Finding Your New Home
If you are a first-time homebuyer or buying your first Wichita, KS area home, you may not be familiar with the process. Below is a general timeline of how we'll go from Start to End. As you click on each section, you'll learn more about how each step of the process can work. If you have a question about any step or how it applies to you, feel free to Email Me your question!
You know you want to buy a home, but your only experience in homes is maybe living with friends and family or an apartment! You're not even sure WHAT you want in a home! We'll start by thinking about your needs versus wants, and as we progress through a few homes, this may change - that's fine, don't worry about it!
To start, think about concrete factors that are easy to search by - number of bedrooms and bathrooms, how much garage space, location, attached or detached home, age of home, basement or not. Location is the biggest, and even if you haven't lived in many homes, most folks do seem to know the areas they wouldn't mind living in.
Make a list of your 5 MUST HAVE's or NEEDS. These are the deal-breakers, meaning that if the house doesn't have these items, it shouldn't even be on our list to see. For example, my list would read:
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West of Ridge Road
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All one level
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4 bedrooms
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2.5 or more baths
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2 car garage or more
Those are all easy things we can search for within your criteria that are concrete facts and normally are not things you change your mind on as we go through the process.
If you happen to know some of the things you'd like or WANT, you can make that list too. These are often more abstract, like a "large" lot or "large" kitchen, "neutral" decor, etc, and aren't always deal-breakers, meaning we'll see houses with none of these or with some of these, but it won't be your main deciding factor on what house to see. This will likely change as we go through the various homes and see different styles, amenities, and decor. Again for an example, my WANTS list would read:
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Large kitchen with island
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Double-vanities in Master Bath
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Large lot, prefer an acre
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Fireplace, brick or stone
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Hardwood floors
This is to help you get started on figuring out what to see. We have a ton of the homes on the market most of the time, over 4000 on average. The price range and location can narrow it down quite a bit, but it's the NEEDS criteria that really help us get the homes down to a manageable number to see! If all the homes we're seeing meet all your basic NEEDS, then it makes it easier to focus on what you like about each house, how many of the WANTS it has for the price, etc.
Once we've dicussed your Needs and Wants, I will then go through the MLS (Multiple Listing 
Service - the place where all homes on the market are stored), and pull out all the ones that fit your NEEDS and price range. I will email that list to you to review. It will be in a linked format, you'll pull up a page with ID links on the left side, and a home's information on the right. Use the links at the left to look at each home. You can click on the photos to make them larger and easier to see. Before you leave our Counsel Session, I'll have gone over the MLS sheets and how to read them, so you should be familiar with what you are seeing.
As you go through the links, keep a list of the ones that pique your interest. Once you've gotten a list of the ones you like, take an evening or afternoon or juts a couple of hours and drive by all these homes. Many times I find that when we arrive at a home, buyers can tell at a glance that it's not right for them - either because the photo didn't show the QuikTrip right behind it or the neon yellow house next door, or it's just not as good looking in person as in the photo. Instead of wasting your time and the sellers by setting up an appointment, it helps for you to preview the homes and their locations yourself. This way you can narrow your list down so that we're only seeing homes you really are interested in.
Once you've driven by, you should have a shorter list of homes. Get with me and let me know which ones passed the screenings, as well as your schedule of days and times you are available in the near future. We will then make appointments to go see these homes when it is convenient for you.
Website Searching
Obviously there are many many websites you can use to search for homes on your own as well. Keep in mind that many of these may not be updated regularly so sometimes those homes are not still for sale when I get the inquiry. A good place to go is one that uses what's called an idx solution, to pull listings FROM the MLS. Again they aren't all updated constantly. My site does pull the info from the idx as you search, so should stay pretty updated!
Again, just make a short list, drive by, then see if they make the cut and we'll set up to get inside!
To Search for Homes go HERE or you may prefer This Map Based Version
Also, when you come into my main page, or as you view this right now, you should see along the top a menu bar, one with the Title Today's New Listings - which does indeed pull up everything listed so far on that day.
Once you have told me what homes you'd like to see and when you are available to see them, I then start scheduling the appointments. This involves many phone calls, occasionally homes get bumped from the schedule when they can't do our times or have gone under contract since the list was made. Most sellers need a few hours notice at the least. Put yourself in their shoes, they have their lives going on and also have to clean, stage, remove the dog, get the kids fed and out the door, etc. Best case is to start arranging the appointments the day before.
We'll meet at the first home on the schedule - which after I arrange all the ones you like into an efficient route, I'll let you know where we're starting. We'll then convoy over to all the others. I like this method versus carpooling because it gives you the chance to discuss amongst yourselves how you felt about each house, gives you a feel for the route and area, and I'm not the best driver, so reduces liability for me. If carpooling is preferable to you, we can accomodate that as well.
When we all arrive at the home, I will get the key from what we call a "lockbox," which is a device that attaches somewhere on the home, normally the doorknob, and contains the key. Some are on combinations, some are electronic and require my keybox to activate with it to record that I was there.
As we enter the home, I like to let you look around and get a feel for the home, adding in when I think appropriate or where I see something you may miss. Once we've seen the home, we'll gather on our way out and decide if it stays on the list of possible homes or gets tossed in the trash. I leave my card to let the seller know I did make my appointment and lock the home back up and we're off to the next one! Rinse and Repeat throughout the schedule.
Most showings take roughly 15 minutes. Sometimes you will walk into a home and immediately hate it - that's fine, and we can move on! Sometimes you'll become intrigued and we'll spend half an hour there. That's fine too! We book appointments in hour blocks and overlapping, to help accomodate different timeframes.
After each showing, I will ask you whether the home is a keeper or not. This way we are only truly keeping in mind the homes you liked. As we get to 3 homes you like, I will then ask you whether each new home gets one of the "Top 3" spots.
While we try to keep only 3 homes on the list to consider, you can't buy all 3! Eventually you will have to pick one home to make an offer on. Here's some tips to help you narrow that down:
- Compare each home to your Needs Vs Wants list and see if they have all you Needed and how many of the "Wants" each included.
- Have the bank run the numbers on each home - one may be a financial win-out over the others.
- Review the Property Condition Report to see if there are issues or benefits for one over another.
- Schedule 2nd showings - view all 3 of your top choices at one time, to compare them to each other better. While there, consider furniture placement, look for potential pitfalls. Often one will just feel more like home.
Once you've decided which one you really think is your new Home,
we'll proceed to make an offer!
There are a lot of things in real estate that are relative. We often get questions like: What's a safe area? What are good schools? What kind of people live there?
Many questions we can't legally answer due to Discrimination law. Aside from that law, the questions are also so relative that answering them are nearly impossible. If you came from a super duper gated patrolled community, some places will seem scary to you. If you are coming from New York, nothing here will scare you. Same thing for schools and more.
In light of that, here are some resources to help you as you filter through the homes you are looking at and trying to decide on areas you'd like to live in. Stats on paper can help but don't forget that it's also good practice to drive through the areas you're looking in, both at night and during the day, work-week and week-end. It'll give you a great feel for area activity, and you just might meet some new neighbors!
Census Bureau - stats on income rates, population mixture, etc.
Crime stats - area crime statistics
Click here to move on to the next step - Making and Negotiating an Offer!
