After a month of unpacking, sorting and large purchases, this half-year house-changing operation has come to an end. During this operation, I allowed myself to participate more in practice, learned a lot, and gained a lot of insights. Thanks to the friends who provided help during the period. From an idea in March to the end now, I have experienced a lot. Now I share it with you in the form of fragments.

My thoughts after viewing 100 suites

Since this is my Nth time to buy a house, I am already familiar with all kinds of tricks. However, this time the situation is quite special. There is a large selection area. Due to my personality, I hope not to miss any possibility within my ability. With the help of my friends, I looked at nearly 100 houses.

About the School District and Neighborhood

Neighborhood is a very easily overlooked attribute of a house, but it is very important, and I found that it has a great connection with the school district.

Let’s start with a brief introduction to school districts. The United States has grades for elementary schools, junior high schools, and high schools, ranging from academics (admission rate), equality (clan distribution, low-income students, etc.), and environment (teachers, students, teaching conditions, etc.), from 0 to 10. The east has more good schools (especially Virginia), while the west has fewer.

I originally thought that Americans didn't care much about school districts, but later I found out that I was wrong. They value them very much, especially Americans of Asian descent (especially those from India and China). Although the school district cannot represent everything, it can reflect some conditions in this area. After visiting so many areas, I found that the Neighborhood community in the area with a good school district must be good, especially if it is a large area with good school districts connected together, it must be a very good place. And a Neighborhood with a very poor school district (2 points, 3 points) is definitely not good. The need to be caught in the middle depends on the situation, especially in elementary school, junior high school, and high school, where the scores are high or low.

However, the same school district (note that school district and zipcode are not the same concept. A zipcode is a large district that may contain several school districts) does not mean that all Neighborhoods are good. Whether the Neighborhood is good or not depends on going to that community to personally inspect it. It can be reflected from two aspects:

1. As for the housing environment, in a good Neighborhood, most families have well-kept lawns and flower beds, and they also maintain public roads and facilities. However, an average Neighborhood will appear more messy. Of course, sometimes the HOA hires people to help.
2. For humanistic care, you can try to walk on the road and ask if people take the initiative to say hello, chat with you, and ask about the situation. Especially if you appear as a person they are not familiar with, they will be more concerned about what you are doing. Of course, you can also ask about the situation in this community.

But if it is a different school district, there will be a big difference, but I think school districts with a score of 6 or above can consider the specific situation. For example: some school districts have a comprehensive score of 6 but the test is 10 points, but they ended up with a 6 score due to other reasons. Some school districts have a comprehensive score of 10, but the racial distribution is only Chinese and Indian, with very few whites and blacks. I personally don’t like it. After all, grades are only part of it. Understanding the diversity of the world and a broad perspective are much more important than this.

A good school district will be about 10%-20% more expensive than a poor school district. Sometimes it is just one street away. You need to consider it according to your own situation. Don't be blind. Your own comfort is the most important. After all, no one knows what will happen in a few years. There are also private options.

About the structure of the house, old and new

There are not many new houses to choose from in the Virginia Belt Way. Most of the good places are 60-70 years old, and the design of those houses will be obviously much worse than those 20-30 years old. And due to the lack of overall design at that time, the two adjacent houses may have completely different styles. If you don’t mind some strange patterns, you can check them out. But I would also recommend houses built after 1990. The internal structure and design of those houses are much better, at least in terms of sunlight, transparency, and practicality, they completely beat the old houses. Of course, some old houses have also been renovated, which is another matter. However, under the same conditions, it is recommended to buy new rather than old, because old houses still have some things that cannot be seen (water pipes and so on).

In terms of housing layout, every house is different. If you find a very suitable location but don't like the layout, don't worry, wait a little longer, there will definitely be one! Based on this, I think it is best to rent a house for a year, look at various locations first, decide the location and wait for the house to be released, so that you can find the perfect home.

What stage is it now?

Current housing prices have still not reached the heights of 2008. As the Federal Reserve begins to tighten money, the increase in loan interest rates will suppress housing prices to a certain extent. We will definitely never see loan interest rates of 2-3% again. At this interest rate, we must buy with our eyes closed, because it is lower than the inflation rate and even lower than the GDP development rate. The current interest rate is around 5%, and it is expected to reach 7% in the next few years. What does this mean?

First of all, the current housing prices are not at a high level. Secondly, 7% is not a very high interest rate. From a historical perspective, 12% or even 17% have occurred. In the end, as time goes by, the interest rates will eventually rise to the housing prices. I think if it is for your own needs, now is still a very good opportunity, and this interest rate hike cycle is not expected to be too long (maybe only 3-5 years).

