mortgage Archives - Detroit Duchess

First Comes Love, Then Comes Marriage, Then Comes House

Let’s say I have a plan for my life or at least a list of things to accomplish in a certain order. Next on that list is to buy a house with my dear husband. I wrote about our decision to start the buying process here and what you can do to prepare. Today I have more exciting news to share today – We were approved for our mortgage and can officially start looking – WOO HOO!!

The mortgage process was fairly easy, we already had a mortgage guy lined up so we sat down with him and talked about what we were looking for, what we wanted our monthly payment to be and what areas we were planning to look. We hashed out some numbers and then we had to provide our W2’s from last year, our last two months worth of bank statements and our last two pay stubs. We were able to do this fairly quickly and it only took about a week to get a final number.

My husband and I are beyond thrilled and immediately contacted our realtor who has been waiting a long time to get us into our dream house. We are going to sit down with him in the next few weeks and start looking through houses.

To kick this process off, my husband and I had to make a list of some of the things that we really wanted in our home, these include:

Four Bedrooms (we need to have room for future kiddos)
2.5 Bathrooms (We need two showers for all of our future kiddos and I want a half bath so guests don’t have to use our bathroom)
Full Basement (Finished would be a plus, but this will be John’s Man Cave)
Dining Room (I love to entertain and have always wanted a Dining Room so I can host holidays and dinner parties)
Attached two car garage (three would be a plus-I can’t wait until we can both park in a garage!)
Nice Backyard (I want to get a hot tub in the future and have room for a swingset for future kiddos)
NO Bungalows (Been there, done that)
Laundry Room/Mud Room
Modern Kitchen with an Island and lots of counter space (The hubby likes to cook and I like to bake)
One room needs to have a master bath, preferably with two sinks (I can’t wait for two sinks!)
A big front porch

I’m sure we will come up with more things to add to the list, but I would love to hear your suggestions on what we should look for in the comments.

Big News and a Giveaway!

My husband and I are finally ready to start the next adventure in our journey…buying our first home! I am really excited that we are finally ready to get a place of our own, but a little overwhelmed with all of the new information we need to know. I thought I would use today’s blog to talk about how to prepare to buy a home and ask all of you to share your tips and tricks for first time home buyers.

Photo Credit: WikiHow

So before we start actually looking for a house I figured there were a few things that we should do to prepare:

Clean Up Our Credit Report

The first thing we need to do is request copies of our credit reports. This is important so we can know our credit score. The higher the score, the lower our down payment and monthly payments will be. We can also use this time to clean up any errors on our credit report. Starting now we have to make sure not to make any major changes that will affect our credit report like opening or closing credit cards.

Determine How Much House We Can Afford

Most of the sources I have researched say that your monthly home payment shouldn’t exceed 28-31 percent of your monthly income. A great exercise for us now would be to try to start making monthly “house” payments to our savings account. That way we can make sure we can still be comfortable with the payment we decide on.

The other thing to remember is that with a big house utilities will be more expensive and you have the added responsibility of property taxes and home maintenance.

**Have Enough Savings to Cover Down Payment and Closing Costs**

For a down payment we need to have anywhere from 5-20 percent of the total cost of the house depending on the financing. You also can’t forget closing costs which could be anywhere from $2,500 to $5,000.

We also want to make sure to have some extra cash for furniture, decor and repairs.

Get Pre-Approved for a Mortgage

We already have a mortgage guy, so it’s important to get pre-approved before we start house hunting. There’s nothing worse than finding the house you love and not being ready to make an offer.

Find a Good Realtor

We have a fantastic realtor and can’t wait to give him the green light to help us start looking.

Over the next few months we will be going through all of these steps and then start house hunting! As we go through this process I would love to hear about any tips you have for buying a new home.

Lately, one of my guilty pleasures has been looking at new home and address change announcements. A few of them have really caught my eye, especially this one from Small Moments:

To celebrate the launch of our house hunting journey, Kimberly at Small Moments has generously offered a giveaway for my readers. She has so many adorable cards and invitations that I can’t wait to use for gatherings at our new place. The giveaway includes an 8×10 “Love is” letterpress print and 12 of her Sweet Like Candy cards. These little cards are so fun and different, I love the humor behind them.