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DC
METRO REAL ESTATE
Serving
the Real Estate needs of the communities of
Manassas, Bristow, Haymarket, Warrenton, Gainesville
and Culpeper in Northern Virginia
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Dave
Scardina
Broker
/ Owner
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703-829-SOLD
866-909-0900
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Manassas Real Estate GuideManassas Real Estate or Homeowner’s Insurance
While it is necessary to have Manassas Real Estate or Homeowner’s Insurance, there are ways to reduce your premium costs.
One: Raise your deductible. Deductibles are the amount you must pay towards a loss before your insurance company starts to pay. You can save costs on your overall policy by increasing the amount of your deductible. For example, according to a Federal Government paper on lowering Manassas insurance costs, you can save up to 12% on your rate if you go with a $500.00 deductible rather than a $250.00 deductible.
Manassas HOME BUYING PITFALLS TO AVOID
Buying your Manassas home whether you are a first time buyer or an ‘Old Pro’ involves legal, financial and emotional considerations. The more you know about the most common buyer mistakes, the more likely you are to avoid them.
Make sure that when you put in an offer on any Manassas home that you have spent time narrowing down just what you are looking for. When the sellers accept your offer, you are involved in a binding contract that could cost you your deposit and other damages should you decide to back out. The opposite scenario, waiting for the 100 % perfect home can be an exercise in futility. With the thousands of variables available in housing, including location, style, size, amenities and condition, perfection is almost always an unreasonable goal.
Before You Buy Your Manassas Home
Whether you are a first time buyer or someone who is moving up to a more expensive home it’s a good idea to start by cleaning up your credit report. Let’s say you apply for a loan to purchase an Manassas condo, town home, single-family home or any type of Manassas. The lender will check out your monthly income and outgo to determine if you can afford to repay the loan. Therefore, it is to your advantage to pay off as many high-interest consumer loans as possible. If you are planning on buying a car, a boat or other major purchase, put it off until after you have bought your selected Manassas real estate. Lenders look for certain patterns they consider red flags. These are: late payments, overextension, liens, garnishments and, of course, bankruptcy. Remember, debts reduce the amount of cash you can spend on the Manassas you want to buy, so clear the decks as much as possible before applying for a loan
Buying Manassas Below Market
On most real estate Websites you can enter the parameters you want for your Manassas. Include the price, size, features and location and the technology will notify you automatically the moment a property that meets your needs comes on the market. Now if what you are looking for is a particular type of property for a price that is significantly under market, you’d better be prepared to act quickly because you aren’t the only one who’s looking for a bargain.
Often times, when a home comes on the market priced under the market there are extenuating circumstances. Maybe the house needs maintenance. Maybe the yard needs work. If you are prepared with a certain amount of knowledge about the costs of roofing, painting, landscaping and other types of deferred maintenance, you will be in a position to evaluate whether or not the Manassas is priced well enough that it truly is a bargain and not a fixer-upper nightmare.
The Benefits of Selling Manassas
If your Manassas holdings consist of both a personal residence and a rental, you can sell your personal residence and exclude up to $250,000 ($500,000 for a married couple) on the gain. Then you move into your rental, live in it as your personal residence for two years and then sell it, again benefiting from the $250,000 or $500,000 exclusion. This is true even though most or all of the increase in value occurred before you converted the property to your personal residence.
Tips for Buying or Selling Manassas
Most experienced real estate agents and brokers already have Websites that showcase their local MLS data so your Manassas can show up online as soon as it is listed. On the other hand, if you are selling on your own it will take time or a considerable advertising budget to get your individual Manassas property to show up on the major search engines where prospective buyers will find it. You could tap into one of the several For Sale by Owner Websites but that would limit your market of buyers.
Buying real estate in Manassas is also much easier when you work with a real estate agent who knows the area and the market. While there is a great deal of information online about real estate asking prices, it is not always so easy to find out what a property actually sold for. And even then, specific terms of a sale often make a difference in how to interpret the sales price.
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