Advice for first timers!

DH and I started looking seriously at houses very recently. We've been preapproved for a mortage and have been looking in our price range. We're mainly looking at. Some of the areas we've been looking at are: Levittown (one of our top choices), East Meadow, Westbury (EM SD), Massapequa, Massapequa Park, Farmingdale, Wantagh, Farmingdale, Bethpage, Lynbrook, Oceanside, Rockville Centre, Seaford, Lindenhurst, Bellmore, and Merrick.

We have a general idea of some things we want: we don't want to live on or too close by the water (so that obviously rules out parts of some of the towns we're looking into), we want at least 3 but prefer 4 bedrooms, most important to us is a good school district, we want a big backyard...

Other than our general ideas we're very new at this. Does anyone have any insight or experience? Things we should be looking for, questions to be asking, things to avoid?? Or any experience with how long it took, how many houses you looked at, good/bad experiences?

Also, if anyone has any experience with any of the school districts I listed above that would be awesome too!

I know I'm asking alot but its such a big step in life I want to make sure we're doing all the right things!

THANKS!

Re: Advice for first timers!

When we were looking we wanted wantagh, seaford or plainedge SD... we did actually look in Bellmore and Merrick also.

You should definitely keep in mind that even though you have your list of wants that its hard to find a house in the condition you want it in with everything on your list.
example... we are not handy people, Dh can barely put a table together, i am kinda hand, but i am limited. We did not want a fixer upper and we did not have money to be putting in a new kitchen and new bathrooms. we wanted 4 bedrooms, 2 baths, basement, attic, nice yard, liveable kitchen and bathrooms, garage, driveway, haardwood floors (knowing we would re-do them). Most of all have a manageable mortgage and taxes... knowing that if the taxes change we could still handle it.

We ended up giving in on the bedrooms... have 3, and a bathroom... only had 1. We love out house and bought it cause it has huge potential to be dormer (which would make an awesome master suite) and to put a bathroom, had a basement we could finish. So far, we put in bathroom #2 and are the contractor is almost done with the bathroom. Our taxes are a little higher in Plainedge, but that was another sacrafice we were willing to make for our future kid.
Its your first house.... know that it can't be your dream house unless you have $1M locked away somewhere... be reasonable and don't over do it. We all want the big 4 bedroom house with the wrap around porch, etc. but you just have to remember you are gonna have more expenses if/when you have kids and you can always upgrade!

***This is one of the most stressful things you will do, so stay in your budget and leave a nice cushion... cause something "ALWAYS" comes up when you move in ($10K cause there was painted wallpaper in the WHOLE house) or broken appliances, oil burners, whatever!***


good luck colleen!

Message edited 1/26/2011 9:21:54 AM.

Re: Advice for first timers!

What area in Levittown? My MIL is going to be putting her house on the market soon.

My advice is to just take your time. In this market you can afford to be picky. It seems you have a a pretty big range of areas. Depending on your price range you might want to narrow down where you are looking.
Good luck!

Re: Advice for first timers!

be patient and don't settle.. it took us a year to find our house but we are glad we did not settle for some other houses we were going to put bids on out of frustration... we are not handy people at all so we needed to find a house that was a "forever" home in pretty decent condition. also try to figure out how much you can afford with mortgage calculators, you can usually find them online, those were very helpful, and also we had an idea of what SD's we wanted to be in (we looked in seaford, wantagh, plainedge, and massapequa mostly but also some in bethpage, bellmore, merrick, and e meadow). good luck!!

Re: Advice for first timers!

Thank you everyone! As far as fixer uppers- we don't want to have to re-do the entire house, but a few repairs arent a big deal. We have alot of handy workers in our families, so a few repairs arent a problem (although we'd like to try to avoid for cost reasons).

Jannette- we're pretty much looking in all of Levittown.

Re: Advice for first timers!

-DON'T settle and be patient. You may not get everything you want so you should be flexible but def. keep a list of "must haves"
-Overlook the cosmetic things. If you hate the wall color in the living room of the house you love remember it can easily be repainted.
-Don't look at your home as a starter home b/c things happen and you may end up in this home for a long time.
-Make sure there is enough storage. I came from a one bedroom apt where I had limited storage and everything was organized and had its place. I didn't think I would need a basement but let me tell you how happy I am that I have one. It is full to capacity, I moved in 3 years ago and still have unpacked boxes
-Keep $$$ aside, there is ALWAYS unforeseen expenses when you move in. A little project turns into a big one. I went from just wanting to paint my living room to may as well re-insulate the walls, add crown molding and base molding that lead to may as well replace the windows, etc...
-Know that your taxes will go up. The better the school district the more you taxes will be.
-Put down 20% down payment so you don't have to pay PMI b/c its a PITA to remove
-Drive by your potential home several times before buying. I drove by my house in the morning and at night but it wasn't until I moved in that I realized my street is pretty busy

Good luck HTH!