What if you could follow your career dreams AND find a more affordable housing market? That’s exactly what James and Cynthia considered. Listen in as they share their journey of exploring homeownership opportunities across the country, ultim/ately landing in Tennessee! This inspiring story will show you how to navigate buying a home in a new location and the unexpected benefits of considering out-of-state options.
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Interview With First-Time Home Buyers – Shopping In Seattle And Buying In Tennessee
How To Shop For A Home From Across The Country
What do you do if you’re living in a city and you start looking to buy a home and you realize it’s too expensive? How on earth do you figure out how to buy a home across the country? Learn from this great story. This is an interview with James and Cynthia. They were in Seattle and ended up looking into, “What happens if we follow a job and we go all the way to Tennessee.” Check out this story.
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This is another interview with another success story and I could not be happier. This is Cynthia and James. I’m going to start the way I like to start all these. You all out there know they bought a home so I’m going to assume that Cynthia and James are not pros at it.
Not at all.
Both their heads were shaking hard, “No.” Give us something helpful from the process. Something you learned, either something terrible that you’re like, “Never do this,” or your best tip. Go for it.
Go ahead, James. Share what we learned from your job.
I think the biggest thing we learned and the biggest struggle that we had through the actual house-buying process was job verification. I don’t know if we’ve ever talked about or you’ve ever talked about on show necessarily, but trying to get job verification from my company was a nightmare.
I have touched on it. Let me briefly, since you brought it up, finish the tip for everybody else. When you get a loan, you get a pre-approval. First of all, that pre-approval, that’s only step one. You’re not even close to done because then when you identify a property and then you go under contract, next you go to the underwriters. The underwriters are people who are trying to decide that they should not give you money. Their ultimate goal is to give you money but their job, if they approve people who ultimately can’t afford the home, they get fired.
HR Challenges
Think insurance people trying to give you the least amount possible unless you can verify everything. One of the things they do is you’re already committed. You’ve done the house. You’ve done the inspection. You’ve done the appraisal. You’ve done everything else. Now, you are 24 hours to 48 hours from closing and then they call your job because there are people that get an offer accepted and then they get fired. Suddenly, it’s 4 days or 5 days to close. You got that approval based completely on the salary and the income you’re supposed to get. They have to call your job. James, tell us what was difficult. Is it your HR department? It’s because I’ve heard the story a thousand times. I want to hear yours.
Yeah. HR was not helpful. There were a couple of factors. We were living in Seattle and we decided to move to Nashville, Tennessee. Part of that was I was transferring to another location within the same company but the loan needed verification that I was working or going to work in Tennessee. I had my manager in Seattle trying to help me get information because she didn’t know how to do that. I had my manager in Nashville trying to help me out and I’m talking to HR as well. They’re like, “This is what you need. Go online. Go to this website.” I can’t even remember.
We had the struggle before we decided to move to Nashville because we were originally trying to buy a house in Seattle and we had it rough with the HR department in Seattle. They kept saying that they couldn’t get through. They couldn’t find James’ work verification and HR kept saying, “You just go here. It’ll work.” Our loan agent or the underwriters kept calling and it wasn’t working. They were like, “We can’t approve you for this loan unless you get verified but we can’t verify you because your company’s not giving us the right info. It was going around in circles for probably a week or two.
I’m going to interject with the solution for everybody else and you’re right, I should have done a full podcast on this. The day you first are ready to go and start looking at homes, on Monday morning at 9:00 AM. Now, who knows? Maybe you ride an offer on Sunday night and it’s a windfall. You have so much stuff you have to do in those first 4 or 5 days but I’m going to add one more to the list. At 9:00 AM call HR. Find the H, find a human.
I’ve had this happen to me with VA loans. They’re phenomenal products for the military, but it’s the military so there’s paperwork on paperwork. If you are going to borrow against your 401(k), if you are going to take money out of a stock that you want to use as that savings now for a home, and if everybody needs verification employment and VA, everybody adds this to the list of things to do on day one.
Just know how to do it. Know how your company works. My work verification was done in two hours. It was so easy but I worked for a small company and James works for a big company. It was so much harder to get in touch with HR and it was a mess. It was not at all expected.
Cynthia, that’s a great point because you have better odds of being approved in the illogical logic of bank approval because a big company, they’re like, “Big company. No problem. Let’s approve them. What’s funny is your little small company that was probably a pain in the butt to verify all the original income and information and all that but when it came to, “Do you still work here?” The big companies, there’s too much red tape, right James?
