Online home listings show estimated payments that often don't match what you'll actually owe. Get pre-approved by a lender before house hunting so you know the real cost and don't waste time on homes you can't afford.
If you're looking for a new home, just be careful when looking at the payment on the online listing on Zillow or redfin or realtor.com because those are best, best case scenario usually. And if that's the situation, then absolutely you get that payment. But we had a recent example just the other day where a client came in on a house, was listed at 375,000 that showed the Zillow payment at $1800 a month. They're like, hey, I can afford that. I want to get pre approved for this house. So we start unpacking, looking at their application, their documents and the numbers were a little different. Here's why. So Zillow listed at 375. Well, them and their agents going to go in at 405 because it was a really competitive situation. They had to outbid other people and they wanted to get some seller credits. So that's $30,000 difference. That touches, you know, changes the payment a little bit there. Zillow showed it with 20% down payment. They were doing down payment assistance. So zero down payment. That's a little bit different as well. Down payment, not only is the loan amount higher, but the down payment assistance interest rates naturally are a little bit higher than if you had 20% down. Kind of makes sense. Zillow also significantly lowballed the taxes and insurance, making the payment super low. Best case scenario, we got an actual insur insurance company and we actually pulled the taxes from the county's website. That changed the numbers a little bit. And with Zillow showing 20% down, there was no mortgage insurance, down payment assistance. Unfortunately you do have mortgage insurance. So when it all settled, the payment was 5, $600 a month more. That was a significant difference to these folks. So it made sense. There was some rhyme or reason. Every little detail made sense. But the gist of it is don't get your hopes up. Come to a lender first. Get the accurate set up, the accurate pre approval and the real numbers and you won't have your heart broken. You get on the right house. That's the biggest of being pre approved.
