GETTING STARTED
Whether it’s your first home or you’re getting ready to downsize, purchasing a house is an exciting life decision that requires lots of consideration to ensure you find the perfect home. Here are some questions to consider before you start looking at listings:
- How large does the house have to be for my family to be comfortable?
- How many rooms and bathrooms are required?
- What size yard will accommodate children and pets?
- What are my current parking and transportation needs?
- What are the schools like in the areas I’m considering?
- How important is having a house close to work, local amenities, public transportation?
- In which areas of the city would you like to live? Are there areas that you want to avoid?
- Are there special considerations required for hobbies, guests, potential additions to the family, physical limitations or disabilities?
The answers to these questions will help you not only determine the type of house that will be the best for you, but also save you time from viewing houses that don’t meet your personal criteria. Getting prequalified is also key at this stage so you have a good sense of the price range you would be looking at and can be ready to make a purchase if the latest listing is the one you want.
THE BUYING PROCESS
Once we find a property you want to make an offer on, this what happens next:
Preparing an Offer:
It’s important at this stage to determine whether the property is priced appropriately, by performing a market evaluation. Using comparable recent sales, we can get a sense of the appropriate price to pay for the home. Once we land on a price that you’re comfortable with we start the paperwork.
Purchase Agreement:
The agreement to purchase and sale in Nova Scotia is typically between 3-5 pages (depending on what type of property it is, and is very protective of the buyer during the ‘conditional period’.) This can be a little onerous but every minute is worth it to make sure you have a full understanding of everything before signing the agreement.
The Wait:
I’ve had a few immediate responses over the year but for the most part, we’ll usually hear back on your offer within 24 hours (unless it’s a bank-owned/estate property). At this point, the seller will reply with either an acceptance of your offer, a rejection, or a counter to your offer, which you will then get the opportunity to make a decision on.
If the offer is rejected we can look to prepare a new offer. The counter process can take some time depending on the issues/changes in question. Once an offer is accepted, we can get the champagne chilling.
Conditional Period:
Once the offer has been accepted there is often a conditional period to ensure there is time for things like a home inspection, financing, insurance and legal approval. This period is about 7-10 days out in most instances. I’ll take care of most of the process at this point but you will still need to be involved at every stage.
Closing Day:
Woot-woot! The big day has finally arrived. This is the point when we’ll do a pre-close walkthrough of the property. This is to make sure the house is in the same condition we last saw it in and that any work required has been completed etc. If all is ok, we’ll call your lawyer to “release the funds” and once the seller has received them we’ll pop the cork on the bubbly and celebrate your new home!