Yeah. Absolutely.
I love that we set the table with this that instantly we’re giving people some nuggets of information. Now, let’s meet you two. Let’s walk all the way back. How long have you guys been living together? Were you renting together? What was your process from becoming a young adult renter to finding the show?
We were living in an apartment in Seattle. It is 500 square feet.
Is it legit 500?
Yeah. The total amount was 565 square feet. It has one bedroom and one bathroom. We were living in that apartment and James mentioned that one day he wanted to buy a house. I was like, “That’s cool. Maybe in 8 years or 10 years down the road, there’s no way. He was like, it’d be nice to own something. I’m like, “Okay, but check out our finances.”
How old are you guys as of his time?
I’m 29.
I’m 31.
I’m telling you, the reason I did this show is you both beat me. I went, “If I could get in a DeLorean and tell myself all this stuff because I get it. Are you guys from Seattle or did you move there for work, life, or fun?
I’m originally from Seattle. I moved back there for work but also moved back there for her.
We met in college. I wanted to live in Seattle. We got married. I like Seattle and wanted to stay there because I was from Southern California. I love the green in Seattle, the lakes, and everything that Washington has to offer.
It made it an easy decision for me.
I’ll put a little pause on the show and now I’m going to get into some reality show stuff because Cynthia and I were talking. I’m from SoCal. Was much of the attraction that he was a Seattle boy? Were you hoping in the back of your brain? Be honest.
I was already planning to move to Seattle before we started dating, but it was nice. He doesn’t have blonde hair, or blue eyes like Californians do and I got a little tired of that maybe. I don’t know.
The hook, the surprise, and the twist that nobody knows out there yet is that we started talking in Seattle. You guys found me and then what happened?
We found you. We tried to buy a house in Seattle. You sent us a unicorn. They were awesome. They were so great.
They were fantastic.
However, there are not a lot of houses for sale. As you’ve talked a lot about on your show with the housing shortage, there weren’t that many on the market. The ones that were built in 1900 with water damage. It was a rough picket for what we were trying to get into.
Anything that we might be able to afford was going to be 2 to 2.5 hours away from work or more with traffic for me and that’s a, “No. Thank you.”
However, we kept hearing in your show, “You could do this.” We’re like, “All right, David. How can we do this?” We’re talking about how in the show you always talk about how you can’t have everything. You can’t always have the perfect house, perfect location, perfect price point, etc. We started looking for possibilities outside of the state where James could transfer within his company and I worked remotely so I could work anywhere.
You can’t have everything. You can’t always have the perfect house, the perfect location, or the perfect price point.
Finding A Home In Seattle
Expand on that. I’m curious because sometimes people don’t realize when I say keep your options open, that I’m open-minded and I never tell people, “It’s never going to happen here for you in Seattle,” because I want to keep it open for them. And a lot of times, we’re trying to figure out, “Maybe a small condo first and then the dream house in seven years or so.” Talk more about that. Did the process of trying to find a home in Seattle make you realize, “Maybe we don’t have to do it here?” I don’t want to put words in your mouth.
I think there were a few different factors. I think one of the factors was the size of the house we were looking for. We’re still fairly young. We don’t have any kids, but we plan on having kids in the near future. We wanted a house that we could grow into. A lot of the houses in the areas that we were looking at in Seattle were too small for that.
They were too small and they were still at the top of our budget. We didn’t necessarily want our dream house, but we wanted a house that we could be comfortable in for the next 5 to 10 years with the plans of growing our family. We also have a dog that needs some space. We wanted a little bit more than what we could find or what we were finding in Seattle.
I found that in the original notes from February 2022. It was that long ago. It was about the dog needing space to run around. It’s so interesting to me because of the pandemic now in this potential for the remote work world, even though you are from Seattle, your individual family unit, which you were intending on expanding, there are some people that say we absolutely one million percent have to live here and then we have to create a different strategy for them. Maybe we find them a two-bedroom, one-bath condo then the dog sacrifices for a little while. However, what led you to the possibility of going across the country?
I think one day were like, “Let’s see what the housing market looks like in these areas where James could transfer within his company to a different service center.” We were like, “Let’s toy with the idea.” We weren’t set on moving, but we were like, “Let’s try something new out. This hasn’t been working.” We did have great unicorns that had suggested condos and they’d never said it wasn’t possible for us, but we figured, “Let’s look elsewhere and see.” We started looking on Zillow and Redfin. We were looking at different areas and the housing prices. We were looking up their schools and all the tips that you said. Walking around on Google Earth. Full on stalker because we became great at stalking houses and neighborhoods.
