House buying-# houses you looked @ in person?

[starlily]

Jan 28, 2013 17:50:19 GMT -5 jenny1980 said:

For those who saw a ton (like 50+) in person, did your realtor go every time with you or was it a lot of open houses?

We went to a lot of open houses. We knew we wanted to stay in our current school district, so we found open homes online & then also stopped at any other ones we saw while driving around. We also set up a couple viewings during our lunch breaks, since we work nearby.
Our realtor was FIL, who lives around an hour away, so he inky came out for some of the weekend viewings.

[KaraOrNot]

We only searched for a few months, but it was discouraging because it was when the first time home buyer credit was being offered and houses in our price range were selling very quickly. We talked about changing our budget, but ended up changing other priorities and bought something w/in our original budget.

We started out by going to open houses and went to maybe 10 on our own. We saw between 5 and 10 houses w/ our realtor. We went through hundreds and hundreds of homes online. After seeing a few in person, it was easier to eliminate things that were deal breakers.

I would consider a house that was covered in wallpaper.

[loveday]

None. We bought H's grandmother's home.

[abramos]

I would say over the span of 3-4 years, we looked at over 100 houses. No joke. We got discouraged ALOT and wanted to give up many times. However, we were determined to get out of the apartment and move into a house.

[RoxMonster]

Our REA sent us probably close to 75 houses online to look at and we saw about 10 in person before putting in an offer on our home. We went through all the online pics and for some, there was a dealbreaker somewhere that eliminated it right away. Others went off the market before we got a chance to see them (I think we marked about 20 total we were interested in seeing and about 10 had already sold).

I will say that if you are at all interested in one, to take a look. Some that looked the best online were the worst in person and hid things like a sinking deck, old roof, old A/C, etc. I actually bypassed the house we bought the first time because I hated the exterior paint color. When I went back through I decided to look at the interior pics just for kicks and absolutely loved it! We plan on painting the exterior this summer, which yes, sucks, but the inside was exactly what we wanted so it was worth it.

It was also at the top of our price range but it was the second summer they had put it on the market so we were able to negotiate quite a bit off.

[FishChicks]

One or thousands, depending on how you count it. We weren't in the market, but I love looking at houses online. After 10+ years of online looking for fun, I found a house in our area that just seemed like the coolest house ever. DH thought I was nuts, but agreed to see it with me. We closed about 50 days later.

I am a rational person, and a planner, so this was totally unlike me. Three years later I am still so damn happy to live here.

Having said that, I would be more worried about you if you bought a house after only looking at one. Looking at lots is probably a really good thing!

[niq]

We saw 17 in person. Almost everything was either too small, or too expensive, or the basement was too short, or whatever. We were pretty exhausted by the last set of 4 that we looked at and at that point we made offers on 1, didn't get a counter that we liked, and then made another offer. We finally bought the one new construction home we looked at.

[magpie]

I think we looked at about 20 houses in person. We did eventually increase our budget significantly after we realized that every house within our budget had some kind of major downside, whether that was size, number of bed/bathrooms, neighborhood and location (on a busy street, for example). Eventually, we realized that we needed to increase our budget in order to find exactly what we were looking for. I'm still very glad that we did increase the budget in the end.

[Deleted]

We looked at 5-6

[magdala]

When I bought by myself in 2004, I looked at 100 house in person.  Bid on 17 including overbids on 7 before I got my first house.   When I bought with DH in 2012, we looked at 12 houses in person.  

Did you get discouraged? In 2004, I got very discouraged.  Did you end up changing your budget?  No.  I could not afford any more. 

I have a lot of houses I'm trying to see. How many did you see in person?  In 2004, I looked at 100 houses. 

Is there any way to narrow down the choices online without going to so many?  In 2004, I was looking at too broad an area. 

I'm afraid to pass up something good so I'm being really open.   

There's too many houses for me to see though, and some are just really, really overpriced. Any tips to narrow this down before I get there?   Get a good realtor who will tell you which houses have problems. 

The reason I have so much to see is that I have no kids (school district is not a huge concern to me), I work from home (so I can go to any number of places in the city if the price is right), and I'm willing to do some work on a house, so I have trouble eliminating anything. I'm not that picky. 

Lastly, off-topic, if you found an immaculately-cared for home but it was *covered,* every room, with wallpaper...would you consider it or is that a heck no?  I would consider it.  My heck no issues were water in basement, bad kitchen layout and bad bathroom layouts.  Kitchen and bath renovations are expensive.  I can strip wallpaper myself.  Good the fabric softener trick for loosening wallpaper glue, it will save you some time. 

[magdala]

Jan 28, 2013 17:50:19 GMT -5 jenny1980 said:

For those who saw a ton (like 50+) in person, did your realtor go every time with you or was it a lot of open houses?

Both.  We went to both open houses on our own and looked at the good ones again with our realtor. 

[awick14]

I think we saw 6-8 houses.

DH fell in love with the one we bought right away. I loved the layout but I couldn't see the potential in the house. (Built in 73 with only a few upgrades.)

We ended up going $5000 above our budget. (We just paid for it outta our "renovation" fund.

I now love the house. (With some cosmetic updates)