Staying Safe in Your First Home

Staying Safe in Your First Home

The following contribution is from another author.

When buying a house for the first time, buyers can become overwhelmed with a property that they fall in love with for all the wrong reasons. Approaching the real estate market for the first time requires a lot of legwork and homework. Whether it’s a 20-year mortgage or 30 years, you can assume that this is a house that you’ll be spending a major portion of your life. There are tips and tricks, as well as good solid advice that will help you choose the house of a lifetime.

Getting Started with a House Hunt

The reason to go through these specific steps is to safeguard your purchase and your health. For instance, if you invest in a home where the asbestos was not properly dealt with, you could be looking at years of asbestos inhalation. Other types of health hazards could include mold, mildew or even vermin. The danger of asbestos is that when the fibers are inhaled into your lungs, it can develop into cancer. Due to the latency of symptoms, it is usually only discovered in later years.

Check How Much Mortgage You’re Eligible For

It’s pretty clear that without some money in the bank, you wouldn’t even consider the option of buying your own home. So assuming you do have a nice nest egg, you can hire the best mortgage broker from mortgage1st.co.uk for proper guidance. Included in that assessment will be a credit check to find out if you’re late with payments or have too many bills to pay. When you have that amount, ask a lender for pre-approval.

Choose a Realtor and Go Shopping

Once you have seen a few houses and you can’t stop imagining your life in one of them, go ahead and make an offer. Order a home inspection of the house you want to buy to make sure it’s structurally sound and in good shape. Here are some of the items on the checklist:

  • Asbestos
  • Termites
  • Mold
  • Cracked foundation
  • Roof leaks
  • Faulty plumbing
  • Ordering a Home Appraisal

There are many points to juggle when choosing a first home, but there are priorities. For instance, according to a report in 2019, the most important feature was safety. In fact, safety came in at 82% in that study. There are different types of safety in a home. One takes into account the safety of the neighborhood, but the safety of the home is every bit as important. For instance, if you moved into a home with asbestos, your possibility of developing asbestos poisoning would be increased. Since many properties in the 1950s through 1980s were built using asbestos products, they could very well be in a home you are interested in. Get a report and know before signing the deal that you won’t be at risk for asbestos poisoning. Be sure to do your own research using sites like Asbestos.Net to be informed.

Finally, after you’ve chosen a beautiful home, checked its safety, and signed a contract, you can move in with confidence that you will be secure.

Author

Eric is the creator of At Home in the Future and has been a passionate fan of the future since he was seven. He's a web developer by trade, and serves as the Director of Communication and Technology for a large church in Nashville, TN (where he and his family are building a high tech home in the woods).