What was crazy interesting, and correct me if I’m not remembering this correctly, you guys, for some reason the job opportunity transfer was in Tennessee, but not necessarily downtown Nashville.
Correct.
This is for your big company James.
Yes.
What’s the deal? Do they have a warehouse or an office somewhere like an hour outside of Nashville?
A little backstory on that. I’m a mechanic. I work on electric vehicles particularly. I used to work for Tesla. Now, I work for a company called Rivian. They have different service centers.
They’re out of Orange County.
Yes. They’re at Irvine.
They’re in our local paper all the time.
I work for them.
Let me guess, low price per square foot and some big old factory warehouse outside of town in Tennessee.
Close to it. It’s a big building. We have our lifts and we service all the vehicles in there. The service center is about 30 to 40 minutes South of downtown Nashville. It’s in a little town called Franklin. We were looking around there and trying to figure out how that all worked.
When we were thinking of other opportunities outside of the state, the week that we decided maybe we should look at other states, James’s exact position became available in Nashville or Franklin in Tennessee. It was a direct transfer. It popped up and we were like, “We got to try it.”
The next step of this perfect kismet meant-to-be scenario was I didn’t have a unicorn in Franklin but your Seattle unicorns had a cousin.
Who had moved from the city where we were living into the town that we had found and decided on Zillow based on walking around on Google Earth. She had moved from our city to that specific town and they’re like, “She’s a great realtor.”
I did another interview today and I said, “All I am is an educator and then a matchmaker.” I didn’t know Kimber and Bryce before the show. I met a lot of the unicorns I’ve known for years and years but another good person I knew said, “These guys are awesome.” I loved it because you saved me a week of work because I would’ve been on the phone for a week trying to find somebody in little Franklin. That’s my favorite part of the story. I love that. Let’s talk about some details for the people. What was your situation? How did you go from one bedroom and Cynthia going, “We should try this,” and James going, “Are you nuts lady?” Where were you with savings and with your rent? How much was that?
It was $1,210 every month and that was before COVID. They didn’t raise the prices in COVID but they did kick everybody out. They remodeled it. We had to leave. We moved in with my mom for a little bit.
James, not probably.
They raised it.
How comfortable were you and what down payment were you looking at? It’s because obviously you got a significant price reduction or maybe you kept the same price and got four times the house.
We had done the Dave Ramsey stuff. We had paid off all of our debt and all that stuff so we didn’t have very much in savings, to be honest.
In the other interview I did, she had $200,000 in student loan debt. She bought a house in three months.
We found your show after Dave Ramsey.
Good Debt Vs Bad Debt
It’s a great starting point. I just hope everybody understands there is a balance at some point because there’s good debt and bad debt. The debt that you’re paying off is bad debt. A home is good debt but if you pay off all the bad debt, you pay 3, 4, 5 years in rent and most people are paying double your $1,250. You were set up. You had no debt. What was your down payment? What were you looking at?
There’s good debt and there’s bad debt. The debt you’re paying off is bad debt. A house is considered a good debt.
It changed from Seattle to Tennessee. It was a very different market. Originally, when we were working in Seattle, our loan agent had said about $40,000.
Which was approximately what percent?
It was 5%. She told us that we could do the 3.5% if we wanted to, but we wanted to save up for the 5%.
This is a whole other episode about how the 3.5% is great, but unless you refinance out of it, you’re stuck with the PMI forever. Therefore, the 5% is a good thing but you ended up at $379,000. Did you guys go 10% down on that?
I think we stuck with the 5% so we could have a lower monthly payment. The builder contributed 3% towards our closing costs and stuff like that.
That’s huge.
That was a nice surprise.
The builders are in a weird spot right now because they’re holding back building homes on purpose so that the prices go up. We’re six million homes short but every once in a while they do it too much and then they have to incentivize you guys.
We got a new build which is still blowing my mind and it had been sitting on the lot for at least six months which is crazy.
We closed and moved in in June and I think they had the house finished in November or December 2022.
That’s crazy because that would’ve been before the interest rate jump because the interest rate jump was in June.
We did move to a pretty rural area though. We didn’t move to Franklin. We moved 45 minutes from Franklin.
It’s another great tip for people out there. If you’re looking rural, you get to be perhaps a little bit more selective or more like a regular buyer. I wish I could give people in the metro areas stories about how to get seller credits or builder credits, but it’s not happening right now.
