After the Crisis: What You Can Do Right Now to Get Ready

With many areas of the country beginning to re-open businesses and services, real estate and mortgage activity will start to ramp up.

If you’ve been waiting for the stay-at-home directives to ease before buying a new home, selling your current home or refinancing your mortgage, here’s what can do right now to get ready:

BUYING A NEW HOME:

• Contact your real estate agent and let them know your timeframe for buying and ask them what you need to do to get ready.

• Decide what you want in a home so that you and your agent can hit the ground running.

• Start researching different areas and neighborhoods that you would consider living in and look at schools, transportation and other services in those areas.

• Make a housing budget that includes all expenses related to buying a new home.

• Continue to save up as much money as you can.

SELLING YOUR HOME:

• As with buying, your first step should be to discuss your plan for selling with your agent.

• Consider getting a pre-listing home inspection done so that you’ll know what needs to be repaired before your home goes on the market.

• Start working on smaller DIY projects, such as fixing dripping faucets or touch-up painting.

• If you haven’t already been sprucing up your yard and improving your home’s curb appeal during the stay-at-home mandate, get started now.

• Start cleaning, de-cluttering and moving items into storage, if necessary.

GETTING A MORTGAGE:

• Whether you’re buying new or refinancing, talk to your lender or broker about financing options and locking in your interest rate.

• Work on your credit score by paying down debt and making sure your bills are paid on time.

• With interest rates at an all-time low, be prepared to move fast.

• Ask your broker or lender about getting pre-approved for your mortgage.

• If at all possible, stay the course with your personal finances, which means don’t open new lines of credit or make any large purchases.

All of these tasks are similar to what you would need to do to get ready for the traditional “hot” summer real estate season. The one big difference? You’ll have less time to complete them, so make sure you get started right now.

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For more than 25 years, Omega Financial has been serving mortgage clients in Massachusetts. Our brokers have approximately 50 years in the mortgage business. You always will receive fast, courteous, and accurate information. Omega Financial, Inc. is a company duly licensed to operate in Massachusetts as a Mortgage Brokerage. We are located in the Town of Norwood, Massachusetts where we have been operating as Omega Financial Incorporated since 1988.

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