First-Time Home Buyer Tips: 18 Things Nobody Tells You Until It's Too Late
Every first-time home buyer tips article on the internet says the same things: get pre-approved, hire a good agent, don't skip the inspection. That's fine advice. It's also obvious.
This list is different. These are the first-time home buyer tips that come from people who've already made the mistakes — the ones buried in Reddit threads, shared over drinks, and discovered the hard way during the first year of homeownership. They're organized by phase so you can use the ones relevant to where you are in the process right now.
Before you start looking
1. The bank's maximum is not your budget
A lender will approve you for the maximum mortgage your debt-to-income ratio allows. That number does not account for the life you actually live. It doesn't subtract daycare, student loan payments, car insurance, the fact that you eat out three times a week, or the reality that you'll need to replace the furnace in five years.
Calculate your budget backward from your monthly take-home pay minus all non-housing expenses. The number you land on will be 20-30% lower than the bank's maximum. That gap is the difference between owning a home and being house-poor.
2. You need more cash than just the down payment
The down payment is the number everyone talks about. The number nobody talks about is the additional $10,000-$25,000 you'll need for closing costs (2-5% of the purchase price), moving expenses, immediate purchases (locks, blinds, cleaning supplies), and the emergency fund you should have before buying.
If you drain your savings to make the down payment, you're one broken furnace away from a financial crisis.
3. Check your credit report six months before you start
Errors on credit reports are common. Disputing them takes 30-90 days. If you discover an error the week before applying for a mortgage, you're out of time. Pull your report early, dispute anything inaccurate, and give yourself a buffer.
Also: don't open new credit cards, finance a car, or make any large purchases in the months leading up to your mortgage application. Lenders pull your credit again before closing, and new debt can change your approval.
4. If you're buying with a partner, have the priority conversation first
One of you wants a big yard. The other wants a short commute. One of you wants turnkey. The other wants a fixer-upper at a lower price. These are not compromises you figure out while standing in someone else's living room with your agent's commission on the line.
Sit down separately. Each of you ranks your priorities: location, size, condition, budget, commute, school district, neighborhood character. Compare your lists. Where you disagree is where the arguments will happen — and it's better to know that now than during an open house.
During the search
5. Visit the neighborhood at 10 PM on a Friday
Every neighborhood looks great at 2 PM on a Sunday. That's when open houses are scheduled for a reason. Go back on a Friday or Saturday night. Is there a bar with a parking lot that fills up? Do the neighbors have parties? Is the street used as a cut-through? What's the noise level from the nearby highway that seemed "far enough away" during the day?
Check flight paths too. Some neighborhoods sit directly under approach corridors. The sound comes and goes, but it comes every three minutes.
6. Check cell signal and internet options inside the house
"Does it have internet?" is the wrong question. "Which ISPs service this address, and is fiber available?" is the right one. In many areas, you'll have exactly one option — and it might be 25 Mbps DSL. If you work from home, this is a non-negotiable.
Walk through every room and check your cell signal. Basements and interior rooms in some construction types are dead zones. Unlike almost every other house problem, you cannot renovate your way out of poor cell reception.
7. Open every faucet and flush every toilet
Water pressure issues don't show up in listing photos. Turn on the kitchen faucet, then turn on the bathroom faucet, then flush a toilet. If the shower slows to a trickle, there's a supply line issue — usually corroded galvanized pipes in older homes. Replacing supply lines throughout a house costs $4,000-$10,000.
8. The smell test is real
Close your eyes when you walk in. Musty smell? Mold or moisture. Strong air freshener? Something's being masked. Cat urine? It's soaked into the subfloor and the only fix is ripping up the floor.
Sellers stage homes with fresh paint, open windows, and scented candles for a reason. Your nose catches things your eyes miss.
9. Don't fall in love with staging
Professional staging makes a 1,400 square foot house look like a magazine spread. The furniture is undersized, the art is strategically placed, and the lighting is optimized. When you move in with your actual furniture, the rooms will feel different.
Ignore the staging. Look at the bones: room dimensions, natural light, layout flow, storage space, and the things you can't change (location, lot, orientation).