We had looked at a house closer to Franklin. It went on the market and we were like, “Let’s go look at that house.” Our realtor was like, “This house is going to go quick.” Since we read your blog, we’re like, “We know.” She was like, “This is going to be bidding wars. It’s going to be hard. You’re not going to get any credit. You’re going to have to pay above the asking price.” We’re like, “We know. We just want to check it out.”
I love the depressed yet informed individual. “I know. Sedoni tells me all the time.” I haven’t talked about this. Did you logically just put together, “These ones out here, this is sitting but that’s not what David was talking about?”
Yeah.
The Process
Tell us about the process. Tell us about the new build. It might not be for another 3 or 4 years or only in very rural places, but how does one shop when they know a home sitting, how did that whole process go?
It was so easy. I think it blew both of us away. Once we were like, “This is the house,” how easy the process was except for the one hiccup of the job verification. Everything was smooth. We technically looked at the house next door first and then while we were there for that little open house with the selling agent, they were like, “By the way, we have the key for the one next door too. That one’s up for sale. It’s not listed but it’s for sale as well. Do you want to look at that one?” It was a little bit bigger and a little bit nicer. I think it bumped our payment up maybe $100. We were like, “We like that one better.”
We made an offer. The next morning, it was accepted and it just rolled from there. We made the offer on May 4th or 5th and our estimated closing date was June 6th. We ended up closing on May 31st. It was so smooth. We had all of our information because we had gone through them before. We had gotten pre-approved and had the full credit put like, “All of the things that you tell us to do, we had that all ready to go before we even came and looked at houses.” When it came to the actual process it was like, “You’re done. Sign this.” “Okay. Done.” “Sign this. Done.” We have the house.
Our story was even a little bit crazier than that because we didn’t tell you guys yet. When James decided to apply for that job in Nashville, he had one interview. It was going to be a transfer so we were pretty sure it was going to work out but he had an interview and then we booked flights for the next weekend to go visit Tennessee for the first time in our lives before he even had the job or officially transferred because they said in the interview process they take him to transfer.
He was going to need to start work in 3 to 4 weeks from when they told him that he was good. It’s going to be a quick process. We booked flights the next week out to Nashville and we looked at houses for three days straight. We were there for over two days and we put in an offer. It got accepted right before we got on our flight home.
Prepare, Prepare, Prepare
The moral of the story is to prepare. The reason it worked out for you guys is because you did it but you did it in another city. When people tell me, “I have a job transfer. We’re going to think about buying a home.” They go, “We’re going to rent an Airbnb for three months and figure it out.” I tell them, “Here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to do that. You’re going to land. You’re going to go out the first weekend and find the perfect house and you’re not going to be prepared.” What your story can tell the readers is you can prepare 2000 miles away.
Prepare, prepare, prepare.
Yeah. We read all of your episodes. We found the show in December of 2021. We looked on Google Maps. We walked around on Google Maps, and Google Earth. We looked up school zones and the ratings. Our realtor had it all mapped out for us. “We’re going to go here. We’re going to go here. You don’t want to go to this house.” That was the craziest weekend of my life.
I’ve done those three-day tours and I can tell you, God bless all the new kids trying to do this. The people who had just got a license, there’s no way they’re going to be able to do what we call the relocation three-day tour. You have to know the neighborhoods. You have to know the guard gates by name and who is going to let you in. You have to know the community center. I’m sure you didn’t do it all within one mile. I’m sure you were looking 20, 30, 40 miles.
We drove all around Nashville.
It’s the best way to get to know a town before you move there, right?
Yeah. Absolutely.
We were there for the first time and making the biggest purchase of our life.
I’m glad you had the internet tools to help you ahead of time. It’s so funny. Just listening to this and talking to you guys now, your mannerisms, and your personality you seem very go with the flow, but you also seem like there’s some solid organization behind what you did.
I think you just described me and her together. I’m very much just going with the flow. We’ll figure it out. She’s like, “I need a plan. I need steps.”
This has got to be planned out, thought out, and not going to ruin our life.
I didn’t want to say it out loud, but that’s what I meant when I said that. The goal is that I want people to understand no matter what it is, if you’re on the emotional side or if you are on the practical side, there’s enough information in the show to educate the heck out either one of you and get you on board. However, there’s a stopping point and then it’s all got to be unicorns because real estate’s local.
Since the buying process of a new build that has been sitting, that’s a great tip. That’s a lot easier but then people go, “I’m going to go out and go get a new build,” and they bid on the one that’s not built yet and there are fifteen people bidding on it. It’s not the same. How has the process been for you in your new home? What’s it been like being an owner of a newly built property? How long have you guys been in the house now?
