Question for home owners, How did you go about getting your home?

[dmvbatman]

and i'm talking from the point of graduating college with your degree all the way to the point where you got your home..

how many years did it take? and how much did you put down on your house?

 

[dmvbatman]

No home owners here?

 

[mojodmonky1]

graduated from school around 2003.

thankfully i was able to find full time employment about 6 months or so after graduating (was doing part time work tutoring kids before that).

met my girl around that same time (2003). She had graduated from school a couple years before me and had been working fulltime since late 2001.

FFWD to 2008/ when we got engaged. We had both been trying to put away as much money as we could (well kinda not really). At that time we both went into super saving miser mode so we could save up for the wedding and also to try and buy a place to live (up until then we had been living in a 1 bed apt for the last 3 years together since we both kinda worked in the same area and it didnt make sense for us to have 2 rents). Most of our savings ended up going to pay for our wedding. My wife's parents arent rich by any stretch but they also helped cover some of the wedding cost.

Late 2009/Early 2010. Although the wedding ended up costing us a bit over $40K, we were able to make that back and then some from our wedding gifts (Asians typically give cash gifts for weddings). On top of that my parents gave us a fairly substantial cash wedding gift as well. Between all of that we were able to build up our savings enough to put a down payment on a new condo.

The condo we ended up finding was a foreclosed property so the escrow/closing was a long drawn out clusterfunk. It took almost 7 months for us to close escrow after our offer had been accepted. We took out a traditional mortgage with 20% down. Down payment plus closing costs ended up being a tad over $100K.

To be honest, we wouldn't have been able to get into a home that quickly if not for the generous gift from my parents. Well... correction. We probably could have, but we would have had to borrow a lot more and our month to month cash flow would be a lot tighter with the higher mortgage payments.

 

[da r entertainment]

Originally Posted by Mojodmonky1

graduated from school around 2003.

thankfully i was able to find full time employment about 6 months or so after graduating (was doing part time work tutoring kids before that).

met my girl around that same time (2003). She had graduated from school a couple years before me and had been working fulltime since late 2001.

FFWD to 2008/ when we got engaged. We had both been trying to put away as much money as we could (well kinda not really). At that time we both went into super saving miser mode so we could save up for the wedding and also to try and buy a place to live (up until then we had been living in a 1 bed apt for the last 3 years together since we both kinda worked in the same area and it didnt make sense for us to have 2 rents). Most of our savings ended up going to pay for our wedding. My wife's parents arent rich by any stretch but they also helped cover some of the wedding cost.

Late 2009/Early 2010. Although the wedding ended up costing us a bit over $40K, we were able to make that back and then some from our wedding gifts (Asians typically give cash gifts for weddings). On top of that my parents gave us a fairly substantial cash wedding gift as well. Between all of that we were able to build up our savings enough to put a down payment on a new condo.

The condo we ended up finding was a foreclosed property so the escrow/closing was a long drawn out clusterfunk. It took almost 7 months for us to close escrow after our offer had been accepted. We took out a traditional mortgage with 20% down. Down payment plus closing costs ended up being a tad over $100K.

To be honest, we wouldn't have been able to get into a home that quickly if not for the generous gift from my parents. Well... correction. We probably could have, but we would have had to borrow a lot more and our month to month cash flow would be a lot tighter with the higher mortgage payments.

You make the $13K me and my fiance spending on our wedding scheduled for 9/9 seem so little

 

[mojodmonky1]

Originally Posted by Da R Entertainment

You make the $13K me and my fiance spending on our wedding scheduled for 9/9 seem so little

 
  

you dont have to spend a ton on your wedding to have a nice wedding.  our costs were higher cause we had 250 guests, we live in LA (nothing is cheap), and me, my family, and my friends are all boozehounds and open bar for 250 people is not cheap.  in hindsight, we probably could have saved a bit by just going with a pre-paid bar since my wifes side of the family doesnt really drink at all (my father in law is a Southern Baptist Pastor and a lot of their friends and fam are very religious).  oh well... no regrets.

 

[dmvbatman]

Lol the deal with these high weddings, I know weddings are expensive but Jesus.

 

[timcity2000]

Originally Posted by Dmvbatman

and i'm talking from the point of graduating college with your degree all the way to the point where you got your home..

how many years did it take? and how much did you put down on your house?

graduated college in '02, moved in to my house in '07.  my goal was to own a home by the time i turned 30.

i put down $10K on a $200K house... not very much.
  

 

[weekz]

 

[returnbama]

Make a realtor do all the leg work, finding places in your area and price range, driving you around, etc. Put down as much as possible, 20% if you can to avoid mortgage insurance which will cause a higher payment. If you can't do that, look for a first time home buyer program which will exclude the PMI and give you three months no payments, rate will be higher, but payment will probably be less. Low ball also on any offers you make and attempt to have seller cover a lot of your closing cost, have them fix everything in the house if you get close to buying, sellers are desperate. Hope some of this is useful.

 

[i am that dude]

I live in Lawton, OK and am looking to buy soon. I have been driving around with a realtor a few times the last wk.

I was originally going to purchase used, set a max price ($160,000, I already got my preapproval letter) and go for the best square footage value I could get. But rather than get an older home, even if remodeled, and risk having any complications related to that, I realized I could get new constructions for starting at 140k in a pretty desirable neighborhood ( http://www.jaykinder.net/...y-Way/13216966/?index=53 )where my sister used to live so I'm going with that; approximately 1400 sq ft, 3 bed 2 full bath, granite, high ceilings, pretty nice homes. They're not putting wood in any of them, but they said I can cusotm build one with wood or catch him on one before he puts flooring in and he'll put wood in. I just wanted to get the 2/10 warranty. Obviously you get it inspected prior to buying but I'd still have better piece of mind with a new.

I am not putting much money down. They have the program that loans you 3.5% but my sister was telling me about some program where I can get a grant of 8-15k I don't have to pay back as 1st time buyer's incentive. I can't find anything about it, but she is the queen of getting over on the system and actually a licensed realtor in Oklahoma so I'm waiting for her to have her friend (she's in VA right now) send me some stuff. She also mentioned getting my license and acting as my own buyer's agent and saving the 3% commission.

Anyways, graduated college in 2007. I was working through college making $8/hr doing IT helpdesk support slash running audio video for shindigs the MWR hosted slash giving classes on how to do that slash setting up concerts slash, anything to do with automation basically. Then I got an opportunity to jump to basically just IT helpdesk support still here on Fort Sill (cutting out all the extra stuff and random hrs) doing the same job at double the salary so I did that. I am a contractor though and not GS so job security is a bit sketchy, but being that I am one of the best and have been doing it a long time and have maintaned all the required certs, every yr when it comes time to reup I get picked back up. Then a few months ago a new company got the contract, gave us all raises at almost double, still doing the same thing, still in the same office.

 

[gingersaintbad]

Graduated college in May 07. Full time employment May 07. Apartment August 07. Married June 09. House Sept 09.

 

[Renaldo Balkman]

Hawaii has the highest cost of living in the nation... I don't even want to muck up this thread with my story


Let's just say the bank owns me

 

[dmvbatman]

Originally Posted by GingersAintBad

Graduated college in May 07. Full time employment May 07. Apartment August 07. Married June 09. House Sept 09.

this man was on a mission.

 

[snaggykicks]

Originally Posted by Weekz