Collaborative post. Moving home can be stressful, costly, and not something you are going to want to do often. From searching for a house(s) suitable for a viewing, visiting them, packing, and then finding a moving company to help you move in – it’s a whole ordeal. There’s a lot to consider, it takes up a considerable amount of time and so it’s important we make the right choice for us when going through the selection process. When we are selecting we will have specific criteria in mind. We need to make sure that these main requirements are met when making our selection. You’ll find my tips for finding the perfect home helpful when you next go house hunting.
Tips For Finding The Perfect Home
What Can You Afford
Buying a new home is costly, but it is also a great investment. Instead of wasting money on rent, you use the money you’d spend on rent to pay the mortgage. This way you have a property that will go up in value and one that you can refurbish to your requirements. Before you decide on one specific home make sure you have explored enough options. You will need to consider if you can afford the mortgage repayments for your chosen home.
Where a mortgage is out of reach you could consider a rent-to-buy option. This allows you to buy a property with a higher value than what you could afford on your own. You’re not paying for the full amount, but you’re securing the property and then continuing to make payments for it while you live there. Although you won’t technically own the full property, you can still treat it and change it as if it were your own.
Check Out the Area
It’s common practice to make a few visits to a prospective home before you buy it, but you shouldn’t stop at just the home. You want to make sure the neighbourhood you end up living in is nice and comfortable for you. Does it have everything you need? Are you going to need to travel great distances to access groceries? Are you close to transport links if you need to travel to work? How noisy is the road, what are the neighbours like? If you will be needing to access a school space at some point, what are the local schools like, and are you within the catchment? These are all things to consider.
Pin It!
What Size Home Can You Afford
It can be tempting to look for a property with loads of space. But, this is not always an option when you get closer to city centers. There, space becomes more limited and far more expensive. If you need to find a home with more space you could consider looking at those that have the potential for extension. You don’t need to extend straight after your purchase, it’s not always an option but the good thing is you then have the option to extend and gain at least another if not a few more rooms. Buying a property that can be extended is normally cheaper than buying a larger property and you’ll not just gain space but also increase the property value considerably.
Allow for Additional Costs
When you are looking for a property, you’ll need to be clear on what budget you have available. Some money will be set aside for the purchase with or without a mortgage depending on circumstances. You’ll also need to have some money set aside for refurbishing the home. You may have to furnish your home on a tight budget depending on what you have available. You might not be able to afford to refurbish some parts at first. Focus on the rooms that need the most work and how much use they would get before deciding which to spend the money on. Depending on funds, you might have to consider working on them at a later date when you have the finances to cover the improvements.
Don’t Rush
It takes time to find the right home. If you need to move into an area specifically for schools it’s important to do this well before you need to submit applications. When picking the right home you need to put time and thought into it. Don’t rush to get the first home you find unless it’s your dream house. Make sure you view a few houses before deciding which to buy. It’s also important not to over-stretch yourself too so you don’t take on more debt than you can handle.
What Tips For Finding The Perfect Home do you feel are most important?
Enjoyed this Post?
Subscribe to Melanie’s Fab Finds RSS feed to see my latest posts. Posts will include recipes, reviews, etc. and as a result, you will hear about my new posts and competitions first!
Watch our fab product reviews on YouTube x
Discover more from Melanie's Fab Finds
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
I can’t think of a better tip than not rushing. Unless you have to relocate right this minute, take your time. You’ll find the right place if you’re just patient.
Additional costs are so important. There are so many hidden costs when I bought my home.
Another tip we were given by our last realtor was to not only check out the neighborhood during the day, but to also drive around it during the evening/night as well. Some places look ok during the day but can be sketchy at night.
House shopping can be so frustrating! So much goes into house shopping and it is good to have some factors to consider.
One consideration for me is the location of the house. The house should be near a supermarket and transportation facility. It is nice that I cannot commute long hours to ge to my workplace.
I agree, you shouldn’t rush into buying first. There may be things that you haven’t noticed the first time, and usually impulse isn’t the key 🙂
Great tips, definitely you will need to clear the budget for it. Thank you for sharing these awesome tips!
These are great criteria, we need to check before getting a home for the family. It’s perfect, especially for those who are the first timer, will give them the idea to consider! Thanks for sharing this with us!
These are all really great and very helpful tips! I’m surely gonna take note of these thanks for sharing this with us!
Your tips are very helpful. I am in the market for a new home and your tips will surely be valuable to me.
These are wonderful tips! Finding the right neighborhood is just as important as finding the right house. We own a home, but would like to move soon, so I’ll be using these tips.
Taking my time looking out and selecting my perfect home, is the best tip. Whenever you rush finding a home, you will be duped!
It can be hard to find the perfect home. I have found you usually have to compromise in some areas!
These are great tips that everyone should be aware of. Especially the “don’t rush” and over stretching yourself part.
Rushing, totally agree here. If you feel rushed, you might make a bad decision. I know this all too well.
Honestly, it can be costly to make a bad decision. We need to really think as buying a home is a big commitement.
These are important things to consider when buying a home! We had amazing realtors too that helped us!
Oh yes, making sure you can afford the place is a must. And that it’s in a good neighborhood. You just never know these days.
These tips will help narrow things down. House shopping is quite stressful.
My sister in law told me to drive by at night, drive by night at weekends, and drive by during a heavy rain before buying. I always remembered that… I did it with my first house. Homes sell in a hot second nowadays though, so I don’t know if you could be so leisurely.
I think the most important is buy what you can only afford. It’s hard to spend too much specially if you are looking for your first home. This is a very helpful post!
So true! We looked FOREVER for our first home! But we didn’t have a high budget and we wanted a lot! I think think the most important thing is to shop for layout. You can change cosmetics but layout changes are expensive and invasive!
Checking out the area is essential! We’ve been trying to buy a home long distance, and it’s difficult to figure out how the area is without seeing it in person.
These are really good points to consider when house hunting, but I really support the suggestion to TAKE. YOUR. TIME!!! If it’s an option, that is. Sometimes we really shoot ourselves in the foot if we take the first offer that seems “good enough” and end up overlooking all of the other points raised.
I had to move a little over three years ago. I spent a ton of time looking for the right place to move to. I’m still here and bought the house I was renting. School district was a major factor for me when it came to deciding where to live.
The housing market is so crazy right now. Just when you think you have found the perfect house. Bam!! Its gone. I feel for those looking today.
It is such a hard time to buy a house right now, however with rising interest rates it may be the perfect time. These tips are very helpful!
These are some great tips! I completely agree about not rushing when it comes to finding a new home.
Took us ages to buy our house. We did tremendous research on the area and look for everything that was in the Help to Buy scheme before deciding on a new built (so we didn’t have to buy any new big appliances). Without Help to Buy I don’t think we would ever be able to get our own property
Thank you so much for this very useful advice for people searching for the right home for them.
Thanks Margaret. I’m glad you liked the post.
Lots of good advice and totally agree on allowing for additional costs
It really helps as you never know what might crop up x
I think in todays expensive market, your first home may need to be seen as a starting point to a long term plan to eventually being able to afford your ideal home
very useful advise it is important to view a few houses to compare and make sure it will be comfortable to pay the mortgage especially at the moment when prices are rising everywhere
We have had to compromise the location to find the perfect property for our needs
I’m now back living in my family home since my parents passed away, I loved it here as a child 🙂 Before that I lived in my other house for 22 years and raising my family there
Thanks Melanie, good things to consider for the future.
The perfect home is never affordable – what can you compromise on?
We moved home a few months ago and we kept getting our priced on properties we put offers on so we got a new build and we are really happy with it.
It’s hard sometimes when a number of people want the same property. Sometimes it’s for the best as it seems to have been with you. Congratulations on the new home x
Nice blog. I like the house. It looks so pretty like it was ripped out of a magazine.
There don’t seem to be many properties in my area on the market right now. Always let the estate agent know what you’re looking for and ask them to call you if someone has a valuation etc on a house that fits the bill!
Great advice, always important to be paitent in finding the right home and not to rush in to a decision
A property has to be in a quiet area for me, don’t like to hear my neighbours.
Some good advice there especially Allow for Additional Costs.
My mum and dad are going through this right now and it has really stressed them out, i will give them some of these tips
First decide on Area, Then Price, Size, Garden, Garaging, Local amenities.