Nolo's Essential Guide to Buying Your First Home

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I am a few weeks away from closing on my first home and read this book nearly cover to cover. I bought this book along with the "Home Buying Kit for Dummies" book. Both complimented each other pretty well, though there was a lot of overlap. Overall, this book alone is not going to cover "everything" you need to know, but I nevertheless give it 5 stars for being an excellent resource. It's difficult to recommend one book over the other because they are so different. The Nolo book is better written and covers more topics that were relevant to me, but the Dummies book might be a better resource overall. Strengths: The book is well-written and covers some topics I didn't expect. For instance, if you are considering borrowing money from a family member, you should take the IRS Applicable Federal Rate (AFR) into account when deciding an interest rate. If you set an interest rate too low (e.g. 1%) then the IRS will consider the loan a gift and the giver will be taxed as such. I loved the forms that the book comes with - checklists for looking at new homes, interviewing a real estate agent, a loan officer, even how to talk with your spouse about your ideal dream home. Weakness: The organization could be better if it was more chronological. For instance, home inspection happened pretty early in our process, but that chapter is near the end of the book. I would prefer to have the book organized so that I could read a chapter as it unfolded. But it's easy enough to skip around if you need to. The book is also weak on evaluating mortgage lenders. It capably covers important topics such as why APR (annual percentage rate) is more important to pay attention to than the interest rate (because the APR includes the interest rate as well as fees and most other costs associated with granting the loan) and also things like how to tell when buying points will be beneficial. What is missing is a step-by-step guide that would tell, for instance, at what stage you should shop around, or at what point you should withdraw your application if you find a better offer. For instance, if you get a GFE (good faith estimate) from one lender, you might wish to consider shopping around to see if you can find a better deal. At that point, you could take the GFE from a second lender and show it to the first lender to see if they would match it. Overall this is a great resource and I'm happy with the purchase.

I took two full-day first-time homebuying courses before purchasing this book, so I wasn't sure how useful it would be above and beyond what I'd learned in the courses. The answer: very, very useful. For example, it described why a homebuyer should check into zoning before purchasing a house: to give one example, if you've got your heart set on adding on a deck, you'd want to know ahead of time that zoning rules mandate a minimum distance between the structure and the property line, which effectively bars you from adding the deck. The book is full of tons of useful information like that. I read it cover to cover and would highly recommend it. Ideally, you should purchase it at the very beginning of your house hunt process, but it would be a valuable asset at any stage. It also is the homebuying guide with the most recent publication date that I could find, which is a big bonus. Definitely get this book!

I'm a dedicated fan of Nolo books. I have been reading them for years. Even their Deduct It book on the latest tax laws put in plain English is a bible as far as I am concerned. All too often first time home buyers have this idyllic outlook on buying a home; it takes on a nirvana type of atmosphere. Unfortunately they look at homeownership as a panacea of good fortune blinding them to the many pitfalls that may await them. Only after getting screwed on their first property do they become astute buyers on their second one. This book shows you how to avoid that costly mistake and become an astute buyer first time around. It is written with contributions by teams of experts in the real estate sales, brokerage, and mortgage and home inspectors. It even includes input from experienced home buyers recanting their experiences. This is an absolute must read for buying a home. I'll never forget what Peter Lynch said in his book One Up On Wall Street. He said that before you buy any stock buy yourself a home. Nothing will give you a greater return than that. Plus with the tax breaks you can make up to 250k on your personal residence tax free. You no longer have to reinvest it either. This book contains so many topics of great interest there is no reason for me to go over the complete list of them. You can easily obtain the information covered in each chapter by clicking on the photo of the book in this Amazon listing, and it opens up the first chapter including all of the chapter titles and complete list of sub-topics covered in each of them. There is so much information it may seem overwhelming at first, but as you digest it, and then get into the search this wealth of information will be very handy to say the least. It is a real hand holder whether you are obtaining the mortgage, hiring a broker, a home inspector, even figuring out how much of a home and what type you will need. You can get expert advice from professionals in the industry, but exercise caution because depending on what you are looking at they may have an agenda. This book is your clear path to knowledge you can depend on.

This was an excellent guide. It broke down the process into easy to understand steps. The whole process of buying your first house can feel really overwhelming and confusing, but this guide eased some of that. My only complaint was that the suggestions on the different players that should be involved (broker, real estate agent, etc.) didn't really fit what seems to go on in my local area. For example, the book makes it sound like using a broker is ideal, but when we tried to find people who fit that description in our area, people looked at us like we were crazy. They didn't know what we were talking about. No one seems to use them here, they work directly with a specific lender. Also, the book advises interviewing real estate agents, and this became awkward because apparently this is not a common practice. Some the agents we interviewed seemed a bit offended when they heard that we had interviewed other agents as well. We interviewed agents before selecting a lender and getting pre-approved, like the book advised, and this also seemed to bother the agents, who all said that we should have showed up with pre-approval in hand already. So, while the book is great for understanding the process in general, some of the practical details won't make sense for your particular market. It presents an ideal scenario that may not actually exist in the real world. So keep this in mind while doing your research. Another piece of advice is to read the entire book at the start. My husband and I wanted to read each section as we were going through the process, but once we had selected an agent the process began moving really quickly. We went from interviewing agents to looking at houses and putting down an offer and having it accepted all within the span of two weeks. It was too difficult to keep up with the book at this pace.