Tips and Traps When Buying a Home
Tips and Traps When Buying a Home
The classic guide to getting the best deal when buying a home–from America�s #1 real estate expert
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Featuring fully revised facts and figures that reflect the most recent changes in the real estate market, Tips And Traps When Buying a Home, Fourth Edition is helpful whether you’re a first-time or experienced home buyer. It gives you practical, step-by-step information on a broad range of proven home buying strategies, along with indispensable advice and guidance on buying in an “up” market, flipping, buying with options, bidding wars, and other important facets of real estate deals.
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User Ratings and Reviews
3 Stars details
Found in useful but not vital when buying our NC home. May be more details than you need to worry about.
3 Stars Mr. Irwin, first do your homework
Mr. Irwin states in this book that a real estate agent taking a commission on his own purchase can get sued on the grounds that he is effectively acting as an agent for the seller, and this creates a conflict of interest. This is based on the antiquated notion that a buyer’s agent is construed to be a subagent of a seller’s agent. Today, a buyer’s agent is construed to act independently of a seller’s agent, and is thus free to take a commission on his own purchase. The matter is simply one of an agreement between agents to share the commission.
4 Stars Worth a read; small investment for some reasonable insights
Not every page is enlightening, but overall builds confidence in the daunting process.
4 Stars Easy to understand
I was pleasantly surprised with how easy this book was to read and understand. I would be interested in reading more of his titles based on my experience.
4 Stars informative, easy to read, slightly flawed
This book is very easy to read, well organized, and contains a LOT of essential information for anyone looking to purchase a home. I recommend it without any reservations.
One issue: I’m not sure if there’s a newer edition of this book than I received last year, but it’s a bit out of date. For better or worse, a lot of mortgages floating around out there today - especially for first time homeowners - are not your standard 30 year fixed. The financing section of the book needs an update detailing the pros and cons of the newer and more complicated types of financing that are more common today. It does this to an extent, but it’s insufficient. Also, the figures used in the book are completely unrealistic. Mortgage rates are very different and so are housing prices. Not a problem if you can handle the math on your own, but certain tables are completely obsolete at this point in time.
Just one point on a personal note: This book really tells you about all the BAD things going on in real estate today. This isn’t a fault - it’s good to know about the million different potential pitfalls when buying a home - but it never tells you to put things into perspective. In other words, you can come away from reading this feeling very pessimistic and cynical about the entire process, which doesn’t have to be the case. If you arm yourself with knowledge, a good attitude, and surround yourself with good people - namely the best real estate attorney and home inspector you can find - you’ll find the experience isn’t as bad as the book can make it seem.
Best of luck!
Filed under: Mortgage Book Reviews
