Buying a home may seem like an incredibly daunting experience. But that is only because there are more negatives out there than successes! Don’t let these discourage you from fulfilling your dream. Join me in this inspiring episode about real-life success stories on home buying.
I do my best to help prepare first time home buyers, but I know, after almost 4 years, you may be sick of me and my thoughts. So, today, we go back and reminisce with homeowners that DID IT! Use these interview lessons with real people to help you on your journey.
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First Time Buyers Who Got The Keys, And How You Can Too!
Lessons From Real People Who Made The Leap From Renter To Owner
Buying a home seems impossible sometimes. It feels like all you hear are horror stories from people about how difficult it can be. Gang, I say to you all the time that negative sells and cynical people are louder and make way more noise than the small success stories that are really happening out there. I got a microphone, so it’s time to change that. It’s time for some positive stories to lift you up on your home-buying journey. Let’s go.
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What is up, homies? I know, interest rates are up. Trust me, I’m hearing it all the time. The news might seem like it’s bad for first-time home buyers, but I’ve got to tell you, I’ve seen this before. This is slow down the stalemate. There are some good things that happen after periods like this if you’ve planned for it. 2023 is going to be interesting because Fed is doing everything it can to basically crash the economy, but with proper planning, you can snag yourself a killer deal in 2023 and stop making your landlord rich.
Because I know this is coming, I’ve got some big news happening for you at the beginning of the year 2023. Keep your ear holes and your eyeballs open. New tools are coming to you that are going to be real necessary to get you in the driver’s seat in 2023. As we wrap up 2022, I was going through all the questions, reviews, and testimonials from all the audience who were either asking me questions or had used the show to help them become homeowners.
I get notes from people all the time. There are some people that just read on their own and use the information they get, and when they close on their home, they send me a little Thank You note from the new home. There are still others I know about because they reached out to me early, and I got them hooked up with unicorn nation. I have got to tell you, either way when people talk to me, I get some intense goose pimples reading about these success stories.
An Email From Ted
Catch this. I was getting ready to do this episode, and I woke up and found this incredible story in my email. It has such a phenomenal ending. I had to share it with you. There’s an audience named Ted. He went to the website, www.HowToBuyAHome.com and hit the Ask A Question or Ask David button. What he said to me originally was, “My wife and I got married in September 2022, and we’re settling into our search for a home. We cut out the bad habit of the high rent costs in New York City. We’re fortunate enough to temporarily live with a family.” I love when I hear about people making that sacrifice.
They’re living in Long Island while they saved up and are getting their debts together, working on their search, and getting their home-buying process altogether. My boy Ted said to me, “We’ve both been in the habit of following the real estate market and loosely looking at homes to understand where the market stands, what we can afford, and what our target goals need to be to get in the house.” He told me he was about 30 episodes into the How To Buy Home Podcast, and he’s got his research ready and ready to start with a good realtor and a mortgage broker where he was in Long Island. He asked me for recommendations in the area.
Moving out of NYC, he also told me that he was ready to go because he just figured out he’s got family in the vicinity, and that would make raising children in that area awesome for both of them. He told me exactly where he wanted to live, so I wrote him back and gave him some more info. The cool thing was they had a really nice plan. They made good money and told me they wanted to settle into a home so they could get their dollars working better for them. It’s a heck of a lot better than rent.
They enjoyed living rent-free with the family, but that wasn’t the long-term plan. One of the things that he told me that was really interesting to help me figure out what the best guidance we could give for him was their dollars that previously were already set aside for rent and paying down student loans and 401(k), he’s admitted to me it was a lot for travel. They’ve decided to put the travel and the rent on pause, and the 401(k) they’ve adjusted as they were aggressively contributing to that for many years. It was time to pay down the student loans and get into a house. The initial goal was to start there, have their married life happen in that new home together, and possibly have a kid of 3 or 4 is what he said.
