Are you considering BUYING a home or income property? First things first – you need to know a rough ballpark of how much you can afford.
To start with, I recommend that you speak with a good mortgage broker to determine a rough idea of how much you might be able to afford. This process is called Prequalification, not to be confused with Preapproval, which is what you will need to accomplish prior to making an offer. To be Preapproved, you must submit a complete loan application and all of the supporting documents necessary for a lender to determine how much loan you can be Preapproved for.
Please let me know if you would like a list of good local mortgage resources to speak with. I will be happy to email it to you. Believe it or not, who the lender is that you are approved with can in some cases make a difference whether your offer is accepted or not. Better to obtain a strong referral than have me tell you later that you will be at a disadvantage because of the lender you unwittingly chose.
If you would like to figure out how much your payment might be on your own, you will need a mortgage calculator. Many lender and real estate search sites have mortgage calculators, they are easy to find online. There is a basic mortgage payment calculator on this website under the Buying & Selling tab. If you would like to include an estimate of property taxes and insurance, here is a link to the one on the Realtor.com website:
