Home Buying Tips
Lessons From a First-Time Home Buyer: How the Pros We Worked With Are Still Helping Us
A few months ago, I wrote about how the professionals we choose to work with when buying our home made a huge difference and made our experience a positive one. Now, one year later, I’m somewhat surprised to say that they continue to help us out on a regular basis despite the transaction that first brought us together being well behind us. So, between that milestone and with it being Thanksgiving tomorrow, I wanted to highlight some of the ways these pros have come to our aid since buying our home and why we’ve been thankful for their help.
Our Team of Professionals and How They Continue to Support Us as Homeowners
Our insurance broker
As I’ve shared before, soon after we moved into our house, we got a random text message alerting us that we’d need to have an insurance surveyor come to our home. Since this seemed more than a bit odd to us, we contacted him to see if he knew anything about it. Off the bat, he let us know that the short answer was “Yes, it was legit” — but he then called us a few hours later to go into more detail about the process and how this was a common practice. Obviously, that was a huge relief to us as, without that info, we might have ghosted the surveyor and ended up putting our policy in jeopardy.
Beyond that, our relationship with our insurance broker has continued to this day. In fact, we’ve had him help with a few other things in the past year. For one, since our homeowner’s insurance is bundled with our car insurance, when we bought a new car, he was able to get our policy updated for us. Plus, as our yearly renewal came up, he not only assisted us in making sure the escrow portion of our monthly payments got updated but even ran another comparison to see if our current insurer was still our best option (it was).
Overall, it’s been great to have someone to go to when questions (that we never would have thought of before) arise. Honestly, he’s been so friendly and helpful that, the last time we relied on him for something, we made absolutely sure he was getting paid and not just doing it out of the goodness of his heart. On that note, it’s kind of crazy that having him as a resource doesn’t cost us a thing — and for that, we are very thankful.
Our mortgage broker
Even before we knew we’d be buying a home, our mortgage broker was recommended to us. Originally, the plan was to get us prequalified for a mortgage so that, when we did decide to make an offer, things would go more smoothly. Being self-employed and having unique work situations, this process proved to be somewhat complicated — yet, you’d never know it by how he managed to handle it all. Rather than just shutting us down and saying it wouldn’t work, he took the time to learn about our situation so that he could then find the best path forward.
Of course, before we could even complete the pre-approval process, we decided to move forward for real. This included finalizing our application while on the other side of the world! Nevertheless, we not only secured our mortgage on time to close but even moved up our closing date as everything was already in place.
Since then, he’s regularly checked in on us to keep in touch and talk Marvel (we’re both big fans) but has also let us know he’s been tracking rates for us. With our current mortgage rate set at 7.999%, he informed us that we’ll probably want something in the range of 6% before refinancing makes sense. Luckily, rather than having to keep an eye out for updates myself, I know I have someone in my corner who will let us know the second we can make something work. So while I don’t know when exactly we’ll be able to refinance, I’m extremely confident that, thanks to him, it will be a smooth process once the time arrives.
Our realty company
Finally, we have our realtor. Sadly, since helping us get our home, our specific realtor has had to step away from the role. Nevertheless, the realty company she was a part of continues to contact us with helpful reminders and tips.
Truth be told, it was actually this realty company that helped inspire this article! Last week, we got an email inviting us to pick up a pie from their office as a “thank you” gift for the holiday. When my wife went to pick it up, not only did she find a delicious (and huge!) pie that she was then able to share with her coworkers but she was also treated to a free beverage from one of our favorite local coffee shops, which happened to be next door.
What’s funny to me is that, since we already own the house, we don’t really have a use for a realtor. But, clearly, this company is in it for the long game, hoping that we’ll not only refer others to them but also give them a call should we want to sell. Still, I’m honestly taken aback at how kind they’re being in the meantime when they absolutely don’t have to be.
I really couldn’t have predicted that our relationships with the insurance broker, mortgage broker, and realty company we met as part of the home buying process would extend past closing. But, here we are one year later and they’re still standing beside us. This is just one more reason why I’d recommend any prospective homebuyer look into working with professionals that they can trust to help them in the moment and well beyond.
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