questions from a first-time homebuyer!

We're in the process of buying our first home, and as can be expected, we have a ton of questions!

Right now we have signed a binder and have the engineer coming out this weekend for the inspection. If all goes well with that, we will go to contract by the end of next week. We have our attorney all set up, so we're good on that end.

Now, I have four questions (uh, now - I will have a million more!)

1. When do we go about finding homeowner's insurance? We'll likely wind up paying it through the mortgage company monthly as part of our mortgage payment, but I do know we have to find the policy. At what point should we start looking for that? Right after we go to contract?


2. What do we do about the title search and title insurance? Do we have this done / obtain this ourselves, or does the mortgage company do it? If we have to find it ourselves, where do we look for it? At what stage do we start this? Right after contract?? How much does this usually cost?


3. How much should homeowner's insurance cost? (Just a ballpark figure). It's approximately a $400,000 single family detached home, shingle construction - in good shape. We were figuring around $1,200-1,500 per year. Does that sound right?

and finally

4. What do attorneys normally charge for closings? I'm just curious to know how good of a deal we got through our attorney (who we'll use no matter what).

Thanks in advance -- I know I just barged onto this board today with six million questions!

Message edited 3/29/2007 4:32:43 PM.

Re: questions from a first-time homebuyer!

Posted by Kara

We're in the process of buying our first home, and as can be expected, we have a ton of questions!

Right now we have signed a binder and have the engineer coming out this weekend for the inspection. If all goes well with that, we will go to contract by the end of next week. We have our attorney all set up, so we're good on that end.

Now, I have four questions (uh, now - I will have a million more!)

1. When do we go about finding homeowner's insurance? We'll likely wind up paying it through the mortgage company monthly as part of our mortgage payment, but I do know we have to find the policy. At what point should we start looking for that? Right after we go to contract? -

i think u can wait to find homewoners insurance until you have gotten your mortgage- the insurance companies usually need an account number


2. What do we do about the title search and title insurance? Do we have this done / obtain this ourselves, or does the mortgage company do it? If we have to find it ourselves, where do we look for it? At what stage do we start this? Right after contract?? -

the mortgage broker does that.. or the lawyer can order the title and do the title serach, it doesnt matter. that should be done right after the contract is signed


3. How much should homeowner's insurance cost? (Just a ballpark figure). It's approximately a $400,000 single family detached home, shingle construction - in good shape. We were figuring around $1,200-1,500 per year. Does that sound right? -

we are paying i think 80 a month, so that is 960 a year and our house is valued at 550 i think..

and finally

4. What do attorneys normally charge for closings? I'm just curious to know how good of a deal we got through our attorney (who we'll use no matter what).

- we paid 1000

Thanks in advance -- I know I just barged onto this board today with six million questions!

Message edited 3/29/2007 4:31:00 PM.

Re: questions from a first-time homebuyer!

Thank you!

Our engineering firm does certified termite inspections as part of the home inspection, so that will be all taken care of this weekend!

Re: questions from a first-time homebuyer!

1. When do we go about finding homeowner's insurance? We'll likely wind up paying it through the mortgage company monthly as part of our mortgage payment, but I do know we have to find the policy. At what point should we start looking for that? Right after we go to contract?

I started searching around once I got a commitment - but you can get quotes before hand.


2. What do we do about the title search and title insurance? Do we have this done / obtain this ourselves, or does the mortgage company do it? If we have to find it ourselves, where do we look for it? At what stage do we start this? Right after contract?? How much does this usually cost?

Our attorney ordered this I believe right after we went to contract. On my papers I have in front of me, it said my title search was 300 and my title insurance is 2413. I also had to pay for a survey which was 650!


3. How much should homeowner's insurance cost? (Just a ballpark figure). It's approximately a $400,000 single family detached home, shingle construction - in good shape. We were figuring around $1,200-1,500 per year. Does that sound right?

I got mine for approx. 750 on a 380,000 detached home. It also depends on the area.

and finally

4. What do attorneys normally charge for closings? I'm just curious to know how good of a deal we got through our attorney (who we'll use no matter what).

Mine is charging 975! Plus he also gets another 650 for being the bank attorney!


HTH good luck w/ everything!

Re: questions from a first-time homebuyer!

1. Start looking now so the insurance co. has enough time to go and get pictures of the house, write up the policy and get all the documents to your lawyer cause you can't schedule a closing date without the policy.

Statefarm may be your best bet on LI for homeownr's as AllState, Nationwide, etc are not writing new policies.

2. Your lawyer should have a co. that he/she will contact once you sign contracts to have the title and research done through. Our lawyer took care of all of this for us and provided us a name and a number for the co. he used, so we could tell our bank (where our mortgage was coming from) that we had taken care of it and didn't need the bank doing this task.

3. We have a colonial and pay less than $1K/year for our homeowner's policy with Statefarm, but we also have our car insurance thru them, so we have a multi-line discount.

4. Our lawyer's fee was split in half. We paid half at contract signing and the other half at closing. Somewhere around $1200 total.

At closing, our lawyer just asked us to bring a certified bank check in the amt of $12K and that took care of our closing costs, so everything was taken care of once we handed over the check.

Re: questions from a first-time homebuyer!

You guys are SO HELPFUL - Thanks so much. I really appreciate it!