House Woes

[ladysprite]

I have decided that the entire process of buying a house stinks. It is no fun, has no traits that are even vaguely enjoyable, and has evolved over the past century into a process designed to scare, intimidate, and generally induce misery in the vast and overwhelming majority of people who take part in this horrid ritual.

I thought that school debt was bad, but that was before I ever entertained the thought of spending nearly half a million dollars on one item. Admittedly, it would be one particularly large and enduring item, but it's still also several years' wages, assuming that I didn't eat, drink, or consume any other products over those years.

And even given that ridiculous price, odds are I won't be able to find exactly what I want. No matter what I find, I'll be settling for less than ideal. Either it'll be the perfect house in the wrong place, or it'll be a sorry fixer-upper in something near the neighborhood I want. Of course, there's also the fact that, since everyone has been told that it's a buyers' market, and house prices are plummeting like great big lead bricks, suddenly houses that have been on the market for the better part of a year are getting four offers a day.

I know I shouldn't have fallen in love with one particular house, especially before we actually got our butts in gear enough to make an offer. And I know that the fact that we can't have that house doesn't mean that we'll never find a house that we're happy with. But right now, I'm torn between the desire to give up and dwell in our mediocre, closet-free apartment for the rest of my life and the desire to just sulk my way to the next, nearest open-house and make an offer no matter what, just to get the whole frustrating process over with as soon as possible. If I'm going to settle for a less-than-perfect house, then one less-than-perfect house is as good as any other. I know that's not true, but it's a tempting philosophy.....

Comments

[tafkad.livejournal.com]

I spent about nine months looking at houses on a local realtor's website, to see what features I liked and didn't like, what I could and couldn't afford (and where), etc. I learned there was a whole range of stuff I could enjoy. This helped me through the process much better than narrowing it down to places that would fit an ever-increasing set of requirements. It also helped me knock out a whole bunch of features that would have been wonderful but felt more and more unrealistic and silly the more pictures I saw.

I hope this helps you enjoy the process more. No, really.

[deguspice.livejournal.com]

Based upon a friend's recent experience, if you haven't already done it, I suggest that before you continue house hunting, that you get pre-approved for a mortgage. She fell in love with a house, signed a P&S, and then failed to find a mortgage she could afford.

Reading articles in the Boston Globe, it looks like no one knows what the housing market will do in the near future. Some experts are saying it's going to continue falling, some experts are saying that the Boston area is done falling.

[quietann.livejournal.com]

I second Ben's advice. As it turned out, our friend qualified for about $75K less than her financial adviser had told her she would qualify for. Part of this is because she refused to take on a "suicide loan" (interest-only, or teaser ARM, 50-year loan, stated-income loan, or other questionable product.) She just wanted a standard fixed-rate 30 year mortgage.

Boston is way more stable than Southern California, the other market I monitor because of property held in a family trust out there, but I suspect we're not at the bottom. We also didn't have quite the level of crazy loans here; mortgage fraud is becoming a huge problem there.

[almeda.livejournal.com]

Thirded, for the reasons they said, and also because the sellers' realtors are going to be way more friendly and serious with you if you have a letter to show them proving you CAN buy the house if you want to.

We ended up getting approved for nearly $150K, and only getting a $98K mortgage on $105K house, because we were calibrating how big a mortgage we actually wanted to get on what size payments we wanted to budget for.

[ladysprite.livejournal.com]

Oh, we're already pre-approved, and for plenty - we've got pre-approval letters for several figures, all within the range we're willing to pay.

No, we just managed to call at about 10am, and the other person making an offer apparently called around 9. By the time we learned about backup offers, two other backup offers had already come in.

We've got the approval, we've got a buyer's agent, we've got a line on a good lawyer.... we just don't have a house we like. And I'm already so burned out and frustrated that I don't want to look.

[spiritdancer]

I remember that stage - we had decided to stop looking for a while, but saw a listing for an open house in that day's paper.

We made the offer that night, and after a couple of rounds of offer/counter-offer, we had an accepted offer for this house.

Now we get to do it all over again, but long-distance. ::sigh::

[solipsistnation.livejournal.com]

You don't even like the part where you get to roam around looking in other people's houses? I liked that part, although admittedly sometimes in a sort of voyeuristic capacity.

It's certainly a cruel process, though-- you have to like a place enough to be willing to devote THIRTY YEARS to paying for it, and yet not so much that it breaks your heart if you can't have it... Terrible.

[vettecat.livejournal.com]

I sympathize completely... we've been on the house-hunt circuit for quite a while now. Hope you find something even better soon!

[corwyn-ap.livejournal.com]

Although I like looking at houses, I find it emotionally draining to shop for a house (for me or others). In order to evaluate how I will feel in a house I imagine living my entire life in it. Then I go on to another house and do the same thing. Coupled with a understanding of what can be wrong with a house, makes it spiritually tiring.

If it's any comfort, it dwarfs beside designing and building a house.

Best of Luck.

[surakofb5.livejournal.com]

If it makes you feel any better, I fell in love with three houses before I got one. The first was darling, but poorly maintained, and when I went back for a second look on a rainy day, we discovered that water was pooling against the foundation and running down the basement walls like a waterfall.

The second I actually bid on, but they got three bids and took one of the others. Buying during a sellers' market sucks.

The third house, the one I actually got, really was the best house for me. I had to pay full asking price, but not having any contingencies in my offer other than home inspection (i.e. no home sale contingency) was what got me the house.

[jducoeur]

and the desire to just sulk my way to the next, nearest open-house and make an offer no matter what, just to get the whole frustrating process over with as soon as possible.

Been there, done that, got the seventeen years in a house we were never quite happy with. (That was also the lesson of Get Ruthless Inspectors and Believe Them.)

We actually wound up *mostly* enjoying the most recent time through the grinder, mainly because we thought of it as window-shopping for most of it. The house we wound up buying was one we were *totally* unimpressed by the listing for; we were really surprised when we went to visit it, especially since we'd been through a string of "eh". But yeah, it sucks when you get your hopes up, only to have them dashed -- I was really cranky when the Framingham house turned out to be such a disaster waiting to happen. (And never did get over the "but the basement isn't as good as the one in Framingham!" effect for the rest of the process...)