Your ready!
The time has come, your savings for the down payment, check, credit score is healthy, and your search for the perfect house is complete. Now you have to figure out the hard stuff, but you saved and kept your credit healthy, thats the hard stuff.
This is a common feeling for many homeowners looking to find the best deal to finance their dream. They even fear mortgage deals so much they just end up settling for the first mortgage put in front of them! Why? Maybe they don’t know where to look? Or they don’t want to spend the time. If any of these sound familiar we are here to help!
It’s important to protect yourself by searching for the best deals out there.
Here are five ways to help you find the best deal:
1.Shop around – Get quotes from various lenders. Look at local and national lenders and don’t overlook the internet.
2. Compare terms – Interest rates vary from lender to lender but lenders offer different interest rates depending on the terms of the mortgage. How long will it be (15, 20 or 30 years)? Will it be variable or fixed?
3. Tweak some of the optional items that you control, such as the type of insurance you will carry and whether or not you will use escrow for taxes etc.
4.Adjust your down payment – Sometimes being able to increase the percentage of what you are putting down can make a difference in the lenders terms (similarly buying a less expensive house will work the same)
5. Haggle – Yes! Lenders often act as if their rates are written in stone but this is not the case. This is where shopping around can really come in handy. If you can show that you’ve got a slightly better deal with another lender then sometimes another lender will lower their rate to beat the competitor.
Hey it’s worth a try!
Just remember that you are in control of your future. You can choose whether or not to accept any lenders terms. There are a lot of lenders out there so you do not need to sign with the first offer you receive. Yes, this is not the most glamours part of buying you new home but it can save you thousands of dollars!
One last tip: It might be best to go through this process before you head out to search for the home of your dreams. You can get preapproved for a mortgage with most lenders and that removes the pressure and worry of losing any home you find while you negotiate with the lender. This also puts you in the driver’s seat when you are negotiating to buy and even put you first in line if anyone else is bidding on the house you want. Get pre-approved, it will save you!