Thinking of buying a house in Bay Area. I have few questions about it: 1. What are some good resources to research the housing? 2. Any good areas preferred in bay area for housing? 3. Would you preder a condo/flat/property? 4. What is a good strategy to finance? 5. Any resources to check property appreciation data in Bay Area? Conaidering budget of arouns 800k, looking for 2 bed, 2 bath. Any experienced folks here? Thanks
Doing same research myself Using redfin app a lot For finance talk to realtor agents and credit unions Go to open houses as many possible Type of house totally depends on personal needs
What has been your strategy? How much is your budget and which areas are you looking at?
All depends on your budget
How much are you willing to commute each day?
Single family homes are tough to maintain. Buy condo in a good school district with 45min to 1hr commute to work.
SFH are better investment financially, no?
They're definitely better than condos or townhouse. End of the day the land is yours and have lot more control.
First step: move out of bay area to a low cost geo. Second step: use redfin or zillow to find home you like. Third step: invest money that you saved in step one.
All houses in Bay Area are old, small lot size, and a short distance to ghetto areas.
Lol. There r plenty of bigger and newer properties. It's just that we can't afford them.
+1 old is done with great materials like redwood and can be much better than new in some cases. Regarding smaller lots: not everybody wants a swimming pool or play soccer at the house.
los altos hills.
Redfin and Zillow will give you idea about inventory. Never ever buy a house with HOA.
Why not buy with HOA?
First of all, no tax relief on hoa. Usually the facilities are way too less than the charges. HOA pays for administrative cost too which is overhead. The worst is you cannot make any change/upgrade to your home without hoa board approval. And selling home can be a nightmare. In my last home that I sold, they did not allow any listing signs. With personal experience, stay away from HOA home.
800k can get you a tiny house in Fremont with decent schools. But prices are going back up now so you need to act fast.
What is your budget, do you need good schools and so on? There are a lot of questions. We used Redfin to search and buy houses
I don’t have kids as of now but yeah having good schools is a positive anyway.