You could see how as excited I was because I love being able to help people at the beginning phases of their massive adulting. I knew a support squad was necessary ASAP. That way, they could have laser-focused planning and make this dream happen. What happened next for them when they responded back to me after I sent them to a unicorn stoked me out and made all the long hours of doing this show worth it.
I did connect them with one of my great unicorns in Long Island, a real pro that could give them guidance because they were in a good situation and had good options. I gave him someone who is a real professional who also has real empathy and actually cares for first-time home buyers. Just because they can do it isn’t going to take him and shove them into the first deal.
They connected, and this is the email I got, “David. Thank you so much. We did connect with Ann. She spent time with us, providing a lot of advice and education as we were both diving into this head first. In fact, one bit of advice that she gave me led us to work with a good family friend with a great reputation in the industry. I wasn’t sure if rolling this friend as my actual real estate agent was too personal, so I originally held off. I was totally open with Ann and told her about this right from the start. It was crazy that it was a bit of her advice that helped me make this decision.”
“Even after knowing this, Ann took about an hour of her time on the phone with me to help inform and educate me all on a Friday afternoon. I can definitely tell why you recommend Ann as a great person to work with. I’m sorry that we’re not going to end up working together, but I am extremely excited for our steps to come. I’ll keep you up to date and let you know how things are going. It’s moving real quickly. We’re pretty positive that we already have the house that we want. Thanks, Ted.”
This is a straight fire for me. The mission of my show is really simple. It’s educating and empowering first-time home buyers so they don’t make the same mistake that I did when I was in my twenties and realize that for a lot of people out there, you can buy a lot sooner than you think, which will set yourself up financially for life.
[bctt tweet=”For many people out there, you can buy a home sooner than you think, which will set you up financially for life.” via=”no”]
The small sub-mission of the show is to start this revolution because I want all the first-time buyers out there to realize that there’s only a small group of realtors and lenders that don’t just look at you as a number, like a dollar sign and a paycheck right on your forehead. They’re going to treat you with the service that you deserve.
If you desire, we here can connect you to the absolute best in the business so you can make your dreams come true. If the advice and the guidance mean that you don’t buy now, that’s the kind of advice you’re going to get. If they advise you to use another pro as this unicorn did, that’s the advice they’re going to give you. That means that unicorn doesn’t make a dime, but they’re in this business for the right reasons, and it’s the best guidance that you, as a first-time buyer, can get. I know it’s unusual and crazy. That’s why I call them unicorns. This is not the normal regular way of doing business in real estate.
The mission started as a warning for me, the industry insider. I quit my brokerage, grabbed a mic, and dropped the truth bomb that first-time home buyers were being treated like garbage and being screwed by the entire business. I want to tell you how to avoid it. Because I’m not necessarily a fan of people just getting online and bitching on social media without providing a solution to what they’re talking about, that’s where I dug deep in my resources and started building the unicorn nation. I could not be prouder of where this little revolution that I started as a pissed-off dude in my kitchen, where it’s gone and mutated into an actual problem-solving machine.
Lessons On Buying In Turbulent Times
Now, with all the fire in my belly from that awesome email I got, I’m going to give you some lessons that, if you’re driving during the holiday season, you can use as your year-end binge fest. I don’t know where you are on the show, but if you haven’t read the episode interviews from buyers just like you or if you’ve read them before, but you haven’t read them recently, I want to remind you of some interesting and inspiring stories that have great lessons for you. It’s not just coming from me. You can hear from real people who did this. This is great stuff to pump you up in 2023, what I’m officially calling The Year of The First-Time Home Buyer.
I dabbled at that because I’ve been doing this since 2005. I know when I see a year first-time home buyer. Since 2019, I’ve been given all the information on the show over 850,000 downloads in November of 2022. Thousands of audiences over the United States and Canada have closed on homes, whether in big cities or rural areas, buying apartments in some of the urban areas, farms in the rural areas, hipster condos, or the suburban house of their dreams. Using this show to dump the landlord is the goal and the mission. We’re helping people get their keys to their own place and living a comfortable life knowing that as we go into 2023 and things get turbulent, they’re sitting on solid financial stability.
