3 Things To Do Now To Buy A Home This Year
Serving Oregonians Since 2002
Sunrise Mortgage Group-Oregon City, OR.
If you want to buy a house in 2020 — especially your first house — you may be wondering where to start.
The answer is, start with small steps you can tackle right now.
You don’t have to worry about deciphering mortgage papers and making a huge down payment right away.
Instead, here are three concrete things you can do this week that will put you on track to buy a house before the end of the year.
1. Check your credit
Your credit is key to your home buying ability. A higher credit score means a lower mortgage rate, and a bigger budget.
Here’s how your credit score affects your mortgage:
500-580: Difficult to qualify, higher mortgage rates580-640: Less difficult to qualify, decent mortgage rates
640-720: Easy to qualify, good mortgage rates
720+: Easiest to qualify, best mortgage rates
Checking your credit at least six months in advance gives you time to flag errors on your report, and improve your score if need be.
By law, every American is entitled to a free annual credit report from all three major credit bureaus (TransUnion, Experian, and Equifax).
If you haven’t used yours up already, head to AnnualCreditReport.com and pull them now.
(This is the only government-mandated site where you can get a free, no-strings-attached credit report for free.)Getting your credit report takes just a few minutes. Once you have it in hand, you’ll want to look for:
Errors and suspicious activity: Is there anything wrong with your name, address, accounts, or balances?
Payment history plays a huge role in your overall credit score, so addressing these issues fast is critical
It often takes around six months or more to fix credit issues, so you want to check your credit as soon as possible.
Feel free and reach out to me by phone or email…
I can help you with getting your credit in shape (if needed) and am happy to advise.
The help is free.
2. Figure out what you can afford
After checking your credit, you may very well be wondering, “Can I even afford to buy a house?”
Getting an answer to that question soon is the next step.
Before going any further, you need to figure out what you can afford given your income and existing debts and expenses.
To get a good pulse on what you can afford, just go here for an easy way to check into your home loan eligibility
and what your down payment options are (including possible very low and no down payment options)
If it’s looking like your price range won’t work for the location you’re eyeing, then you might need to tighten that belt and start stowing away some extra cash or looking in a different area.
3. Make a savings plan for your down payment
The down payment is probably your biggest concern if you hope to buy a home this year — and for good reason.
Your down payment impacts not only your home buying options but also how affordable your house is in the long run (even decades down the road, in fact).
And here’s the simple fact of the matter: You don’t need 20% down to buy a house. But, the smaller your down payment is, the larger your loan balance and monthly payments will be.
>> Related Article: 3 Misconceptions about low and no down home loans
Down payments don’t have to come only from savings, though.
With most mortgage loans, you can also use gifts from family for the down payment or if you have a 401K you can usually get funds from that for down payment.
We have many loans that are available for very low and no down too.
Whenever you’re ready here are 3 ways I can help you now…
#1)-Go here for an easy way to find out how much you can be bank approved for, your price range of home and what your real monthly payment will look like…
#3)- I am here for you…Reach out to me with ANY questions and /or for personalized help.
Kurt
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