where/how did you learning about buying a house

[uscuba2]

where/how did you  learning about buying your first house?  What  sites etc did you  use  to learn about buying?

[Susie]

Home Buying for Dummies is actually pretty helpful if you're looking for resources explaining how the process generally works.

[hurricanedrunk]

I checked out several books at the library. Sorry none of the titles come to mind as super helpful but there was a whole shelf and best of all free.

Once we started the process we relied heavily on our real estate agent to guide us. This alone was huge so take some time to find someone who is a good fit.

[chessie]

The worst way possible by buying one. Find a good realtor. Check out the library and your local HUD office they will be able to assist you.

[magdala]

My state has a housing finance agency that offers homebuyer classes. I took one before buying my first house.

[FWP]

My best resource was a friend who had recently bought. They (and we) bought sans realtor and she was nice enough to give me copies of her contract, closing statement, and inspection report/request forms to use as guides. Plus she gave me a bunch of advice along the way.

[noodleoo]

Books. I took out everyone they had at the library. My favorite one was by NOLO, guide for first time home buyers. I highly recommend it!

www.amazon.com/Nolos-Essential-Guide-Buying-First/dp/1413313221/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1358874305&sr=8-1&keywords=nolo+first+time+home+buyer

I'd also talk to friends, find out what mistakes they made or advice they ave. also look for a good buyers agent. Recommendations from friends are good here too. Good luck!

[simpsongal]

Mortgages for Dummies and Homebuying for Dummies. You can find a lot of good info online too. And this board. Feel free to post questions.

[sillygoosegirl]

We read a couple books and lots of stuff on the Internet. We also asked our parents lots of questions, as they have purchased many houses. Our experience was completely unlike anything we read or were told. It was even largely unlike what our real estate agent told us to expect. If I was doing it over again, I wouldn't waste my time trying to educate myself.

[pixiedust]

Once we had some basic knowledge from books (including some other posters mentioned), we also looked around on location-specific online forums to learn more about conditions specific to our area. Redfin was helpful for this (if they cover your area).

[magpie]

We read few books, inducing the nolo one mentioned above. We also used a REA who definitely helped us through the process.

[Deleted]

Our REA was super helpful. Find a really good REA. Ask your coworkers and friends who recently bought for recommendations. For websites, we liked trulia and zillow.

[halfpint]

My ILs. Tons of open houses and talking to REAs at them to get insight on the market, the neighborhoods, what you can get for your money. Honestly? A little HGTV watching (My First Place, Househunters, etc.). I know they are staged, but there are some good tips to be had. We didn't read any books. We ended up building our first house, so our process was a bit different. Our developer had a seller's agent that they worked with to seal the deal, and we were happy to work with her - she was very helpful.

[KaraOrNot]

I read most of Homebuying for Dummies and random threads on TN.

[abramos]

Jan 22, 2013 7:34:46 GMT -5 Susie said:

Home Buying for Dummies is actually pretty helpful if you're looking for resources explaining how the process generally works.

Yes, this helped us out.
We also attend various free seminars about home buying through our local credit union. They usually have a REA and loan staff from the credit union doing the presentation. In fact, that is how we me our REA at one of these seminars.

[drloretta]

I bought one cheap with my parents' help and figured it out along the way. Mind you this was a $23K house I only had to put 3% down on. I've bought and sold 5 homes since then.

[greencrayon]

TN was actually pretty helpful, with all their checklists. My REA was also pretty amazing.

[minzy]

We did what a lot of the others have mentioned (looked at websites, open houses, books, HGTV, worked with a realtor, etc.). 

I am admittedly somewhat jaded, but what would have been more helpful to us than any of that would have been a frank discussion about why we felt we needed to buy when and where we did, and what our long term goals were.  We bought the moment it was a financial possibility, at the height of the market, in a HCOL area, I think in part because we wanted a little piece of "the American Dream," blah blah, etc.  In reality, owning tied up at least double the amount we had been paying in rent, left us paying for a new hot water heater, furnace work, etc., and when we decided a few years later to move to advance my husband's career (even with relo assist), we took a considerable loss on the sale.  Also, had we stayed, we would have outgrown the space within five-six years.  Of course hindsight is 20/20, but in retrospect in my case, buying when and where we did was a huge financial setback for us. 

Now we are in a much better position to buy, but we are continuing to rent until we are nearly certain we will be in our job(s) for a very long time, and plan to live in the space for at least 10 years.

[lurkergirl123]

My parents mostly. I bought my first house before the internet was a thing. I'm old.

[shadyblue42]

Jan 21, 2013 22:12:50 GMT -5 uscuba2 said:

where/how did you  learning about buying your first house?  What  sites etc did you  use  to learn about buying?

www.mgichome.com/

Our bank required us to take the class offered on this site. We just kind of winged it when we bought our house but this site was very useful.