If you want to be in that same position, too, here’s some cool stuff you can learn from a bunch of them who came on the show. I reached out to a couple, two 19-year-old randos that I found on TikTok. I did interviews with them too. Since interest rates are a hot topic now, check out Episode 135 with David. He’s got some great tips on how he bought a home in 2022, even after interest rates jumped a full 2% from when he started doing his calculations.
There’s the oldie but a goodie way back. My first interview was Episode 24 with Chris and Jacqueline. They gave you a great tip on the house hack of using roomies. They became the landlord instead of paying money to one. Take your friends’ money and kick them out when life gets easier because you’re going to be on a fixed mortgage. A fixed mortgage price is going to sting a lot less, and it might only take 2, 3, 4, or 5 years. Why? It’s because most of you out there who are reading this are young, and your income is going to grow. Think about it. What did your rent cost you 3, 4, or 5 years ago? Wouldn’t it be nice to have a fixed payment?
For the first little while, if it’s still too much, bring some roomies in, and then you can kick them out because in five years, imagine how low your monthly payment is going to feel when it hasn’t gone up every single year. On Episode 31, you could check out Zach and Chantal. They bought a home in less than three months. They were local here in Southern California, and I helped them myself. They were bummed out because they were renting for $2,000 a month for a little two-bedroom. We ended up getting them a $448,000 home with less than $20,000 all in to make the purchase happen.
For you homies out there, stop me if you’ve read this before. When market conditions are in your favor, as they will be in 2023, buying a home can be almost as inexpensive as putting down a first, a last, and a security deposit on your next big fat lease rental. You do not need 20% down to buy a home. Make the math start working for you instead of trying to figure out how to save that much and fight an uphill battle.
[bctt tweet=”First Time Buyers: When market conditions are in your favor, as they will be in 2023, buying a home can be almost as inexpensive as putting down a first, a last, and a security deposit on your next big fat lease rental.” via=”no”]
If you haven’t read in a while and want some laughs, Episode 33 is awesome. It’s Alvin and Ashley. It was hysterical. There are 37 different lessons about how to buy your home there. Alvin and Ashley are two young adults. They’re working in the tech world and found their hipster dream pad that fits their lifestyle, giant ceilings complete with floor-to-ceiling windows. With careful planning, Ashley, this gal from South Central LA, and Alvin, this creative dude who wanted a place big enough to have an extra room for his DJing photo equipment, did it.
One of the lessons in there is they almost lost that dream home because they didn’t follow the steps in order, those steps 1) Get a team, a realtor, and a lender, and let them help you make a plan. 2) Plan with the team for options. 3) Go shopping. If you read that episode, you’re going to learn how they jumped right to step 3 without figuring out steps 2 and step 1. Thank goodness they talked to me, and we figured out a way to get their ducks in a row and make it happen.
Lessons On Buying Investment Homes
Episode 37 has some great options if you’re thinking about buying investment homes once you settle on your own primary residence. You can hear how Kyle used a multi-home purchasing strategy where he bought a place, lived in one unit, and rented out the others. By the time we got ready to do the interview, he had already purchased his second investment property.
Episode 45 is a fun one with a 25-year-old reader who closed on our home. Lenora found the show and reached out to me. She got a local unicorn realtor and lender. They gave her a plan and helped her educate, fix some credit issues, showed her the possible numbers for her, and they finally helped her and her husband buy a home with only 3.5% down, and their monthly payment ended up being less than the rent that they were paying.
If you’re reading this and you’re calling me old and Boomer or old and drunk, I’m not a Boomer, I’m Gen X, and I haven’t done that in a while. It’s fun to read Episode 53 with my girl, Madison. You big time how to buy a homies know that I talk about Madison all the time. She’s awesome. She was 24 but looked about 19 or 12 when we ended up talking with her and getting her to buy a home. She was incredible. This is a must-read for any of you guys out there who are analytic spreadsheet savers or for any skeptics out there who are wondering if buying a home is a great way to save you money because you’re frugal and you save money.
