Ask Renee: What are the more common buyer regrets in Real Estate Purchases & How to Avoid It

Hello, Renee Han here, your Naples real estate expert, and I'm doing a quick article for you on buyer regret. Have you ever been in a position where you've made a big purchase and afterwards you started hemming and hawing about some of the bits and pieces and would you have done anything different? Well, I would tell you that you are not the only one in that situation. And of course, when we're talking about purchases, what bigger purchase is there than a home purchase. It's significant, right? It's important. And if anybody says it's not emotional, then, uh, maybe it's their fifth house and it really isn't. But for most people, it's also an emotional decision. So I thought I'd do a quick vlog on that as a topic, and I'll give you a couple stats to start off. So two different, um, published surveys, uh, there's one that's made— that was published by Clever Real Estate, um, back in 2023, and they showed that a whopping 93% of recent home buyers and 95% of home sellers have regrets. Um, that was upped from in 2022, 72% of home buyers had regret and 90% of home sellers had regret. So we're talking about buyers today. So in 2022, 72% had regrets from their purchase, and in 2023, 93% had regrets. Another one, Zillow performed a survey, um, that was published, and 75% of home buyers that purchased a home in the past 2 years said they had at least one regret about the home they bought, um, and 81% of successful buyers say they have made at least one compromise, um, in order to afford their home, according to the survey. So again, buyer's regret is not unusual or unique to real estate, nor is it unique to you. So let's talk about what are some of those regrets, if you will, and what can we do to get outside of it. Let me say before we go further, I have yet to sell a single home where a home buyer felt like it was perfect. The perfect home, I am on a, a mission to find it, but I've bought and sold a lot of homes and I have yet to find the perfect home because it's all about compromising, right? You might want a location, but a price point, but features within it, etc., etc., etc., right? The list goes on. So you try to find the home that's best for you. So it's already flawed in that regard because there is no perfect. So of course there's compromise. Regret to me is sometimes a little bit beyond compromise, right? Compromise you do, it's hopefully thought through, you've come to terms with that compromise. But regret is, gosh, I did it and I wish I hadn't. So we're talking regret here. So one of the more common regrets, in fact, it came up in 33% of the respondents, is that they found their home requires too much maintenance. That maintenance could be anything, right? Maybe somebody didn't want a home with a pool and then they got one with a pool and the, the pool has maintenance. Maybe they wanted acreage and there's more required of them in maintaining that acreage than they thought. Maybe they bought an older home and they're realizing that there's more maintenance involved in older homes. So it could be a mix of things, um, but that came up 33% of the time. That's significant, right? It's not insignificant. So one of the things that I always suggest as a counterpoint to that is going into a purchase where there could be those maintenance items anticipated or on, make sure you know what your physical, psychological, and financial limits are. Recognize that going in so that you're not surprised and in a position where you're not able or willing to take them on. Easier said than done, right? I get it. Um, the second one, they bought a home that's too small. I very rarely say I bought a home that's too large, but it does happen. I bought a home at one point that was too large, and I just felt like it, it spread our family out too much. It meant more space to keep clean, all of those things. But more often it's that people feel like the home is too small. So if you have gone into a home and maybe you thought the size of the home was going to be okay, um, and you set out to do that, or maybe you were going to buy a bigger home and, and maybe because the price was such, you settled for a smaller home. So I always suggest don't get fixated on buying any available home. And so fixated that you lose sight of what makes that home livable to you and comfortable. So make sure you've got a list that you keep back— coming back to when you're shopping, because you need to know what are the must-haves versus the nice-to-haves. And I'll give you a personal example. We had a list of what was important to us when I shopped for my last house, the one I'm in, and along the way we knew we wanted a specific neighborhood, and we were just so fixated on that neighborhood, which by the way I did end end up getting one in. But we were, we were getting discouraged, and we found a house that was just really a cool house. It was visibly, visually attractive. It was in the community we wanted, and we caught ourselves trying to talk ourselves into it because it was really cute. It was— would have almost worked for us, but we, because we had taken the time to really put together our must-haves, We went back to that and we're like, Tom and I are both like, you know, it's really easy to get excited about this house, but it's not the right house for us. And because we had done that, we walked away from it, which meant, by the way, we didn't have another alternative. But we slowed ourselves down to stay true to what was important. And I can't tell you how many times we drive that by that house every day when we're coming in and out. And it is still a beautiful