Putting an offer on a home........(law ?)

by love11 37 Replies latest social relationships

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  Jourles

  Regarding FHA loans, I wouldn't worry too much about them. Afterall, they are guaranteed by the US gov't to the lender. A couple of drawbacks are -- you may pay a *slightly* higher interest rate over a conventional loan, you will have to pay PMI insurance typically until the remaining-principle-to-appraised-value ratio hits 80% or until a certain amount of time passes(look at the contract to see which). Otherwise, they are a good option for new home buyers with no or little money down with good credit.

  KLS said something about FHA interest rates climbing as the loan timeframe went on. That would only happen with an ARM or interest-only loan(the interest rate changes when the Fed changes). If you plan on flipping the house in a little over a year or two, sure, go ahead and get one of these - especially if you happen to live in Vegas or somewhere else where the market is climbing at a 30-40% clip year over year. Otherwise, settle yourself into a fixed 15 or 30 year loan. The interest rate will NEVER change with these types of loans, no matter what happens in the marketplace/gov't.
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  Simon

  "Just to get your feet wet and see how it's done, why don't you put an offer on this house, make it really low since the house is probably sold anyways."

  That sounds like one of the dumbest things I've ever heard !

  Putting an offer to buy a house isn't a trivial thing and shouldn't be done as some sort of 'learning experience' IMO. If nothing else it is very inconsiderate to the other people involved.

  In the UK things aren't binding until you have signed and exchanged contracts (so we have 'gazumping').
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  G Money

  Online lenders are nothing more than hourly paid cube jockeys with little experience. You need to find a local person with experience in your market who can help you and then be there for questions after the fact. One who inspires confidence in the selling agent so that they will accept your prequalification / preapproval letter. Online lenders have jerked many people around and Ditech bait and switches and has hidden fees. A local lender has to be honest as they will be seeing the people they deal with day in and day out, they have no anonymity.
• 

  Purza

  Disclaimer -- I am not a lawyer.

  If you did not sign a written offer you will be okay.

  If you did not put any money down -- they have nothing to hold over your head.

  There is a period of time (I think it is within the first 10 days) that the buyer would have to release the contingencies (based on home inspection, etc). The buyer can back out during that time period without any penalties.

  I am basing this on my own personal experience. Last year, we placed a written offer on a property. The seller accepted our offer and THEN got it appraised. The appraisal came out $100K more than the offer she already accepted. She was pissed. She did everything she could to try to make us fall flat on our faces. Once we released the contingencies we were locked in. Until that point, we could have walked away.

  Best of luck to you.

  Purza
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  Grog

  Well I'm a real estate agent in california and I would say that you have nothing to be worried about. It sounds like for 1 your offer will not even be accepted and if its not accepted then you have nothing to worry about. In california usually the seller has 3 days to either accept the offer or counter offer to you. If they counter offer you in any way you can just decide that you don't like it and be fine. The other thing is.. even if you do decide to just walk away from it and decide not to buy it all that is at risk is your deposit that your agent would drop off at a title company. It sounds to me that any offer that the seller "laughs" at will of course not be accepted... there are also other ways to get out of a contract like say during your inspection period you find out something with the house that you are not happy with.. say it needs a new roof and the seller isn't going to pay for it you can use that as an excuse to get out of the contract.. thats what the first 17 days of escrow are for. Also.. in california the contracts have a built in loan contigency that if your loan isn't approved then you don't have to buy the property. To sum it all up without an accepted offer you have nothing to worry about at all. BTW... not really something you would threaten divorce over, maybe you should deal with those issues Casey
• 

  garybuss

  Here in South Dakota the law says earnest money only needs to be deposited the day AFTER an offer is accepted, so I never give the seller's agent the earnest money check until AFTER an offer is accepted. I'll usually give the seller's agent a photocopy of the earnest money check so he can show that to his seller. That ends all hassles with getting earnest check back and buyers have a loaded gun to go right to the next offer with all their available cash available.
  I almost never give sellers time to shop an offer, so I usually like a short time on the sunset clause. Sometimes 10pm the same day I wrote it. If I'm representing sellers I always shop an offer with a long fuse, so I make it tough for another agent to do that to my clients. I never work for the deal, I always work for the client.
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  damselfly

  Glad to hear it all worked out for you in the end! That must have been a big relief to get that phone call!

  Damselfly
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  love11

  Wow, I had such a great response. Thanks to everyone's expertise I feel alot more confident on what to do when we do decide to buy a house. Thanks again. Love