About three months as of this time.
How’s it been so far?
I’ve been here the longest because I had to move here and immediately start working. She had some stuff she had to finish up back in Seattle. She moved and then went back for a month and a half. It’s been a little bit of adjustment. The house itself is nice. We haven’t had any issues with the house but with the yard, we have to figure some stuff out. I guess I should back up. We moved in. We didn’t realize that there were no blinds and no toilet paper holders, towel holders, and shower curtain rods.
We didn’t think about it. We walked through the house and we saw it, but we were so excited to be looking at a brand new house that we didn’t even think to look if they had a random necessity I guess.
Now, I know what’s coming next but for the readers, finish that statement. Why the yard? Is the yard just a patch of dirt?
It has grass because it’s Tennessee but it’s not great grass and it’s not level.
Is there no landscaping?
They put in three shrubs because they had to put in some shrubbery to the contract but two of those died by the time we moved in. There’s one still living.
They threw some grass down. It’s patchy. We’re in the South and when it rains down here, it rains. When that happens, there is a river that runs through the backyard. It comes off the roof, puddles in the front, runs around the side, and down through the back. It’s a lot of water. We have to figure out some things there. We’re going to have to figure out some things.
There is a French drain.
We’re going to do something like that.
You need some French drains.
It’s a new house. Structurally, it’s great, but there are some extra things to make it our own that we weren’t necessarily planning on but now we need to take care of those things.
I think it’s a good trade-off for people to understand especially if you get a home that’s been sitting for a little while. If you’re doing a new build and you are involved at the very beginning, you get to go to this lovely place called the design center and you pick and choose. Even though it’s a new home, you bought like a rental car. It had 10,000 miles on it but you’re not getting power windows or you’re not getting the satellite. You buy it as is. It’s still brand new. It’s a good lesson. Also, you get to enjoy the fact that you have a wonderful home with great value. You’re getting good appreciation for it. You guys bought at the right time when the market started to come back.
We feel we got in at the right time.
I would say that from 500 square feet to what’s the square footage now? Do you guys even know?
I think it’s 1,900 and it’s on an acre.
On an acre? Cynthia, you’re from my part of the world. I know now when you said you wanted a dog to have space to run around, in my world that’s 6,000-square-foot lot.
That’s what I was planning on too.
Do you have an acre?
We have an acre.
It’s insane.
I’d be freaking camping half the time.
That’s what we told our family they could do when they come for Thanksgiving. We’ll just set up a bunch of tents in the backyard and have a big bonfire and everything. I have a big family.
I tell everybody to get the kitchen table with leaves. Leave the leaves in the garage the whole time and then go to Costco and buy some of those glamping packages. Tell everybody they can stay because we can only fit three couch beds so deal with it. That’s awesome. I’ve been so enthralled with what you guys have been saying. Is there anything when you were like, “We’re going to talk to David,” that you want to tell the people out there about the process besides it’s easy, James?
It wasn’t that easy until we got to this house because in Seattle we had put in an offer on a house that Kimber and Bryce helped us do, which was amazing. They walked us through it and we didn’t get it. Our offer didn’t get accepted when we tried for that house. It wasn’t all easy. It was just that we had been preparing for a year and a half, with the show, and with the unicorns you sent us. I don’t think we could have done it if we didn’t have Kimber and Bryce, especially because if we didn’t have them they would not have referred Samantha who was living in the town we were looking. It just works out.
I think the whole process of making the offer was challenging. We tried for probably a year to find something in Seattle and wondered, “How are we going to make this work,” and then the process of making the decision to look elsewhere was not an easy one. All of my family is still in Seattle. We were living with Cynthia’s mom who’s also in Seattle now. Our family’s there. We know no one out here. I have one friend from college and that’s it. I think that the whole process up until making the offer on the house was not easy. It was a struggle, for sure. Just trying to figure out what the right choice was for us, our budget, and our situation.
To clarify, we lived in a 500-square-foot apartment until we decided that we wanted to buy a house and they were going to start kicking people out of our apartment. We moved in with my mom for extra savings to save up for a house and that helped make it possible too.
That’s a great clarification and it comes from the planner side.
Although it was my idea to move in there.
I said the recap came from the planner side. We all know what us free spirits do. What we tend to forget is that we also brought up seven other things that she was like, “Are you crazy? That’s dumb,” but then eventually, we hit the right one.
