We're first time home buyers, and the process of going without an agent is frankly pretty intimidating. (2.5-3% off the price is strong incentive to consider it though.) If we move forward without an agent, I really want to know the process inside and out. I want to know exactly what we need to do and when. Attached (in 2 file formats) is the result of my research efforts thus far. Is there anything that I'm missing, or that is inaccurate on here?

Question: What does this process look like? I've submitted an offer already, and have been pre-approved with one lender, just waiting to hear back from the sellers on their response. Do I need to get pre-approved right away with a couple more lenders, and then make them compete against each other right after our offer is accepted? Or can I wait until our offer is accepted to get pre-approved and compete lenders against each other? We have a tight deadline, doing a 30-day close, so I don't want to do anything to slow it down, but I also don't want to get pre-approved before knowing if the sellers are going to accept our offer if I don't have to (since we'll otherwise be going with new construction and won't want to get pre-approved with additional lenders for several months--see "context" paragraph at the bottom for the reasoning). Do I even have time to shop lenders if we have such a tight close deadline, or should I just go with the one lender I already got pre-approved with? My original understanding was that you get pre-approved with 3-5 lenders before even starting the search, and then you choose your lender based on that. But I've since seen other sources say that you don't really get a good estimate until you are under contract, so you instead only need to get pre-approved with 1 ahead of time, and then shop lenders in the first 3-4 days after going under contract. So which is it? Given that I'm likely soon going to be either under contract or rejected, do I wait to see what happens? Or do I put a rush on getting pre-approved by a few lenders ASAP? Context: We're having a baby in the beginning of July. Originally, it looked like we were going to go with a new construction home, which would probably be finished around November--we are in line, just waiting for our lot to come up before moving forward with a contract. We got pre-approved with their preferred lender (or at least he called it pre-approval--it doesn't look like he did a hard pull on our credit), but since closing won't be for several months, and his pre-approval (or whatever he did) didn't involve a hard credit inquiry, we didn't get pre-approved with anyone else, to avoid a double ding on our credit score (since we'd have to get pre-approved again a month or 2 before closing). Then we unexpectedly found a great existing home we wanted, but we need to close in time to get moved in before the baby. So we quickly submitted an offer, and are waiting to hear back, and I don't know whether to try to get pre-approved right away with other lenders, or wait until seeing if the sellers accept our offer first. (It's been a couple days since we submitted the offer--we put in a fairly assertive offer since it's much more expensive than our other option, so I'm not surprised they didn't respond right away. Seller's agent says they are considering it though.)

Hi Nick, Since I’m still in the looking phase of buying my first home, I do see a lot of home prices that have risen exponentially in the last few years. For instance, maybe somebody bought a home for 200, kept it for four months, fixed it up, and now they want 400 for it. I often feel like realtors are in the game of not offering a low offer “because the comps.” I also find it frustrating that first Zillow, and now Trulia, are not showing anything but about a year’s back worth of sales prices and history. It feels like everybody is colluding to keep everything so secret and the fact that maybe the bottom is falling out of the market after riding high for so long people are defaulting, etc..Is there any way to find this information without going to the county records department in person? Are there ways to determine true comps? If I were a cash buyer, how much would you say could be offered below asking price in this market , because we all know that asking prices are oftentimes just a wish.

This is a judgment-free space for those new to the home-buying process. When posting: - No question is too basic - feel free to ask anything - Share your concerns and excitements about buying your first home - Offer encouragement and support to fellow first-time buyers - Share resources that you've found helpful in your journey - Remember that everyone starts somewhere — be patient with yourself and others We're all in this together — let's make your first home-buying experience a great one!