6 Risks and Pitfalls Archives - Agents for Home Buyers

Lending Requirements

Make sure that the complex meets the criteria for major lenders. If you are getting an FHA loan, your lender will verify that the complex is FHA approved. However, if you are paying cash or getting a conventional loan, you may only discover that the complex is not FHA approved when you are trying to sell it and find out that an FHA buyer can’t buy your condo because the complex doesn’t meet their lending requirements. If the complex is not eligible for FHA or conventional loans with low down payment limits, you may have purchased a condo with a

November 16, 2017 No Comments

Rules and Regulations

In addition to recorded covenants, most town home or condominium associations have unrecorded rules and regulations that you will have to live with. You need to review these and make sure you are comfortable with them. It is also a good idea to review the minutes of recent association meetings to familiarize yourself with the issues that are of concern to current owners in the complex.

November 16, 2017 No Comments

Condos and Townhomes

We noted in our section on Legal Issues that the evaluation process for any real estate that you’re buying requires that you look beyond the physical structure or the land itself to the more abstract legal characteristics of the property you’re buying. When you’re buying a condominium or town home, or any even a single family home or piece of land that is governed by a home owner’s association, you need to be a least one degree more cautious. When you buy this type of property, you’re not just purchasing a piece of real estate. You’re buying into a corporate

November 16, 2017 No Comments

Plans vs. Reality

As the construction proceeds, do your best to monitor the correspondence between the house that is specified in the contract and what is actually going up. As busy as builders sometimes are, it is very easy for them to overlook the fact that you wanted a skylight in the living room, an extra 220 outlet in the garage, or even an additional bedroom.

November 16, 2017 No Comments

Home Warranty

You need to evaluate the warranty language itself. Warranties offered by builders in this area vary widely. Some cover the home for a year after closing. Others cover some parts of the home, typically structural elements, for 10 years. Some cover concrete flatwork (e.g., basement floors and driveways) if there is differential movement of a 1/4-inch or more. Some explicitly exclude any coverage of flatwork. I wouldn’t make a buying decision solely on the basis of the warranty, but you need to know what the warranty covers before you sign.

November 16, 2017 No Comments

Who is the Builder

You need to make some attempt to evaluate the builder you will be working with. This is particularly important if you are going to work with a builder in the construction of a custom home, but it is still significant if you are buying a completed tract home. You need to have some sense of how easy the builder is to work with, whether they build good homes, and how they deal with warranty issues after the construction and sale of the home is complete.

November 16, 2017 No Comments

New Construction

There are several issues that require special attention from those who are considering buying a new home from the builder.

November 16, 2017 No Comments

Minimum Recommendations

If you are determined to buy land to build on in this area, I would recommend the following as minimum precautions: Work with Experts. Don’t even consider doing this on your own. You need to be working with a real estate agent or an attorney, preferably both, who have substantial experience with buying land in the specific local you are interested in. Purchase Contingent on a Building Permit. Make any purchase contract contingent on building permit approval by the relevant city or county authorities, and be certain to require that the terms and conditions of their approval must be satisfactory

November 16, 2017 No Comments

Historical Background

If you are considering buying a building lot or larger piece of land in Boulder County or elsewhere in the area, a bit of background will help you understand the dynamics of our current situation. State Law. You need to understand that state law prohibits landowners from subdividing their property into parcels of less than 35 acres unless the city or county in which the property is located approves the subdivision. For several decades, Boulder County has approved such subdivisions only under very special circumstances, thus restricting the availability of new building lots within the county’s jurisdiction. As a consequence,

November 16, 2017 No Comments

Potential Risks With Vacant Land

If you want to be prudent and resolve these questions before you close on the purchase of a piece of land, it may take a year or even two to complete the purchase. Certainly, the purchase of a building lot is not always such a complicated and extended process. But it is important to understand that you can easily spend several hundred thousand dollars on a lot only to discover that you can’t build on it, or that the building site that the county officials will allow you to build on results in a 50% reduction in the value of

November 16, 2017 No Comments

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