house. In fact, we know the people that bought it. But the reality is it wasn't the right house for us. And because we had taken the time to come up with our must-haves we could make that trade-off decision with confidence and wait for the right house. So houses, whether it's too small or, or candidly, any other number of criteria, don't compromise unless you absolutely have to because you're under the gun with maybe a work relocation. People feel like they bought a house in the wrong location. So, you know, imagine buying a house and you want it for the peace and quiet, the serenity or whatever, and then you realize that come Monday, you saw it on a Saturday, come Monday there's more traffic, there's businesses nearby that are loud. It could be any given thing, but about 28% of the survey people surveyed said they regretted the location. They felt like it was the wrong location. Maybe it was further away from things than they want. And the risk, I'll tell you that I see that happens quite a bit, is people will come to Naples and want a new house. And to get new houses, oftentimes you have to push further out depending on your budget, push further out east. And then they buy the house because they compromised on location to get what they wanted in finishes and other things. And then they're realizing, oh my gosh, I'm spending too much time driving in the car. That might turn out to be the wrong location that they compromised on. So I always suggest, as a way to make sure you've got a good handle, make sure you visit a home multiple times of the day. Visit it during busy traffic hours. So again, people like to push out for new things, and they may end up out on Immokalee on the east side of the highway, and they came on a Sunday morning and didn't realize— guess what? When buses are traveling or when people are on their way to and from work, you're going to have to add time onto your commute time. So visit it at different times of the day. Visit it at different, um, days of the week to make sure that you've got a rhythm of what life is going to look like, um, and, and plan accordingly. Take test drives during rush hours, see what your commute is like. Again, visiting it during different times of the day and different times of the week will help with that. The next one, um, they bought an older home and it's now needing a lot of work. Now we talked about maintenance, and I was talking about more the maintenance of work that you might have to do as ongoing maintenance, but it could be that it needs a lot of repairs. There's a number of people that will compromise on this, and that was a popular response in the survey. So the types of things I suggest in counteracting, countering this is one, make sure you get a really good inspection. And the reality is inspectors miss things. It's sort of like finding the perfect house. The perfect inspector doesn't exist because they're all imperfect. They're going to see things, and, and candidly, sometimes things won't come up in inspection because maybe at the time of the inspection that item wasn't demonstrated. Maybe 2 weeks later or 30 days later something goes wrong with it. So, but still, getting a good qualified inspector, um, considering purchasing a home warranty. So if you're worried about the condition of some of the things, get a home warranty. They're relatively inexpensive. They usually will cover things for a period of multiple years. And that might be something to take on to get ahead of potential maintenance issues. Make sure when you're doing a home warranty you know what's covered. For example, there are home warranties that don't cover pool, pool heaters, and different things because you have to have specific licenses to be able to do repair work on that. Make sure an AC is covered, for example. But that's number 4. Number 5, they didn't consider the total environment. What do I mean about that? Well, think about what makes you happy happy in your current home? What is missing that you would be willing to pay a premium for? Make a list of those things, just like we talked about your must-haves, your nice-to-haves. And make sure that, um, you know, for example, if you need a lot of lighting— I've had people go into a place and when they, when they went to see it, maybe natural light is important to you. That's me, don't know if that's you, but I love natural light. I can't stand dark spaces. And I don't mind augmenting it with some artificial light, but I like natural light. Well, if you go into a place and you're on a showing and they have every light turned on— because we all do it, that's what listing agents do, because we want to make sure you can see everything, we want to make sure it's bright. We know people come to Florida and they want light spaces. Nobody likes dark spaces— shouldn't say that— most people don't like dark spaces. So you're going to want to, if that's important to you, you're going to want to make sure you're looking at things like, okay, all those lush trees you liked, guess what? Those lush trees also provide shade, not just for you, but for your house. You know, looking at that, look at it different times of the year. If you don't like yard work, why would you buy a big house on a big lot? You know, those kind of things. So there, again, I think that you should be thinking about if it's imperfect, are you willing to take on the work to make it perfect for you, right? Perfect. So, um, you know, could you add windows? If it's the perfect home and you love everything else about it, are there things you can do structurally to it? But it's going to be expensive, so make sure you know those. So again, figure out what's most important to you and