Do you get stressed thinking about home buying? Only 20 percent of Americans feel confident while looking for a home according to recent research. And, 40 percent of home buyers rate buying a home as the most stressful thing in their lives. Where there’s stress, emotions run high. Understanding the emotional steps of home buying and how they can affect your home buying process will help you reduce stress and complete a successful transaction.
Why Buying a Home Arouses Your Emotions
A home means different things to different people. For some, it’s a status symbol. For others, a home is a symbol of achieving the American Dream. Many people think of their home as the place they go to feel comfortable and build memories.
Regardless of how you think about home, buying one is going to trigger different emotions. It’s a big financial decision, and it represents an investment that you will need to care for and protect as long as you own it.
The home buying process isn’t something you do every day, or even every year. As the real estate market and your needs change, the process is different each time you decide to buy a new home. It’s not always easy to feel confident in your decision-making skills.
The Problem with Letting Your Emotions Rule Your Decisions
There’s no doubt you want to find the right home. You can’t eliminate the emotional component of home buying. You must like the home you buy. But at its core, home buying is a financial transaction. You’ll be most comfortable with your home buying experience if you keep emotions in check and put enough focus on treating the purchase as a business transaction.
If you let emotion rule, you could run into some big problems. For example, you may spend more on a home than you should and end up “house poor.” You may ignore problems with the home you’ve fallen in love with and purchase it anyway. Or, you might wait to find the perfect property and make your home search a long and frustrating process.
You may also move too fast and fail to get guidance from the right professionals. Professional guidance can help you avoid many problems you’ll run into when you let your emotions rule.
How to Control Your Emotions When Buying a Home
The best way to control your emotions is to take one step at a time, and to involve the real estate professionals who are available to help guide you through the process.
Get Pre-Approved for a Mortgage
Unless you’re extremely wealthy, you’ll need to finance your home purchase. Getting pre-approved has two advantages. When you’ve been pre-approved, you have a much stronger negotiating position because the sellers know you’re qualified to purchase their property.
Working with a lender to get pre-approved also helps you control your emotional response to homes you can’t afford because you won’t see them. The lender will pre-approve you for a specific mortgage amount, which will let you know how much house you can afford. Based on that, you’ll be able to limit your home search to the appropriate price range.
Make sure to discuss your financial goals with your lender. Be realistic about the overall cost of home ownership, and how that relates to your other financial goals. For example, if you plan to take an extended vacation every year, you may not want to set your price range at the upper limit the lender will approve.
Finding the best team to help you through your real estate transaction is key. You can get pre-approved through SD Capital Funding in a few simple clicks and they’ll be there for every step throughout the process to ensure you close on time! The next member of your team should be LemonBrew Abstract, offering innovative, electronic title and escrow services. Our fully digital solution eliminates the need for borrowers, buyers, sellers and real estate agents to write paper checks, making the whole process seamless and stress-free.
Define Your “Must Have” and “Want to Have” Home Criteria
It can be difficult to separate your wish list into must-have and want to have home features. You may need guidance to help you finalize those lists. Your goal should be to identify those things that you can compromise on and those things that you absolutely must have to be happy. Using these lists, you can avoid the temptation to make an emotional buying decision.
Hire the Right Real Estate Agent
There are undoubtedly many real estate agents in your area. You need to work with a professional agent who understands your local market and who will help you focus on homes that meet your criteria at a price you can afford.
The right agent can help you finalize the lists you made to identify the things you must have in a home, and the things that would be nice to have. For example, assume you listed a swimming pool as a must-have. Your agent can warn you if you won’t be able to find a home with a pool in your price range. You can update your lists and save yourself the frustration.
That agent can also increase your confidence and reduce stress by guiding you through the home buying process, protecting your interests, negotiating for you, and identifying other professionals you’ll need such as home inspectors.
How to Find Your Dream Home
Start by recognizing that buying a home is a process, not an event. Don’t feel pressured to make an offer on the first home you see. And, don’t fall in love too quickly. If you let “the one” go, realize that it’s not the only house that will meet your needs and just keep looking.
It would be a shock if you see yourself living in a mansion, and then discover that your budget won’t let you buy the home you’ve seen in your dreams. But, you need to be realistic. That home in your dreams would quickly become a burden if you tried to buy it.
Keep your must-have and want to have lists nearby throughout your search. If you find a house that meets all the things on both lists, you’ll be in the minority. Most of the time you’ll need to make compromises, so plan on it. It’s why you made the lists in the first place.
Listen to your advisers. If the home inspector finds a major flaw in the foundation of a home, don’t dismiss it. It could turn your dream home into a money pit. Find out if there’s a realistic way to resolve the issue. If you can’t find one, just move on.
You Can Make Home Buying Fun
When you remove heavy emotions and stress from the home buying process, you can make it a lot of fun. Be realistic, get the right advisers, and treat buying a home as an exciting opportunity. You’ll end up loving your new home.