{"id":4822,"date":"2009-03-23T11:16:19","date_gmt":"2009-03-23T18:16:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/?p=4822"},"modified":"2009-03-23T11:16:19","modified_gmt":"2009-03-23T18:16:19","slug":"reader-question-seeking-first-time-buyer-advice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2009\/03\/23\/reader-question-seeking-first-time-buyer-advice\/","title":{"rendered":"Reader Question: Seeking First-Time Buyer Advice"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Once in a while I like to feature individual requests for advice from readers.  The following was <a href=\"http:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/forum\/viewtopic.php?f=1&#038;t=2162\" title=\"Seattle Bubble Forums: First timer - When to buy?\">posted on the forums<\/a> by a reader going by the name &#8220;Novice.&#8221;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Advice Please!<\/p>\n<p>I am a long time resident of Seattle and a renter. I am currently spending $700 \/ month to live on a tiny boat &#8211; I have to move out on June 1. I am 40 years old, I made the mistake of NOT buying in Seattle 15 years ago and now I feel that the bursting bubble has given me another opportunity to buy a home in this city. (where there are still homes and not condos that is)<\/p>\n<p><strong>My questions are: Should I buy? When should I buy?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Here is some more information:<\/p>\n<p>I can afford to pay $2k \/ month &#8211; but I would prefer to pay less.<\/p>\n<p>I can put 20% down on a $300K home (let&#8217;s say this is my max price)<\/p>\n<p>I can qualify for a 30 yr fixed rate mortgage.<\/p>\n<p>This would be my first home.<\/p>\n<p>I would intend to hold the property for at least 5 &#8211; 10 yrs and rent it out it if I am not living in it.<\/p>\n<p>I am in no rush to buy &#8211; I do need to live somewhere but I work from &#8220;home&#8221; and I can find temporary living quarters \/ sublet \/ leave town for some time etc&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>I would buy the small \/ dumpy house on the nice street in the nice neighborhood &#8211; this is what i am looking for&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><strong>So, Do I buy? When do I buy? How will I know when the time is right?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Another question &#8211; I saw a beautiful cottage in a fantastic neighborhood that I would love to live in &#8211; it was priced at $280K &#8211; price lowered 10K from 6 weeks ago when it was first listed. The same property sold for $255K in 2005 and for only $150K in 2000. How can one determine the &#8220;real&#8221; value of the property?<\/p>\n<p>Any advice would be much appreciated.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I&#8217;m going to reiterate my five self-examination questions that I think everyone should be able to answer affirmatively before deciding to buy a home:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Do you like the home well enough to stay there for at least 5-10 years?<\/li>\n<li>Do you feel that the home is priced fairly?<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2009\/03\/06\/simple-affordability-calculator\/\" title=\"Simple Affordability Calculator\">Can you afford it<\/a> using a conventional 30-year fixed-rate loan?<\/li>\n<li>Do you have a minimum 3-month emergency fund that is not part of your down payment?<\/li>\n<li>Would you be able to handle it both financially and emotionally if the value of your home dropped considerably after purchase?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>If you can answer yes to all of these questions, then I would say the answer to &#8220;should I buy&#8221; could be yes.  Note of course that these are the <em>minimum<\/em> requirements.<\/p>\n<p>Novice, it sounds like you are already thinking along these lines, so you&#8217;re already ahead of the game in that department.<\/p>\n<p>As far as whether an individual home is priced fairly, a good starting point would be the <a href=\"http:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2008\/08\/05\/pricing-calculator-for-todays-market\/\" title=\"Pricing Calculator for Today's Market\">rough pricing calculator<\/a> we posted here, or a site like <a href=\"http:\/\/www.estimike.com\/\" title=\"EstiMike\">EstiMike<\/a>.  You should also compare the asking price to what similar properties in the neighborhood have sold for recently.  Redfin is a good tool for this (uncheck all current listings and check only past sales).<\/p>\n<p>In the end, the &#8220;real&#8221; value of a property is simply what someone is willing to pay for it, right?  So if after studying the market you think a property is priced fairly, and you believe it strongly enough to commit $464,000 (the full cost of a $240,000 loan at 5% over 30 years), then I say go for it.<\/p>\n<p>What advice do you, the readers, have for Novice?  Have I missed something that needs to be considered?  Let&#8217;s hear it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Once in a while I like to feature individual requests for advice from readers. The following was posted on the forums by a reader going by the name &#8220;Novice.&#8221; Advice Please! I am a long time resident of Seattle and a renter. I am currently spending $700 \/ month to live on a tiny boat&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[206],"tags":[11,9],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-4822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-features","tag-advice","tag-reader_question"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Reader Question: Seeking First-Time Buyer Advice \u2022 Seattle Bubble<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2009\/03\/23\/reader-question-seeking-first-time-buyer-advice\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Reader Question: Seeking First-Time Buyer Advice \u2022 Seattle Bubble\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Once in a while I like to feature individual requests for advice from readers. 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