There is a good guy at ERA in PQ, his name is Jim Smith. I know him personally, although I did not use him. I used to be an appraiser, in my purchase, I basically did my own homework-found the house, went to the open house, researched everything, and my mortgage guy who is also a broker did all the paperwork (and gave me a rebate on 1/2 his commission for additional down payment). sdmove, there are some bargains in PQ, right now the interest rates are so low, you might be surprised at how much you can afford. Have you gotten pre-approved for a loan? That might help you in your decision. I simply went to SDlookup.com, I would look every day, that is where you can see “today’s changes” on the list after you input the zip code. You can see what comes on the market daily. If I really wanted to see a house, I would call my broker or the listing agent directly and go and see it. We did go to open houses, but in hot markets, the houses have several offers by the time you go to the open house. If you see a property you like you have to be ready to go. We put in offers on only two houses, one was a foreclosure, and the one we bought. The foreclosure sold for $30,000 more than we offered, it had some issues, so I wasn’t too upset. It needed at least $30,000 worth of work. This house we happened to know the owners, so we didn’t want to insult them, but we did offer the lowest end of the range and had a list of repairs to be done prior to us taking it. It is hard buying from an aquaintance that you know when they are in financial trouble. I am able to seperate business from friendship, I don’t really know if they were, but that is not my concern. They have avoided us since…
Yes, it is a big house, we have three kids, and may have to take in grandparents soon. I also teach music in my house and am an artist, so I needed a big studio. I have converted the living room into an art studio/teaching space, it works great. No one ever uses a living room anyway when there is a big family room. I rented a house once from a Chinese man, he always said “biggest room in house, no one ever go there…strange American custom!”.