Think about China and the United States, which have released a lot of money in the past few years. However, in the United States, this water has not affected housing prices. It reflects that the bubble here is still very small.

The deal with Lao Yin - small actions = trapping oneself

A very interesting episode occurred during this period.

In fact, the house we were initially interested in was not the current one. Because we were extremely satisfied with that house, we tried our best to win over him. After some tricks, we learned that the other party had three offers and didn’t care much about us. At this time, we decided to increase the price by 6,000 offers.

Here is a little knowledge. Generally, the price is slightly reduced when making an offer. The reason is that sellers will charge a higher price if they want to sell more, and buyers can always find some faults, and the price difference will come out every time. Generally speaking, you can basically win a house by making an offer at the listed price, and most of them are taken advantage of, unless it is a particularly popular house.

The reasons for deciding to increase the price are also very simple: 1. Show your attitude and you will win. 2. Since there are already 3 offers and the attitude is indifferent, it means that a reasonable offer has been obtained, which is very likely to be a listing price offer. 3. In order to ensure that we can defeat people who have the same strategy as us, because people who usually increase the price will add 5,000, and our 6,000 is just higher than them without losing grace (5,001 is very retarded). Based on the above considerations, we finally made an offer with a price increase of 6,000.

And before making an offer, when we visited the house again, we met the owner by chance. We also expressed our wishes and situation in person, saying that we were bound to win. However, we also reported a problem with the house to them (this was a foreshadowing). We found that the master bedroom of the house was a little tilted, but we said that we didn't mind at all as long as there were no structural problems.

Then the drama started, and the offer review started, and the other party started to ignore me, and occasionally responded to a message without enthusiasm. This situation can only be caused by our offer failing, but usually if the offer fails, they will tell you directly that you have not won the bid. If they think you still have a chance, they will negotiate with you (increase the price or put forward other conditions). This time the other party just said that they need more time to review, and they neither refuse nor agree nor negotiate. This is very strange. Our offer has already shown our attitude. They must know that if they ask us to increase the price, we will increase it. What is going on?

After some investigation, I made a bold guess. First of all, the seller is Lao Yin and the agent is Lao Yin. Lao Yin has many customers in this area. When this happens, there must be someone who wants to buy it, but the price is lower than our offer. They use our offer to ask the other party to increase the price. They keep hanging on to us because if the other party doesn't increase the price, they can still take our offer.

I was very angry about this little move, and my agent also said that he had never seen such bad behavior. The final result was consistent with the situation. The other party rejected our offer after 3 days, and the offer was pending to someone else. We can only swallow our anger, but the matter is not over yet...

After 10 days (usually 7 business days for house inspection, confirmation, etc.), the house was released again. The guess is that the buyer had some grudges about the price increase itself, discovered the tilt during the house inspection, and ultimately gave up the bid (if the house has irreconcilable problems, you can choose not to buy it).

After 40 days on the market, the house was finally sold, and the transaction price was nearly ,000 lower than my bidding price...

Should young people “trap” themselves by buying a house?

This is the last topic I want to talk about. Many friends say that it’s a struggle to switch back and forth, and it’s easy to trap yourself and make yourself tied up. I agree with the first half of the sentence. It is indeed very troublesome. This is not only reflected in the consumption of money, but also the consumption of mental and physical strength. But the second half of the sentence feels inappropriate to me.

Youth is only a few years old, and these years are the best time for me to enjoy what I want. In a few years, I may not dare to take risks and consume because of my family and children. As I grow older, my health and other reasons will make me more conservative.

Before the age of 22, we are learning, struggling, and growing. After the age of 30, we have to protect the family. There are seniors and juniors, so what about in between? Since I have the opportunity to experience the life I want, why not?

A house traps you because you can't change places easily. Yeah? I'm just lazy... It's so easy to buy and sell houses in the United States, and the loss of money during this process may be about the same as the support of renting a house. If you are always restrained by your thoughts, time will slowly pass, and the best opportunity will be lost. In my opinion, this is much better than renting a house. While I feel happy, I might also be able to get some wealth through increased value. And when it's time to leave, just be more free and easy, and those losses will be just an experience. For a young man, seizing the opportunity is always the most important thing.

postscript

The more times I do something, the more I lose the original passion. After these few operations, I feel more and more that the house is just like this. I just want to live comfortably and be happy. A real life should be about pursuing childhood dreams. This is the biggest regret. Money, fame and fortune are all vain. What we want to achieve in our hearts is our lifelong pursuit.