What Are Your Essentials When Buying a Home?

Buying a home is the ultimate exercise in compromise and most buyers head to the table understanding that they’re unlikely to get everything they want. For buyers who understand what their essentials when buying a home are, the home buying process goes much smoother.

Four Essentials When Buying a Home: Don’t Compromise

In order for the sale to be mutually beneficial, you need to get what you want while also being willing to give a bit. In order to protect your own best interests, you need to have some pre-established boundaries when you head into negotiations. Here are the top things you shouldn’t compromise on.

1. Your top three “must-haves”

Before you started shopping for a home, you likely compiled a list of “must-haves” for your new home. In order to ensure that you’ll be happy in the home you purchase, you should commit to not compromising the top three “must-haves” on your list. Regardless of whether these things include having a large yard or a certain number of bedrooms, refusing to compromise on those things will result in a happier living situation in the long run.

2. Neighborhood quality

If you’ve decided what type of neighborhood you’d like to live in, it’s wise not to compromise on this down the road. If you do, you may find that the house you purchased isn’t working for you and your family in just a short period of time. For example, if you have children and are committed to living in a neighborhood with good schools, sacrificing this requirement may result in unhappiness down the road.

3. Your safety

Home inspections are a key tool to protect buyers during the purchasing process. Even if you’ve fallen in love with a home, you’ll need to be prepared to walk away if the home inspection reveals something dangerous, costly, or extensive. While most buyers will work with you to reach a solution, sometimes negotiations grind to a halt and the only way to purchase the home is to compromise your safety or financial security. Neither of these is worth it and it’s wiser in these moments just to walk away.

4. Functionality

If you have a family of eight, a 10 x 10’ kitchen likely won’t work. While it’s easy to make excuses for less-than-functional features during the romance of the purchasing period, these things are likely to come back to bite you at a later date. Refusing to compromise them from the get-go results in a better fit and a home that truly works for your purposes.

While you can expect to compromise a bit during the purchasing process, knowing what you shouldn’t compromise on is critical to maintaining your own best interests and winding up with a home you love. By having your own personal list of essentials when buying a home and knowing when it’s time to walk away from a sale, you can protect yourself and your family and find a house that works for the long-run.