look at it on the holistic level. So what will the total living environment be? If you, um, like neighborhoods that are more peace and quiet, you're probably not going to want to go to Esplanade. Esplanade is socially busy, it is physically active busy. Maybe that's not the best place for you to go. You're not going to be able to read quietly at a book at the pool because the pool is always packed. Again, that's about— also relates back to going and seeing things at different times of the day and different times of the week. Um, a next regret people have is not doing more research. Um, so for example, if you're buying new construction, research your builder. If you're buying an existing home Make sure that you're researching the people that you work with. So doing that up front, if you're going to make an offer on things, research what things are selling for. Just because something's asked— somebody's asking for a certain price doesn't mean that's the price that you need to be paying for that. Maybe somebody else will, but maybe it's not you. So what I suggest on this one is taking the time to research issues, things that would be important to you up front Um, before you get overly enticed by a specific property, it's worth spending the time up front to do the things necessary to build your knowledge so that you can make more informed decisions. This is especially the case if you're buying something for the first time, either you're a first-time home buyer or you're buying a new area that's completely new to you, right? Um, you don't want to miss that. All right, some other things that are regrets. Let me go back to my list here so that I make sure I don't miss anything that I wanted to talk about. Um, we talked about too much maintenance, buying too quickly. Um, sometimes if you're in a— um, by the way, 30% felt like they bought too quickly. Um, if you're— you find a perfect house, especially if you've been looking for a while, right? You get tired, you don't want to go see more houses, and you find the house that is best for you, and then all of a sudden You're having to act quick because maybe there's others interested in it. Um, I always say you've got to be okay losing something. So if you're the kind of person that needs reflection time and you're forced into a decision too quickly, it may not be the best outcome for you. So try not to get too emotionally connected to homes. There will always be other homes. Maybe it won't be one you love as much as that one, but there will always be other homes. Can't say the same about spouses. But anyways, make sure you slow down and take the time. Know what you need, know what your tendencies are. Do you tend to act quickly and then later regret a purchase? Well, if that's true, this is a big purchase. Take your time to slow down and, and make good decisions. Um, you spent too much. Ooh, 28% felt like they spent too much. Um, the, the That could be a function of do you feel like you spent too much for what you got, or did you get extended beyond your budget? Two different issues, right? So take the time to line up your financials ahead of time so that you know what you can afford to spend and what— how far you're comfortable stretching. And then on the spent too much, again, do your homework to know. I tell people— I was out with a couple today and they went to a house that's absolutely gorgeous. They really liked it. I liked it. But in that case, I needed to tell them, look, for this neighborhood, this is the price band that you're going to be in. It's a tight price band, and price band, when I say that, I mean, you know, houses range from this price to this price. In this particular house, you're going to be at this top tier. There's nothing wrong with being at the top tier, but you need to be okay with it. You needed to know that before you make the purchase. So those are the kind of things that if I'm your agent, I'm feeding you so that you make an informed decision. Someone will always be the top price house. It's how it happens. That's why there's a range, unless they're all the exact same house in that price, and that never happens. Someone's at the top, someone's at the bottom. Know where you're comfortable being. If you want the nicest house in a neighborhood, you're going to be the top price. That's just usually how it is. So again, um, my interest rate was too high, um, you know, that's come up 28%, particularly when things were rising. Know what your interest rate is. Sometimes you can't control that. It is what it is. And if you're at a position where you need to buy, um, but what my advice is, find out what the limitations on refinancing are, right? There are some that will have some loans that will have penalties for paying it off early. There will be some loans that won't let you refinance. Know those things ahead of time because if you're getting into something at a higher interest rate, you're going to want to know what your options are down the road. What else? I was pressured to make an offer. Hopefully that will never happen if you're working with me. I've talked people out of making offers, even if that means I don't get paid. But again, know what your tendencies are, decide what your rules of engagement are going to be, and hopefully you'll have an accountability partner in that. So again, those are some of the ones. I wanted to keep this under 15 minutes. I didn't— it's 16 and a half minutes right now, so I'm going to wrap up. If you have any questions, feel free to ask. My number is 239-287-2576, or you can always find me on my website, yournaplesexpert.com, and I'm happy to talk to you about these things. Thanks and have a fantastic day, everyone.