10. Use a scoring system, not your gut
After seeing five houses in one weekend, your memory blurs. You'll remember the one with the great kitchen and forget that its basement smelled like mildew. A simple scoring system — rate each house on 8-10 criteria, compare scores — prevents emotional decision-making.
This is why couples argue about houses. One person remembers the kitchen. The other remembers the yard. A scorecard gives you shared data to discuss.
During the offer and inspection
11. The inspection isn't pass/fail — it's a negotiation tool
Every house has issues. The home inspection report will list 30-50 items. Most are maintenance tasks (replace furnace filter, caulk bathtub). A few are significant (aging roof, cracked foundation, recalled electrical panel).
Your job isn't to demand that every item be fixed. Your job is to identify the expensive, safety-critical issues and use them to negotiate — either a price reduction, a seller credit at closing, or a requirement that the seller make repairs before closing. Focus on the big-ticket items and let the cosmetic stuff go.
12. Ask for credits, not repairs
When you negotiate after the inspection, consider asking for a closing credit instead of requiring the seller to make repairs. Here's why: the seller will hire the cheapest contractor they can find. They have zero incentive to do quality work on a house they're leaving.
A credit puts the money in your hands. You choose the contractor. You control the quality. And if the repair comes in cheaper than the credit, you pocket the difference.
13. Get a sewer scope on any home older than 30 years
Standard home inspections do not include a sewer scope. The inspector checks that drains flow, but they can't see whether the sewer line from the house to the street is intact. Tree roots, collapsed clay pipes, and bellied (sagging) lines are invisible until they back up into your basement.
A sewer scope costs $200-$400. A sewer line replacement costs $10,000-$25,000. This is the single highest-ROI inspection you can add.
14. Don't waive contingencies in a panic
In a competitive market, your agent might suggest waiving the inspection contingency or the appraisal contingency to make your offer more attractive. Think very carefully before doing this.
Waiving the inspection contingency means you're buying the house as-is. If the inspection reveals a $30,000 foundation issue, you either absorb it or lose your earnest money walking away. Waiving the appraisal contingency means if the house appraises below your offer, you're paying the difference in cash.
These contingencies exist to protect you. Waiving them to win a bidding war is how people end up underwater.
At closing and beyond
15. Read your Closing Disclosure line by line
Three days before closing, you'll receive a Closing Disclosure showing every fee you're paying. Compare it to the Loan Estimate you received when you applied. Fees change — and not always in your favor. Look for new fees that weren't on the original estimate, and ask about any line item you don't understand.
"Document preparation fee," "processing fee," and "administrative fee" are often padding. Ask what each one covers and whether it can be removed. The worst they can say is no.
16. Verify wiring instructions by phone, never by email
Real estate wire fraud is a multi-hundred-million-dollar crime. Hackers infiltrate real estate email chains and send fake wiring instructions that look identical to legitimate ones. If you follow them, your down payment goes to a criminal's account and is usually unrecoverable.
When you receive wiring instructions, do not call the number in the email. Call your title company or attorney using a phone number you got in person or from their official website. Verify the account number and routing number verbally. This is not paranoia — it's the standard protocol that every title company recommends.
17. Do the final walkthrough like you mean it
The final walkthrough is not a formality. It's your last chance to verify that agreed-upon repairs were made, that the seller didn't remove fixtures that were supposed to stay (light fixtures, appliances, window treatments), and that no new damage occurred after the inspection.
Bring your inspection report. Check every item that was supposed to be repaired. Turn on every appliance. Run every faucet. Open every door. If something's wrong, you have leverage — closing hasn't happened yet.
18. Budget for the first month like you're furnishing from scratch
Even if you're bringing furniture from a previous home, there's a long list of things you won't have: blinds or curtains (the first night in a house with bare windows is memorable), a shower curtain and rod, a lawn mower, a garden hose, a toilet plunger for every bathroom, fire extinguishers, a basic toolkit, cleaning supplies for a full house, and the replacement locks you should install on day one.
Budget $2,000-$3,000 for first-month essentials. If you're coming from an apartment, double that number.
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