Found the Home

According to my fiance we have found the home we are looking for.  

#1 It is close to downtown Berkley one of the three areas we were looking at.

#2 It has 3 bedrooms including a master suite upstairs.  With the housing market in the shape that it is in we wanted whatever house we were going to buy to last us for a while.  With 3 bedrooms we will be able to have children and still have enough room.

#3 It has more than one bathroom, and the other bathroom is not tucked away in the corner of the basement.  A lot of the houses that we looked at before claim they have 1.5 bathrooms, and they do, but the second bathroom was located in a corner of the house that would be rather inconvenient to visit in a hurry.  This house has 1.5 bathrooms, one on the main floor and a toilet and sink attached to the upstairs master suite.

#4 It has a garage.  Although it is a 1.5 car garage I am used to parking my car outside year round anyway.  Plus my fiance's car is not doing so hot so we would definitely want to park it indoors in the winter.

#5 Although the outside of the house could use some updating, the inside has been completely redone with hard wood floors and new paint and windows (important on those cold Michigan nights).

#6 Low property taxes!  The taxes on this house are low right now.  Who knows what they will do as the years go on but Ferndale taxes were killing us!

Bonus:  There is a custom built wine cellar in the basement.  So now we have people over for dinner I can say, "I'll be right back with some wine from the cellar."

I have not had a chance to look at the house myself but my fiance went with our realtor to check it out the other day.  We are still not sure we will be able to afford it, $109,900.  But the good news is that it is bank owned and they are trying to sell it on a short sale.  This is the same house I talked about in one of my previous posts.

Market Analysis in Berkley and Ferndale areas

I found these two links very helpful.  Good information and laid out in an easy to understand format.  Stuff like Average price of sold homes and number of houses sold.  They also compare stats from the first two months this year and last year.

Market Analysis of Ferndale Housing February 2009

and 

Market Analysis of Berkley Housing February 2009

Crazy statistic --- The average price that homes sold for in February 2009 in Berkley is about double that of the price in Ferndale!

Second Opinion

We found out yesterday that there is going to be a pay freeze at my fiance's work and possibly a fee to keep health insurance.  So now we are rethinking the purchase of a new home.  That would stink for this blog but that is real life right now.  

Getting a Second Opinion

We are going to shop around a little more for home loans.  The one we can get from Fifth Third is good but we are interested to see what another bank, Flagstar, has to offer.  Plus this bank works with our realtor and comes recommended by her.

New Home to Look At

Plus, our realtor emailed us the other day about a new home that is a short sale located in Berkley.  Apparently the prices of homes in Berkley are higher but the taxes are lower.  The house that she sent us was originally for sale at $129,900 and is now priced at $109,900.  According to our Fifth Third loan this would still be out of our price range but I wonder if we could negotiate down to $90,000 or so?  In talking with a few people that have bought houses in the past, you should never pay the asking price.

What is a Short Sale?

A short sale is when someone can no longer afford to pay the mortgage on their house and the bank takes it back from them.  Then the bank tries to sell the house for less than it is really worth in order to recoup as much of the loan as they can.  So the house is being sold by the bank.

I wonder how much the bank is willing to drop the price?  If it stays on the market long enough they might be anxious to sell it.  

Looking in Royal Oak, Ferndale and Berkley

Today is the day and I'm up early like a young child on Christmas morning waiting impatiently to open all the presents.  We are going to look at the insides of houses today, something we have yet to do.  Last night I had dreams of huge rooms with hardwood floors and big backyards with a dog running in it...  So we're meeting our real estate agent at 11 to begin the most fun/arduous process of finding a home.

Let's get real though.  We are going to look today in our three ideal neighborhoods; Royal Oak, Ferndale and Berkley.  These three suburbs of Detroit are some of the hippest downtowns around and we want to be right in the middle of it.  We're looking for walking distance from the main streets and attractions.  

So far we have not been impressed by the houses that are close to it all.  It seems that they are over priced for what you get, but then there is the old saying... location, location, location.  But I don't know if we will want to lower our expectations for something close.  But don't worry, we have plenty of houses to look at today.  I bet we'll be surprised by something!