House Hunting... How many houses did it take?

[Parrothead]

The first one we bought we looked only at it. It was the only house in town within the right price range. Now that we are looking (at house plans) again I'm being picky as it will probably be our forever house. I can't find anything I like. I've looked at hundreds of plans. I'm thinking I'm going to have to have someone draw it out for us.

[GAPeachie]

Still looking...

[LucyStoner]

3. But that was with a small budget in a HCOL area in early 2007. So it was not a buyer's market and there were maybe 10 houses in the entire city that met our minimum criteria...not a big fixer (we were not handy, too busy for repairs and did not have a ton of cash to pay someone else to do the work), under $320K and with some sort of yard (even if it was small). We eliminated the houses that were very far from our jobs (and thus not very bus-able or bike-able) and that left us with 3 houses total. We crossed off the first house we saw because the 2nd upstairs bedroom was too small for a twin bed and the yard was basically a 4 foot wide strip of bark. We crossed off the second house we saw because there were three 3/4 baths in the house but there was no bathtub or even room for a bathtub. The 3rd house we saw had reasonably sized rooms, a bonus small room, a decent sized yard for a townhouse and was directly across from a park. I would have liked the location of the first two better, but we got a nicer house that was big enough for our family and as it turns out we are much closer to a light rail stop which will be built when my oldest is a teen.

 

Of course what we would have been able to buy for the same $$ (we came in about 40K less than our max) a few years later...ah, such is life. We should make up our lost value when the light rail line hits in short walking distance. :001_smile: I am just glad we are not upside down.

[GAPeachie]

We found one and are set to close in Aug! :)

[A.Balaban]

We found one and are set to close in Aug! :)

 

Congrats!!!

 

We have looked at approx. 15 houses so far. We found one we liked, but we needed to go back and look at it further (due to some issues). When we got home that evening we found out an offer had been put on it.

 

I have looked at HUNDREDS of houses online though.

[chepyl]

First time around....less than 20. We were in a small town and there was not much to look at. We bid on one, lost it mod negotiation due to a bad realtor (went out of town and did not call is when they came back with a.counter and had no one in her office covering her stuff. Another bid came in that was slighlty higher and we lost the house we loved. We looked at two fsbo homes and had a contract a week later.

 

Current home....100s! DH did a lot of o.line.shopping to narrow down the list, we spent weeks driving around to see neighborhoods and the houses from the outside. We looked at a few fsbo homes. Then made a list for the realtor. Dropped a realtor who did not seem to habe time for us because we were looking under $100,000. Went with a great new realtor who found our house the second trip out and helped us get our box in and win the house over several other couples!! But between driving ourselves and the two reactors....it was well over 100! Maybe 200.

[Hoot]

We ended up seeing 4, but we knew immediately that the first one we saw was the one we were going to buy. The others were only formalities since we had already agreed to see them.