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Once you've decided that you are interested in purchasing a condominium in Gainesville, FL, the following is a list of tips offered to make your buying experience a smoother one.

It is very important for home buyers to understand that it's critical to apply for a loan before searching for a home/condo. This is an essential first step and is most commonly made.

The following is a list of advantages to gaining Pre-Approval;

• Save Time by Looking at the Right Homes
• Spend More Time Examining the Right Homes
• Gain Confidence & Avoid Disillusionment
  
• Increase Bargaining & Negotiating Power
  
• Enjoy a Faster Closing Period

Once you've determined the purchase price that you are willing to spend for the condominium, you need to ensure that you will have enough to cover the closing cost. Depending on the agreed upon terms, closing costs will generally cost between 1.5% and 4% of your loan amount. Ask your lender, Bryan Royal with Wells Fargo , or mortgage broker to give you a Good Faith Estimate (GFE)of the loan-related fees you’ll have to pay as early as possible.

The middle of July in Gainesville, FL is way too late to find out that the air conditioning unit does not work in your new condominium. The one condition you should always include in an offer to purchase is for a condo inspection. Find out how much it will cost to fix any defects and have the seller fix them before you agree to buy the condo or deduct the estimated cost from your final offering price. If the seller won’t help bear the costs and you want to go ahead with the purchase, make sure you can afford the necessary repairs on top of your mortgage.

Information: Once you’ve found a condo, the first step in negotiation is to determine its fair market value. Matt and Tiffany Thomas can prepare a Comparable Market Analysis (CMA) to show you what comparable condos have recently sold for. Importantly, what a condo is listed for does not mean that is what it will sell for or can even be bought for. There can often be a big discrepancy in the CMA figures and the Asking/Listing Price. The more information you have on the subject, the better off you are.

Condition: Ask yourself, does the condo that interests you stand above or fall below those recently sold comparables? Make a realistic, un-emotional, comparison of condition, then adjust your thinking up or down according to what you see.

Extra Amenities: Does the condo you’ve chosen have more or less amenities than comparable condos? Although amenities won’t affect the value as much as location or condition, they can be a factor.

Preparation: The most important factor is your emotional frame of mind. Never let emotions override common sense. Excitement is normal, but keep it in check during negotiations or you’ll lose the value of the information you’ve gathered.

In addition to your emotional frame of mind, your finances should be in order. An offer carries more weight if there are no dangling financial problems.

You can’t be afraid to let the condo go. Convince yourself that if the price is not to your liking or is outside your budget, you’ll walk away. Set a realistic limit and stick to it. Overpaying for a condo is an epidemic among buyers who let their emotions rule their better judgment. It is a mistake you will regret every 30 days for years to come.

Finally, organize your information and have it readily available.

Realism: Don’t throw away all your information gathering and preparation by making a ridiculous offer on a well-priced condo, Nothing turns a seller off more than a low-ball offer on a condo that is realistically priced. Often, negotiations will stop, rarely to be revived again.

When a new condo project is planned by a developer one of the major transaction hurdles they face is financing. New Construction lenders gage market interest and finance-ability on the developers pre-sales and are becoming more and more strict each day in the current market. When there are adequate pre-construction sales/reservations, the project will move forward. Pre-construction reservation pricing is generally below that of completed condo units which translates into savings for buyers who are willing to reserve or purchase units at this early stage.

This type of purchasing takes a unique personality, because since you are purchasing prior to seeing a final product there are often changes to floorplans, finishes, etc.