Madison and I came together. Before she met me, she was a Dave Ramsey Saver. His program did a lot to help her with her saving. When she reached out to Dave and his crew to talk about home-buying guidance, that’s where things fell short for her. She came to me with some opinions. We had some spirited discussions, but once I started giving her things like math, data, and actual numbers, she realized that for her, it would be better for her to leverage with a low down payment. Now, my girl Madison is swimming in equity.
Lessons On Moving Away
If you’re out there reading and life has changed since you read some of these episodes, and now maybe you’re looking at moving a little further away doing some remote work possibly, or maybe you’ve got a job opportunity that takes you out to a different state while there’s a lot of great interviews, you can read how real people did it.
Episode 55 is about Adrienne and John. They were living in LA. They originally wanted to buy in Seattle. Check that out. They ended up buying in Portland, but they did the whole process while they were still living in LA. If that’s not enough to convince you that it’s possible to buy in some far-off land, then I encourage you to read Episode 119. Briana bought a home in the US. Why would I say in the US? It’s because she did it when she was in Germany.
Briana is an amazing interview. She’s a military buyer, and she did this whole thing in another country. Check that one out. While you’re there, you can just jump right to Episode 120. That’s Tatiana and Donovan, who moved states and never had to rent in the new state they were moving to because their unicorn team helped them buy before they actually had to move to the new state. What if life changes for you, and you need to move from an inexpensive area to an expensive city? You can read Episode 76. That’s a story of Apoorva moving from Indiana, which is a great place to live but not nearly as expensive as where they had to go to the San Francisco Bay Area, one of the most expensive areas in the country.
Lessons On Buying On A Budget
The interviews I’ve talked to you about so far were buyers from $350,000 to $900,000, maybe even more. What about if you are a first-time home buyer, reading the episode, and looking for something even less than $350,000? There are a lot of those out in the country. I suggest you go back and read Episode 71 with Randy. You can read how a year before I got him on the show after he closed on his home.
One year before that, Randy had no job, paid cash for everything, and had zero credit score, nothing at all. He got a job and called his bank to get a loan for a truck. They said yes. He then called them back and asked for a loan for a small $60,000 home. They said no. What does everybody do? They went online and talked to Zillow, and they said no. He then found my show, reached out to me, and at the time of the interview, in less than a year, he had closed on a $200,000 home, just eight months to close on a home like that.
There are many lessons from these people. Episode 82 is about Kenneth and Danielle. They realize that with a plan and utilizing the awesome VA loan for military people, it was an easy way for them to stop paying rent in a place in a part of the country they didn’t think they could afford. For you youngsters out there, I reached out to two different 19-year-old TikTokers. They were on TikTok talking about how they were nineteen and bought a home. I brought them on. They were on Episode 85 and 115.
Lessons On Planning
For those of you who aren’t nineteen, let’s say you’re nineteen years old times three, you can read Episode 103, which is the story of a 59-and-a-half-year-old finding her comfort zone in the trusted resources of unicorn nation and buying that home that fit her needs. No matter how much I tell you guys should plan, some of you guys are still going to wait to plan and get a time crunch because you’re going to wait too long to start your planning. Episode 91 has the not recommended but possibly doable incredible story of Chris and Emily finding the show way too late. They managed to close on a home in just 60 days after starting to read the blogs. Those are some encouraging stuff.
We’ve got a few different episodes with single female buyers. This year in 2022, we hit the highest number. Twenty percent of first-time home buyers in 2022 were single female buyers. Episode 104 is about Tuesday, who’d been trying for three years to buy a home until she found the show and got it all worked out. While you’re there in the early hundreds, there’s a great episode at 107 where Philip teaches us how parallel path planning landed him the one thing he wanted in his first home purchase with more storage. Phillip’s a fun dude. Still there, there’s Episode 109, lessons on how to binge the show and buy your dream home in just a matter of weeks. They’re Brian and Diana.
