It's time to buy!

It's been a good run -- for home sellers that is.          Now, it's the buyers turn!

In many markets over the past five years, anyone posting a "for sale" sign in the front yard was virtually guaranteed to ignite a bidding war. Lots of sellers doubled their investment dollars in a few short years.

Since the beginning of the new calendar year, the market place has changed dramatically. The market is now flooded with foreclosures, auctioned properties and short sales. Furthermore, bankers are now desperate to dispose of their “REO’s” (Bank owned properties) that they seized recently from non paying home owners. One of the measures taken, in an effort to revive the real estate market and preventing it from dragging down the US economy was lowering interest rates, and they were lowered dramatically. These events have created great opportunities for buyers and especially first time buyers that had not been previously able to afford buying a home in the earlier price hype. Investors are also taking advantage of the market condition and the new opportunities arising buying properties at 70 cents on the Dollar.  As every real estate professional knows, a "down-market" is the best to time buy!

Ready to plunk down your hard-earned cash for a slice of the American pie? Make sure your financing is low fat. Buying a home is likely the most expensive, long-ranging financial commitment most of us ever make. The more homework you do before heading out with a real estate agent or before making an offer on a home, the more likely you are to stretch your mortgage budget.  Here are six ways to get the most bang for your money beginning before you step out the door to shop.

Get pre-approved
Get pre-approved for your mortgage loan, rather than just pre-qualified.

With pre-approval, the lender pulls a credit report, verifies a borrower's income and takes other preliminary underwriting steps to come up with a maximum allowable loan amount, which usually doesn't change. The lender also commits, in writing, to making that loan if a purchase occurs within a set amount of time. In a pre-qualification, the customer provides the information, but the lender doesn't check it and there's no assurance that the loan will be approved.

Pre-approval requires the home-shopper to fill out a loan application and provide supporting pay stubs, bank statements, employment information and W-2 forms. Lenders charge for the service -- generally from $20 to $50 -- but it's worth it. Pre-approval puts you in the strongest possible bargaining position with sellers and their real estate agents. Those who are in a hurry to move a property often will accept a lower bid from a pre-approved buyer because they can be certain the deal will go through.