Story Time: 3 Big Mistakes My Clients Made Before Buying Their First Home
You'll probably make at least one before we're done...

Chris Clasby
Mortgage Professional

Buying a home is not like buying a pack of gum at the gas station, it’s a serious process. Sometimes a long process, and often a stressful one. However, it really can (and should!) be fun and exciting.
The following stories are based on real events, and they’re presented here so YOU can learn from the mistakes without making them. The names have been changed to protect the innocent, but by keeping these stories in mind as you start your process, you will turn the process of buying your home into the fun experience that it should be.
So buckle up because it’s storytime!
Mistake #1
One morning at the office I got a frantic call from a woman I’d never spoken to before.
“How quickly can I get Approved for a Mortgage?” she said.
“Usually it takes me a few hours from when you get your income documents to me,” I said, and I gave her my email.
About 20 minutes later, I had everything I needed from her and got the Pre-Approval letter to her shortly thereafter. She wrote an offer that day, got it accepted, and then bought the house.
Success story right? Well, yes it was a success but it was MUCH more stressful for her than it needed to be!
All of that stress was self-imposed, simply because she didn’t get a Pre-Approval early in the process.
As the story turned out, she had been working with a Real Estate Agent but hadn’t gotten a mortgage Pre-Approval (despite the Agent basically BEGGING her…), and then suddenly the right house showed up: location, price, bedrooms were just right and she wanted to put in an offer.
The Sellers were only accepting offers until that evening, and just like all offers, they’d want to see a mortgage Pre-Approval Letter. Luckily for her, I work quickly and we were able to get her Approved, but again she was frantic over something we could and should have completed on day 1 of house shopping.
Plus, she spent weeks looking at houses with only a guess for the payment or whether she really could afford to buy the house she wanted.
The Fix
Say you’re in the market for a new home. You’ve looked at a few homes online and are ready to take a few tours with your Real Estate agent. At this point,
Getting Pre-Approved is the #1 item on your list.
This process may take some time and you NEED to be Pre-Approved before making an offer to the seller.
Mistake #2
No one wants to compromise when buying a home, but the long-term costs of renting rather than buying are sneaky and usually even more expensive than making a compromise. Sometimes NOT buying something that’s less than perfect might actually make buying that perfect home harder to achieve in the future.
A former colleague had a friend who was renting a fantastic condo by the beach when he was single. This was in the early 2000s (older colleague…), and the rent was cheap: “why buy a house when I can stay here for the same monthly payment as buying, and no down payment?” he thought. Truthfully, the “Dream Home” he really wanted wasn’t affordable (he made decent money but didn’t have the down payment) so he kept renting.
Pretty shortly thereafter he got married. Because his condo was in a better location than her place, his wife moved in with him. The landlord raised the rent, but with her additional income the rent was still affordable and the new couple enjoyed their beach condo life. Again, they probably could have found something to buy, but they were newlyweds living at the beach! So they kept renting.
Well, as happens with many young married couples living together, pretty soon she was pregnant and again they had a decision: keep renting a house that their family was starting to outgrow, or buy a house they could afford and give up the beach life. Since they were now making more money, they could probably have bought a nice little starter house or condo, but again the “Dream House” a 3 bedroom 2 bath near the beach, was still more than they could afford.
That nice starter home would mean giving up the beach life! So, again, they decided that rather than buying, they’d rent a larger condo by the beach. Again, the rent went up, but they couldn’t afford to buy the “Dream Home” so they rented it, meanwhile, that dream was actually getting more expensive and larger as their housing needs changed…
"While he rented, his rent went up, and the prices of homes around him went up as well, pushing his dream further from reality."