Yes.
Recap
A massive recap. It’s so exciting. Start the planning and get the education. The moving home thing is a huge piece for the readers out there. Understand that those of us who are fortunate enough to have anything from parents giving you $1,000 to $100,000 to the opportunity to move home. All that is so important and the fact that it wasn’t easy when you’re going through the first part of the process but that created the other part of the process to be easy for you. Also, what’s so wildly important is that because you were working with a team that cared about you, Kimber and Bryce put in tons of hours and didn’t make a dime.
It’s important that you work with a team that actually cares about you.
Whether they had their cousin or not, we were going to find somebody together because it’s a big game of karma. What goes around comes around and you guys were the fortunate recipients. Now, I guess my next best piece of advice would be to get ready for when you start the family and call the in-laws and find out what kind of bed they want to sleep in before you put the guest room together because if they’re all back in Seattle, that’s going to be the big thing for you.
My dad’s already come to visit and he’s coming back again. We’ve been here for a few months.
He came the second week we moved in to help us move in and then two weeks after he left, he was like, “I think I’m going to come back in September.” He moved it up. It was supposed to be October. He is like, “Actually, I’ll come in September.”
What’s his favorite part? Is it the city? Is it the acre or is it just tinkering around the house because that’s a dad thing?
I think he loves the area that we’re in. There’s a lot of wood in this and open this. He loves taking pictures of birds so this whole area is perfect for that.
You could have stopped right there. I get it now. You have a private acre for him to knock himself out. That’s amazing. I interrupted you a thousand times because you guys had so many interesting things, but your story is one of my favorites. I laughed when I was talking to Bryce and Kimber and I was reaching out because just this week I had to find somebody in Knoxville.
I went to my Nashville guy and he had somebody. He goes, “Whatever happened to Franklin?” I’m like, “A funny story.” Congratulations to you guys. You’re sitting on an acre for $379,000. You’re probably going to be in a great situation in the next couple of years where you’re even going to get to refinance and save some money.
That’s what we’re hoping.
What’s your rate? I’m scared to death to ask.
We got it at 6.3% or 5%.
You know that for the past many years, the average has been 7.7% so you’re doing well even though all your friends are like, “No way,” and then you ask them about the apartment that they rent. You are just rubbing it. That’s awesome, guys. I love it. Thank you so much. I appreciate you sharing your story. Say goodbye to the world.
Bye. You could do it.
Yes. You can do it for sure.
Believe in David. I didn’t at first, but you really can.
Thank you.
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That was incredible. James and Cynthia from a 565 square foot one bedroom, one bath apartment trying to figure out what to do, realizing Seattle was too expensive for them, figuring out that they could go home, save some money, and then looking on Zillow as stalkers. I loved that they used all the internet tips from the show to figure out how to buy a home all the way across the country. Buying a home, at first, you might run into some sticker shock like they did in Seattle.
You might figure out that maybe if you want to live in a city you’re not going to get the four-bedroom house. You might have to start with a two-bedroom condo but understand all the different things that you can do. The internet stalking, talking to people across the country, or talking to a good unicorn team in your own hometown both the realtor and the lender side so you get all of your options.
I’ve said it before and I’ll keep saying it on the show. Starting to talk to someone as soon as you can, means you understand all of your options. Now, you can do like they did and figure out how to take one of those options. Get out of the 565 square feet and go across the country and get a big old giant Tennessee-style yard so your dog can run around or perhaps maybe you’ll find out once you look at your options that you need to look at different options within your own hometown.
I’m thankful to them for coming on. I hope that you guys learned from all the stuff that they talked about. They only put 5% down. They bought a $379,000 house. Also, make sure when you start looking for homes, if you’re at a big company, call HR immediately because they will need to verify your job at the end of your contract time right when you’re getting ready to buy the house.
If you need to do anything, if you need to cash out stocks, if you need to go into your 401(k), if you need to do anything that is going to take a little time with the bank or a different entity. If you need to talk to the VA people, if you need to talk to the military, you know how that goes. Make sure you do that stuff early in your process or the day your offer gets accepted.
Go to HowToBuyAHome.com. If you’ve got other questions, there’s a starter kit there. There’s an Ask David. You can ask me a straight direct question or you could ask me for a unicorn and we can get your unicorn team. Even if you’re moving across the country, you can get a unicorn team that can help you start the process while you’re all the way on the other coast. I always love to hear the great stories like that. I hope it’s inspirational and a motivation for you. Also, I hope that you always remember, you can do this.
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