[blparent] Advice: buying a house

Wed May 9 15:14:59 UTC 2012

Realtors always take you to prospective houses unless you tell them not to.  This isn't a selling point.

What you want is a buying agent. Know that buying a house and selling one are two very different animals. Most agents cannot do both.  We had an agent that was an incredible buying agent, but couldn't sell heat to an Eskimo.
Most agents don't know or won't admit that they lack a skill set.

Know that agents can't tell you about schools or other neighborhood features.  They can provide you access to public data, and they should do this. Some will and others won't.

The first thing I would look at are crime statistics. The police station is a good source.  Some counties have web sites stating this info, some don't.  All neighborhoods have some form of crime so make sure you are okay with what you find.  In our old house, we had a neighbor that was quite the pot smoker.  He never gave us any problems.

Also, and I can't stress this enough, talk to potential neighbors.  If people don't want to talk to you, this is a huge red flag.  We were looking at a house one time and there was a woman with a baby the same age ours was at the time.  I went over to her and introduced myself telling her we were thinking of buying in the neighborhood.  She brushed me off.  I told my husband i wasn't interested in the neighborhood because ther e was no reason why this woman shouldn't want to talk to me. Sure, she may have been busy, but she should also have been interested in a potential neighbor. She should have shared info with me about parks and schools and kid stuff.  The fact that she didn't is something that I can't and won't excuse.  You want to be able to trust your neighbors.  You don't necessairly want to be friends, but you do want to be able to trust them.  If an ambulance pulls up in front of your house, you want them to know and care. You want to return that favor should you need to.  You want to share info on community events.  When you lock yourself out of the house, you want to have a few neighbors you can wait for a locksmith with.

People who are happy where they are want to share.  Look for places where people are happy.  Look for places where families are out and about. If you don't see this, don't excuse or rationalize the behavior.  People want to be outside on nice days.  If they don't, there is a reason and you won't like that reason.  Pay special attention to kids and dogs.  If you don't see any, or the ones you see don't seem interested in you, don't move there.

I'd stay away from your husband's boss's realtor. He sounds like a slick one and not somebody who would serve you well.  I base this on his making it a point to sell you a service that isn't anything special.  It's kind of like a plumber saying "After I remove your old toilet, I'm going to do something just for you.  I'm going to install the new one and I'll even hook it up to the sewer system".

-----Original Message-----
From: blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of jan wright
Sent: Wednesday, May 09, 2012 7:53 AM
To: blparent
Subject: [blparent] Advice: buying a house

Hi All,
First, I want to thank everyone who responded to my questions about
bottles and johnny jumper things.
We have a pretty consistent group of parents and child care providers
who --- may not always agree, but give wonderful advice for each
season of our lives. And, we are as diverse as any other parent group:
 from spiritual to not; from crunchy to progressive (those might not
be opposites, but you understand what I mean); from babies to adult
children; from stay-at-home parents  to working parents; ... etc.

So, I thought that I might post here about our "house buying" and ask
for any tips and advice. I have done research, but, there isn't much
from a blind person's prospective. Maybe there doesn't need to be:
because maybe it is not any different from sighted people buying a
house. But, I did have a couple of questions:
1. How did you choose your realtor? We have one of these, already, but
wonder if we  shouldn't have looked farther. DH's boss said that his
realtor would transport him to and from the prospective houses. Is
that normal??? We find that this is one of the most difficult things
to do because paratransit takes so long, we can only see one house
per day.
2. Public transportation is not very good here in Indy. People from
other cities have commented on how fragmented it is. And, there aren't
many sidewalks in residential areas or down busy streets and ... ... a
good shoulder is hard to find. [ARe those words to a country
song?????]  (smile) But, we are trying to find a house that is close
to a bus stop --- and a bus stop that would take DH to work and us
downtown. Sometimes we find a house close to a bus stop, but the wrong
bus stops there.

Any other advice????

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