The role of a real estate agent is to guide you through the entire process of finding and buying a home. For home buyers, this journey can take days, weeks, or even months, depending on your situation. To serve you best, your agent needs time to understand your unique needs.
If you’re a first-time home buyer, we’ll invest extra time exploring your priorities and educating you on the market. Even if you’re an experienced buyer with a clear vision, partnering with a seasoned agent is invaluable. They’ll bring deep knowledge of local inventory, save you time, and uncover opportunities you might otherwise miss.
Financing
Your home-buying journey should start with financing. Determine how much you’re comfortable investing, whether paying cash or combining it with a loan. For home buyers, getting pre-approved by a lender is essential: they’ll review your finances and issue a letter confirming how much you can borrow, along with estimated closing costs and monthly payments.
Sellers expect serious offers to include a pre-approval letter. Without it, you risk losing your dream home to a better-prepared buyer. I can’t emphasize this enough, especially for first-time buyers—get pre-approved early!
Locating The Right Home For You
A dedicated buyer’s agent takes a thorough approach to understanding your must-haves: location, features, timeframe, and budget. We’ll refine these criteria as needed to zero in on your perfect match.
Browsing thousands of online listings can feel overwhelming, but focusing on your priorities helps narrow it down. Once we identify strong options, we’ll tour them in person as photos don’t capture the full experience! Expect to adjust your search as you see homes firsthand and clarify what truly matters to you.
Negotiating The Best Price And Terms
Once we find the right home, we’ll craft a strong offer designed to get accepted. Price is important, but so are other terms such as contingencies for selling your current home, seller concessions for closing costs, or repairs.
It’s easy to fixate on snagging a “deal,” but remember: years from now, you’ll value paying a fair price for the perfect home far more than a discount on the wrong one.
Example
You’ve found your ideal home at 1234 Main Street, listed at $369,000 (likely worth closer to $375,000). Homes in this hot neighborhood sell quickly. Offering too low, assuming you’ll have the chance to “negotiate up” could mean losing it to another buyer who was willing to pay full price.
A strong initial offer often wins the day. Imagine sticking to $365,000 only to learn it sold for $370,000. That $5,000 difference equates to about $30/month in your payment (based on a 30-year loan at current rates around 6.25%).
Your agent invests significant time analyzing the market: recent comparable sales, inventory levels, showing activity, the listing agent’s style, seller motivation, and competing offers. This insight helps craft the optimal strategy for securing your home at the best possible price and terms.
Inspections
After getting your offer accepted, you usually have a certain amount of time to have the property inspected by a professional (or professionals) of your choice. 10 days is the default inspection period in the Kansas City Metro, but everything is negotiable.
What to inspect can depend on the age and condition of the house. Here are some common items to inspect:
- Structural and Foundation
- Roof
- Mechanical equipment: Furnace, Air-Conditioning, and Ventilation
- Plumbing
- Electrical
- Pests & Infestation: Termites, etc.
- Environmental Hazards: Mold, Radon, etc
- Well & Water Quality
- Sewer & Septic Systems
A whole house inspection will provide a general overview of the standard items in a house. Some items will require additional inspectors, or further evaluation by a specialist. Regardless of whether a home is brand new or 100+ years old, there will be dozens of things noted by the inspector. The purpose of the inspection is to provide you with information about the house (good, bad, or otherwise). From there, you and your agent can create a plan for how to proceed.
Repairs
While most things an inspector finds aren’t major, sometimes dangerous and/or expensive defects exist. The challenge can often be deciphering what to make of a 40+ page inspection report. A good agent can help you determine how to address these issues. If there are any “deal breakers”, you only have a certain amount of time to work out a solution with the seller, as outlined in your purchase contract. Most of the time, your options are as follows:
- Accept the property as-is (no issues or nothing major)
- Request the seller correct certain issues (you won’t have total control over repairs made by the seller)
- Request the seller credit the buyer for certain issues (this give you control over the repairs, assuming you have the cash on hand to make repairs)
- Cancel the contract and find another house
This phase often sparks a second round of negotiations. An experienced agent keeps perspective, prioritizes deal-breakers vs. minor issues, and creatively bridges gaps to keep the transaction on track.
Making It To Closing
The home-buying process can be exciting yet stressful. Once past inspections and appraisal, things usually smooth out as you await closing. But your agent’s work continues, coordinating dozens of tasks and deadlines to ensure everything closes seamlessly.
- Deliver ratified contracts to all parties (agents, lenders, title company, etc)
- Deposit of earnest money and delivery of receipt
- Order title commitment
- Assist buyers in scheduling inspections, meeting inspectors, and obtaining reports on time
- Helping buyer determine next steps after inspections
- Coordinating delivery of inspection results, or title issues and resolutions to all parties
- Assist seller’s agent in hiring quality and affordable contractors as needed
- Monitor progress and completion of repairs; collect documentation of repairs
- Schedule re-inspections upon completion of repairs
- Coordinating appraiser access
- Monitoring loan status and assisting to obtain necessary documents from buyer
- Assist buyer with common real estate related tasks
- gathering utility contact information
- contractor referrals
- general research and tips – ask your agent anything, they’ve done this before 🙂
- Schedule closing
- Schedule final walk-through
- Review closing documents prior to closing date and request corrections as needed
- Facilitate transfer of keys, garage door openers, and other items to buyer
Proper follow-up and coordination by your agent will keep everything moving along as smoothly as possible.
Ready to start your home search? Contact me for a no-obligation buyer consultation and pre-approval guidance.
Justin Rollheiser – REALTOR®
Keller Williams Realty | Diamond Partners Inc
13671 S Mur-Len Rd | Olathe, KS 66062
Direct 913-800-7653
Office 913-322-5878
www.JustinRollheiser.com
Comments or Questions?