Steps to Buying Property

1- Make the decision to buy. Buy doing this you have set a new goal!

2- Get mortgage finance approved. – This is a crucial step, and usually neglected until the last minute when you have found a home to buy. Find out what your credit score is and purchasing power is and how it ties in with your budget. Do you need to buy cash flow positive, neutral or a negative geared property?

3- Find an area and start researching the homes for sale. Or alternatively start researching great growth areas this will find you an area. This will be one of the most time consuming steps of all, however this is most important and where the serious money is made. Learning your area and its details is vital to being able to pick a property and confidently know what is worth renovated, un-renovated, developed, un-developed and how much you willing to pay. Knowing the past growth rates and key price drivers is risk protection and ensures you know what your buying.

4- This would be a good time to do a little research and find a good accountant and solicitor if you don’t already have one. You need to ask them one important question among others- Do they invest money in property and do a lot of their clients do the same (are they property savvy and familiar with its practices and laws). If you had a property coach or mentor this is also an opportune time to double check your direction and get a valuable second opinion.

5- This time is also well spent finding a well experienced and qualified building and pest inspector. Ask them what their lead-time is if you do happen to be in a rush to get an inspection (during a short settlement time).

6- Once you have found your property through your now honed laser guided research and data, you can then start focusing on the one property. This could involve a long list of questions to the property agent, a friendly chat to the neighbors and a visit to the local council to check out zoning and restrictions. This will determine if the property is worth pursuing if it meets your requirements or you need to find another. You can in some instances sign a pre-offer agreement if the market is busy to secure your bid while you are researching the finer details to keep other bidders at bay.

7- If you still go ahead this is where you will make an offer (usually a signed conditional sales and purchase agreement) and start the fun and lucrative game of negotiating price and sales terms. With consultation with your solicitor ensure you have terms in the contract if you need to pull out for any particular reason (this could save you from an unwanted purchase). Always try to get a decent settlement term so you have enough time to get all your check done and finance in place (banks can be slow in processing sometimes).

8- At this point you should have agreed on a price and have a counter signed contract with an unconditional and settlement date. This means you are now closer to ownership. You have till unconditional date to have all your checks done and be ready to buy the property.

9- You now have to send a copy of your contract to your finance broker and your solicitor for final checks and approvals.

10- During this time you would have the property checked by your building and pest inspector. Go over all building extensions, alterations, and things that look out of place a builder would know about. Anything out of place can be negotiated down in the contract price to reflect the changes and problems.

11- Once all the checks have been carried out and you are happy to go forward, your solicitor can officially confirm settlement with the selling party and it then goes unconditional. You are 90% of the way to ownership. If there were any more negotiations and it didn’t go unconditional its common practice to extend the settlement date so you still have sufficient time to negotiate, fix problems and reschedule settlement.

12- Once settlement is confirmed, both solicitors will book in a time with the banks to transfer the money and respective property titles.

13- Settlement. Congratulations. This is the day all the money gets transferred and you take ownership.

14- If you are going to live in the property-Party!

15- If it’s an investment, a property manger might need to be employed and all relevant tenant checks done. No Party though…

Finance Me operates throughout Australia and helps investors and home owners get the right advice and finance for property ownership and investing.