If you’re dedicated to this mission, read their story and get all kinds of tips to help you get even more focused. Our other single female was Stephanie. She was from Episode 113. She worked a plan and discovered using her 401(k) as a supplement to her cash position was the perfect move for her to diversify her portfolio and still fund her retirement by becoming a homeowner and putting her largest monthly output, her rent, into this long-term appreciating asset. If you haven’t read that one and you’re freaked out about the whole 401(k) thing, Stephanie’s a great story. Maybe you’re freaking out about the rising rents because you live in one of our more expensive cities. Here’s what Jacob did in Episode 116 when he discovered that his rent was going to be going up 90%.
Maybe you’ve been living in one of those expensive cities for years, and it seems like housing is out of reach. Episode 118 is with some Southern California buyers, Andre and Lenay. It has great tips on affording your dream home in what seems to be an unattainable and unaffordable area to buy your first home. In Episode 127, we got some great practical tips from an electrician. Trenton bought his first home, but he had eyes way different than you and I do. He was checking out all the ins and outs with his inspectors. It’s a great way for you to read and learn how first-time buyers can expertly negotiate with all your inspections by either being an expert yourself, like Trenton, or having a great team to help you out.
The Year Of The First Time Home Buyer
Episode 128 is going to help you figure out how to buy in big cities like Boston. Episode 135 with Nathaniel and Bryan, they bought in San Francisco. Not cheap. Read how they did it. If you still think you can’t do this, read Episode 129 with Quasi. He tells you how he bought a home only five months out of college without two full years of employment. There are ways to do this, gang. You just need to get the right guidance. That’s my plan for you here at the end of 2022. Instead of listening to me coming in here and giving you all the facts and data, go back and learn from these people. Get some motivation and inspiration. I want to pump you up for 2023.
Frankly, I realized the best way to do it was for me to stop talking and let you learn from real-life people just like you. I’m seriously telling you, gang. 2023 is going to be the year of the first-time buyer. While everybody else is freaking out, you are going to be okay. You’re going to be setting yourself up and finishing up your last lease ever when everyone else is freaking out about the 2023 recession. Opportunities are coming. I’m rolling out some new tools for 2023, so get ready. If you are ready to start your plan, start it now. You know the unicorns are here for you.
[bctt tweet=”2023 is going to be the year of the first time buyer. While everybody else is freaking out, you are going to be okay.” via=”no”]
All you have to do is go to HowToBuyAHome.com and ask to start your plan. No hard sales pitch, just the best advice for you, your personal situation, and your best personal timing. Planning with a support squad means that you are going to have more options when you’re ready to buy. The more options you have, the better deal you can get. Let’s keep it going, gang. Please help me grow the revolution so I can keep reinventing this for you. I’m going to be doing that in 2023. Get ready.
I want to keep bringing you more and more resources and more and more up-to-date information on what’s happening for first-time buyers now. Help me out. Share the show with everything you know. Get on the subreddits for first-time home buyers and tell them about the show. I tried to do that, but apparently, self-promotion is frowned upon in Reddit land, which is dope.
That’s my place. I love real community help. No selling, no pitching, no BS. Help a brother out and talk me up on the subreddits. Review on Apple and Spotify. Tell people about their stories. These people came on and were gracious enough to tell you everything they learned so you could be just like them. Join the revolution. I’m telling you, you’re going to want to get yourself and all your friends and family ready for 2023. The time is now to start planning. Let’s go. You can do this.
Important Links
- Ask A Question
- Episode 135 – Previous Episode
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- Episode 45 – Previous Episode
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- Episode 119 – Previous Episode
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- Episode 76 – Previous Episode
- Episode 71 – Previous Episode
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- Episode 115 – Previous Episode
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- Episode 113 – Previous Episode
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- Episode 135 – Previous Episode
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- Apple – How to Buy a Home
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