Online House Hunting

Tips for house hunting in a hot market?

I'm currently looking to buy a house in the very hot market where I live. In this market, bidding wars are pretty common...you finally find your dream house and lose out on it because someone that can pay more than you. Any advice on keeping your sanity? Any general advice?

Public Comments

1. Go to HGTV.com keyword house hunter.
2. Yes we went through this last Sept. First off, whatever they're asking, offer over! Make an offer ASAP. Here's an example. We found a house we really liked. It had been on the market for like 12 hours. We offered 5k over asking. They got 6 offers, ours was second. We found another house we loved about 2 blocks away from the last one. We had just lost another house (long story) and the sellers had just lost their buyers. We made the first offer, 2k over asking. They accepted, it was their first offer. We went to look at some houses and was told not to even bother coming since they got a good offer or a cash offer earlier in the day. When we sold our condo, we didn't even put it on the market. Went looking at a for sale by owner who turned out to be an investor, who came & looked at our house & made an offer on the spot. I guess what I'm saying is decide ahead of time how much you can spend. When you find something you love, jump on it!
3. 99acres.com
4. Are there times of the year that the market isn't quite as "hot"? I know in the midwest, things slow down quite a bit in the winter months and there are less offers coming in for people trying to sell their homes. You may want to take advantage of a situation like that, if possible. As a previous poster said, definitely decide how much you want to spend ahead of time and don't go over it if you cannot afford the monthly payments on a larger loan amount. You don't want to get caught up in the excitement and get in over your head.
5. Just because you are in a hot real estate market, don't think that every property sells above asking price. Your dream house may or may not sell at the asking price. It may be overpriced and not sell at all, maybe the owners are only testing the market. Don't get caught up in a bidding war, only to find out later that the value of the house does not appreciate in the way you expect. You might be better off renting, and investing your downpayment rather than buy a house that goes substantially down in value. One thing you can do in a hot real estate market is to find homes you like that are not currently on the market and ask the owners if they would like to sell to you. Would you be happy owning the house next door to your dream house? How about the one down the street? An experienced buyer's agent can help you with this.