Buying a home single and selling in a few years?

Doing this was a great financial decision for me.

As a single guy you can be strategic. You can buy a cheaper house. You can buy in a neighborhood that no one is talking about. You're not limited to turn-key houses. Because of all this, my "day one" mortgage + expenses were less than almost every apartment in town. As rents have gone up, my mortgage stays the same and it's more affordable than ever. Also, chicks dig guys who own houses.

Don't even waste your time talking to for-profit banks / lenders. They're all upwards of .5% higher, which can easily equate to tens of thousands of dollars over the life of the loan. Even a single 1/8th (0.125%) is substantial. You probably will have to call and talk to a human for them to "push it through" because the applications are on the internet and they can't just let every application run through the system without authorization, but it's all the same system. A good relationship with your lender will NOT help you qualify for a loan that you don't qualify for. They all follow the same federal rules, because they all issue the same loans and sell them off on the same secondary market (hence mortgage backed securities). You'll hear scare tactics about credit unions taking forever to move paper, but in my experience that was all super easy and quick.

In terms of timing the market, you can't do it. If we hit a global depression in 5 years, then we're going to hit a global depression whether you're in a house or an apartment. Even if it hits in 1 year and you end up way underwater, at least you have a house. Your mortgage could very well be the same a rent, and it's a lot harder to repo a house than evict someone from an apartment.

Moreover, if you don't overpay then you won't end up underwater. Even when the market is hot (which it's steadied off around here), there are good deals and there are bad deals. Find a good deal.

 

Wow y’all have given me some EXCELLENT advice! I hadn’t even thought about keeping the house and renting it out when I move out west (probably Texas) or developing a relationship with a smaller bank like @senecataco said. I have a lot to think about now. I won’t be moving out of the apartment for another 6 months or so, plenty of time to figure out exactly where I want to buy and what I want to do. I will be coming back to this thread for reference a lot! Thank you all for helping out a clueless first time home buying

 

Right on, dude. You're doing the right thing asking questions... I've bought two houses and I still feel like I barely have a grip on it. Seriously, you don't know what you're in for until you've gone through it, so don't hesitate to ask questions. It's a big commitment, so go in with your eyes wide open.

Even if you're six months out or more, keep researching, thinking, and even start looking at houses. Just skim realtor.com or Zillow, or look for open houses or whatever. Call up a real estate agent, and be up front with them, say you're still probably 6+ months out from a purchase but want to start looking just to get a feel for what’s available in the area--they'll be more than happy to show you some houses. Just spending time looking at places and actually physically visiting them will help you get a better idea of what you can afford, what you want (and just as importantly: what you don't). My wife and I actually ended up renting for a year longer than we originally planned, just because when we started looking, we just didn’t like the houses in our price range, so we sucked it up and saved for another year. We didn’t really know what we could and couldn’t afford until we really started looking and visiting houses.

Also bear in mind that it takes freaking forever to buy a house. Even in the small, relatively rural town where I live, the process from offer, to inspection, to counteroffer, to closing... took probably two and a half months? And it took even longer in the midsize city where we bought our first property. And if you buy a house in some state of foreclosure or that's otherwise owned by a city/county/etc for tax or debt purposes, you can get a deal but it can take an incredibly long time. Don’t mean to stress you out anything, you’ve still got a ton of time if you’re gonna be in your current place for another six months... just do yourself a favor and keep moving forward.

 

It is true a relationship will not help you qualify for a loan you don’t qualify for. It is also true all secondary market loans are pretty much the same. A relationship with a lender may cause them to work a little harder for you and book it in there own portfolio as opposed to selling it. If they book it in there own portfolio the lender has more flexibility. Although not as much as pre Dodd-Frank.

 

This is so true, it took 7 freakin months from when I shook the sellers hand till we closed on the house! Surveys, inspections, legal issues, banks, credit unions, red tape, what a pain in the ass.

 

I've only bought three homes, but none took more than 35 days from offer to moving in. I suppose there are extenuating circumstances occasionally, but unless there is something strange going on with the title, it shouldn't take months to buy/sell a house once a legitimate offer is received/accepted.

You're going to get pre approved at your bank while you look for a house, so once you actually get an offer accepted, it will go pretty quick unless there are problems with the house.