Hi everyone!! Haven't been blogging because.. Well... We got a house!!!! Hooray!!! I'm so stoked..beyond words and also nervous for this big investment..
Anyway, I want to post here my experience buying a house and my short sale timeline for those who wants to buy a short sale property.
First - me and my husband started looking at house around March 2012. That's also the time that we got pre-approved for a loan by Wellsfargo. Sam - my realtor back then was the one who went with us looking from house to house. The market was good at that time. You can find so many houses with good prices. But being a first time buyer, I don't know what's worth it and what's not at that time. For me, when it doesn't have "this and that" in a house, I'd be saying "NEXT"! Anyway we did find some houses that we "fell in love" with but we weren't able to get it because either we got outbid or we suddenly found another one we want. Lol! Come May 2012, we haven't found anything we wanted so we stopped looking and took a break. Me and Adrian flew to Philippines., china and Hongkong for a get away vacation. It was so nice to just stop and just be free. We went away for a month. When we came back on July 2012, my realtor Sam already retired and so we had to find a new realtor. We met Doris and Linda who are very sweet and very nice. Very patient too! We started looking around August 2012. We found so many that we liked, bid on so many houses too but we always get OUTBID! I almost gave up! I told Adrian maybe we should just stop because its tiring to fall in love in a house and not get it at the end. I know, you aren't suppose to fall in love or get attached to a house that's not guaranteed to be yours but you cannot help it especially when you go inside and have that "feeling" of this is it! Hahah! Anyway, when we are about to give up, a realtor contacted our realtors and asked if we are still interested in this property we saw a couple weeks ago. I liked that house so our realtor told her yes we are and so we began our offer on a short sale property.
For those who doesn't know, SHORT SALE means that the owner owes a lot to a bank though they cannot afford the home anymore so they would put it on short sale so they can walk away from it without paying anything. when the homeowner owes more on their mortgage more than what the property is currently able to sell for in today’s Real Estate market place.
Here is our Time Line:
The property has 2 liens: Ocwen and chase
9/22/12 - showing of property
9/24/12 - offer sent/accepted and sent to the bank
9/2412 - signed arm's length affidavit
9/26/12 - wired earnest money
10/5/12 - BPO ordered; seller asked for HAFA assistance
10/15/12 - BPO completed; File is in HAFA review and lender asked for a current payoff
10/26/12 - still in HAFA review.
11/15/12 - received a call from my realtor that the seller had been making mortgage payments for their credit to be somewhat intact so their lender doesn't feel the need for short sale how's that? Now the seller said they would stop their mortgage payment and start the short sale on December again.
*** at this point I was already fuming. The thing with short sale is that it has lots of process and you need to be patient. Now if you want a fast closing, you need to find standard sale or REO (real estate owned) properties.***
Anyway, we waited until after the holidays to restart this process again:
01/01/13: submitted offer and got accepted by seller same day
01/10/13: my realtor Spoke to the agents assistance and she is getting some more updated documents from the sellers.
01/24/13: my realtor told me that
The short sale packages have been submitted to both lenders (1st and 2nd). The files are in review.
02/01/13: Both lenders have acknowledged receipt of the short sale packages, and the files are in review.
02/08/13: Received approval on the first bank. Yay!
02/11/13: received both approval! We are scheduled to close 03/11/13 (hopefully)
02/15/13: Signed my loan. Assigned an appraisal
02/16/13: signed arms length, and other paperworks needed, Did inspection for the house.
02/21/13: Appraisal results came in today. Came in high which is good. Waiting for the underwriting approval which might happen next week
02/26/13: loan is out of underwriting and is approved according to my lender.
03/04/13: Prior to loan docs. More paperwork needed.
03/12/13: prior to loan docs completed. Going back to underwriter for final review.
03/14/13: Out of underwriter and is cleared for loan docs. Emailed to escrow and we set up an appointment to sign loan docs on Saturday.
03/16/13: signed loan docs with escrow officer, wired the downpayment + closing costs
03/18/13: final walk through done. Seller's stuff were already packed and they're ready to go. everything looks the same. (I know you aren't suppose to wire the money or sign if you haven't done the final walk through just to make sure no damages has been done but we are just too anxious to close and besides a $400-$500 damage won't deter us from closing it for sure. We've waited this long. Anyway, not sure what else are we waiting for. The keys I guess!
03/19/13: Wellsfargo said Loan's been funded! Yay!
03/20/13: it's been recorded! We get the keys tomorrow at 5pm! Yay!
03/21/13: got the keys! They left the house clean. So nice of them to clean all done!!! So happy!!!
So that concludes our timeline :)
We did Conventional Loan and paid for closing costs as well. All in all we put down 8% of the total price. My tip for you when you are planning on buying a house is save as much not only your down payment but also for closing cost just incase you have to shoulder everything. Also have money for appraisal, home inspection and home warranty. There are so many "surprise" fees you will encounter besides your closing costs and down payment.
When we got the house, we still needed repairs like the faucet leaking, paints, flooring, and of course furnitures. Since we came from a one bedroom apartment, we don't have washer/dryer, refrigerator and a lot more needed. We only bought the necessary stuff and decided to just take it slow. However we hired a contractor to paint and did our flooring - another expenses you need to save because most likely they will ask for cash as payment.
Sorry for the long post and if I misspelled anything. I'm so tired right now.. Hahah!
Here are some pictures of the house. I'm such a proud home owner! :)
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