Why You Need a Pre-Approval Before Shopping for a Tucson Home

April 29, 2010 | By Kelley Koehler | Filed Under Home Buying, Loans and Financing

I’ve had a couple of calls recently from folks that seem to be leery of talking to a lender. They want to go look at homes around Tucson, but aren’t willing to have a 20 minute conversation with a lender first.

So let’s dispel some fears and misconceptions.

First, having your credit pulled to see what kind of loan you qualify for doesn’t really hurt your credit score – estimates are that you’ll get dinged about 5 points. But you’ve got to do it to get the loan. Good news is that you can have as many lenders you want to talk to pull your credit score in 14 days, and it only counts as one time. So whether you talk to one lender or ten, it all only counts once.

Second, you need a preapproval from a lender in order to make an offer on a house. In 7 years practicing real estate in Tucson, I’ve never seen a seller accept an offer where a Buyer didn’t provide a lender signed loan approval.

It doesn’t make sense to go out and shop for homes when you can’t buy the one you want when you find it! Not having that pre-approval in hand puts you in a position where you can’t act on the right house when you find it.

And finally, until you’ve talked to a lender, you have no idea what kind of payment you’ll have. Yes, you can go online and fill out loan payment calculators, but your interest rate is heavily influenced by how much you have to put down and what kind of credit score you have. And only a lender can tell you what rates apply to you and your specific situation.

Getting a pre-approval is a relatively painless process for most people. And it puts you in a position where you have the most power and knowledge and control over your home purchase. If you need a good lender recommendation, contact me and I’ll share!

Comments

One Response to “Why You Need a Pre-Approval Before Shopping for a Tucson Home”

Scott Stephenson on April 30th, 2010 8:06 am

I think it should be national law that a realtor must verify a customer is financially qualified to make the purchase before showing any house, not just before making an offer. That verification should written and it should be from a bank.

It’s a dirty little secret of the realty business that a significant number of home viewers are just out for entertainment at the seller’s expense (in time and effort). I actually had a potential listing realtor explain to me that he’d throw an open house for the community so that he could get all the people wanting to waste our time through the house at the start. I tossed that realtor out the door five minutes later.

Over the years, I’ve asked a few viewers what price range they were looking for – only to find that they were only qualified to buy a house half the cost of my listing. So why exactly did my realtor have me spend 4 precious hours disrupting my life and cleaning every inch of the house – just so some sightseeing clown can march through a house he can’t afford and toss off disparaging comments?

I’ve always scratched my head over this. It wastes the seller’s time, but it also wastes the showing realtor’s time too (and they have less time than me). Why do realtors do this? Why do sellers put up with it? I no longer do. I require proof of means before I’ll allow a showing. Can’t show me that proof – then you’re not a serious buyer.

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