtoBe09

Lauren, I really don't know a lot about house buying but I feel like I know you from meeting you and reading all of your posts. I think having to pay two mortgages and the stress of not knowing when the condo will sell might be too much to handle.

Personally, I would worry when the condo would sell, if it will sell for the price you need it to sell for, how the closing will go due to the sellers, etc. I don't think I would be able to bear the weight of a double mortgage, even if financially we could handle it for a while.

Good luck!!!

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I do kinda agree here. You have to be completely ready for anything! & i mean anything. Lauren you know we own 3 homes & for sure things pop up.

Also its really difficult to buy a home relying on the sale of another home. So many times people get pre-approved & when you get down to it they cant get what they/you need. Then have to pull out. I would hate for this to happen to you. While being smart & putting in clauses etc. I would hat eto see your hope get high & then possibly crash. I know its exciting to see homes & be in that mind set. Heck i cant wait to close in two weeks. But for you i think you need to have signed contracts & then start looking. JMO. Good luck