100 Questions Every First-Time Home Buyer Should Ask
By Ilyce R. Glink, Times Books, 450 pages, $14
The emotional roller coaster that comes with buying a first home has enough ups and downs to make most people a little queasy.
After months of open houses, credit checks, mortgage banker meetings and writing big checks comes perhaps the most sickening feeling of all. Real estate pros call it “buyer’s remorse,” and characterize the symptoms with phrases like “an overwhelming feeling of anxiety” and “that sinking feeling in your gut that you’ve forgotten something.”
One local real estate writer has the Rx for first-time home buyers: “100 Questions Every First-Time Home Buyer Should Ask” (Times Books, 450 pages, $14) by Chicago writer Ilyce R. Glink is a tonic for novice buyers who continue to take advantage of single-digit mortgage rates. And with 2.3 million first-time buyers in the market annually, that’s a lot of tonic.
Glink conceived the book when she was chasing an assignment for the Tribune’s Your Place section about the questions first-time buyers ask. After hearing brokers repeat the same questions over and over again, she decided to put them in book form.
The result is a book that asks-and answers-most every question that either first-time or out-of-practice buyers could ask. The book lists 100 questions that range from simple to soul-searching from “How do I make a counter-offer?” to “How do I find the home of my dreams?”
Like a good reporter, Glink leaves no simple question unasked, and her answers are concise, simple and pragmatic.
Example: Question 54-“How do I choose the right lender for me?” Glink gives the bare facts on how mortgage bankers do their job, the fact that there are options to meet each buyer’s needs and a couple of resources for finding a local lender. And she also offers some good advice: Remember, when applying for a loan, you’re in the driver’s seat. If a lender seems condescending or doesn’t treat you fairly or with civility, take your business elsewhere.
Common-sense advice like that runs throughout the book, which is arranged in four parts-“Looking for a Home,” “Putting Together the Deal,” “Financing,” and “The Closing”-that mirror the process of getting into the first abode.
Her plain-English approach helps, too. Not a bit of jargon goes unexplained, and Glink goes to great lengths to turn the alphabet soup of home-buying-PITI, PMI, ARM, etc.-into reading that’s digestible and helpful.
Fortunately, Glink’s book doesn’t end after she’s answered question No. 100 (Q: “What if I discover the seller or the seller’s broker lied about something in my home after I moved in?” A: Consult your attorney).
In fact, the next 140 or so pages offer amortization charts, sample contracts, a glossary of terms and enough other resources to merit a book of its own.
Glink, for example, gives us a David Letterman-type rundown of the “Top Ten Mistakes First-time Buyers Make.” They include:
– Looking at homes you can’t afford. When you finally come to your senses and start looking at homes in your price range, it’ll probably be disappointing.
– Operating on a “first house is best” thoery. Coming from a cramped, one-bedroom rental, almost any house will look good.
– Being indecisive. The problem with indecisiveness is finding a home you would like to live in, but being afraid to make the commitment.
Fear of commitment spells doom for many relationships, including the one between home and home buyer. For its $14 price tag, “100 Questions” provides a lot of insight for home buyers ready to commit to the “M” word: mortgage. Over 30 years, that only comes out to about 4 cents a month.
