today we're going to talk about the top 10 mistakes to avoid when purchasing a home here
in Florida if you're new to my channel my name is Katrin Pfitzenreiter I'm a real estate agent in
Sarasota Bradenton Lakewood Ranch and Venice For Florida related information subscribe to
this Channel and we're going to get right into this video number one is if you're interested
in purchasing in a neighborhood make sure that you really understand what that neighborhood is about
spend some time in that neighborhood because your realtor is not going to be able to tell
you all there is to know about the neighborhood especially if you're interested in understanding
what the crime is and the demographical aspect of the neighborhood and so one of the best things you
can actually do is rent first spend some time in that neighborhood a week a month maybe two months
before you start committing to it that's also going to allow you to really know what's around
it from a shopping perspective from an amenity standpoint it's really going to help you test
drive the neighborhood before you start investing your money your hard-earned money in purchasing
a home there number two is neglecting the home inspection there's still some home buyers who
are willing to neglect the home inspection Maybe because they are cash purchasers and to them it's
really not that important perhaps they're putting too much faith in how well the home looks from the
outside from a visual inspection when you just walk through it and so they're willing to take
a gamble but the home inspection is so crucial because it checks the Integrity of the house
and in Florida where the weather is so intense when it comes to hurricanes and summer weather
the heat the glaring Sun you want to make sure that your roof is sound the Integrity of your
house is in good condition that your electric plumbing is working in order to uncover any
hidden problems before actually committing to the purchase of the home with inspections yes you're
going to be spending some money you're going to be spending anywhere from 500 to a thousand
dollars maybe a little bit more depending on how many different kinds of inspections you're going
to get but in my opinion it is far better to lose a thousand dollars versus is being stuck with a
lemon later with a home that may cost you 30K 40K 50K in Home Improvement repairs after closing my
recommendation is at the very least when you do home inspection is to do a regular home
inspection and also do a termite inspection and that actually leads me to number three and that
is Florida is a very hot and humid place right and so our homes are very prone to pest infestations
especially termites subterranean termites being one of the worst kind now if you're somebody that
just closed on a house in Florida or perhaps you've owned it for a long time but you don't
have termite protection definitely definitely get turbine protection especially for the Subterranean
type because they're so hard to spot until the damage is so far gone but if you protect your
home by putting in bait inside of the ground it is far less likely that you will have a subterranean
termite issue you want to safeguard your home your investment also if you have termite issues
you have to disclose it when you sell your home to the next buyer and in many cases it's going to
lower the perceived value of the house in the eyes of a buyer so it's best for you to never even have
an issue with termites and what do you do well you take preventative action now if you're mortgaging
the house the bank that's lending you the money they're going to request that you have insurance
or the house and if the home is in a flood zone say it's in flood zone AE they're going to request
that you get flood insurance as well if you put an offer in and you don't understand what the
home insurance and the flood insurance costs are going to be you may be stuck having to pay a far
greater Bill than you initially anticipated before you even put an offer in talk to a home insurance
broker get an estimation of what's it's going to cost you to put insurance on the house do you need
flood insurance likely if you know flood zone and you're financing your home you're going to need
flood insurance if your cash buyer really is up to you if you're going through Citizen then you
absolutely will need flood insurance along with homeowners insurance it's just a new mandate that
has come through so the best thing again that you can do is talk to a home insurance person before
you put an offer in number five is not really understanding flood zones and elevation we're in
Florida and we're prone to hurricanes if the home is really close to a coast it could potentially be
prone to flooding just think Fort Myers Fort Myers Beach got completely wiped out of course a lot of
this depends on where the hurricane hit but you want to understand the risk level involved in the
home that you're about to purchase right and so flood zone X is the preferred flood zone there's
still a possibility that a flooding could occur in flood zone X but the likelihood is far less than
if you were say in a flood zone a e so understand the flood zone also make sure that it's not about
to change because FEMA did just reissue new maps and so some areas may be changing from an X to an
AE talk to your realtor your earlier is going to be able to advise you on this most of the damage
that typically happens during a hurricane isn't wind damage but it's surge damage so if you're
at a higher elevation for example it is far less likely that you're going to encounter bad flooding
because it's already reduced you're at a higher level number six is not really understanding
the rules and regulations but yet you signed the contract I think that's a huge mistake because a
lot of HOA communities have really strict rules and regulations and so if you have for example
a pet and you're looking to fence in the area where you live in so that your pet has a place
to kind of run around in a lot of HOA communities where I live in in Sarasota won't allow it some
HOA communities are very strict when it comes to the Aesthetics of the community you can't just
paint your home any color you want to they may have rules or regulations that put standards in
place in terms of what modifications you can make to the house if you're somebody that's looking to
rent out the house maybe you're looking to rent it out 12 times a year make sure wherever you buy
into that you're actually allowed to do that now with the Surfside bill which passed due to the
incidents that happened in Surfside in Miami it is so important that you check also the financials
the budgets of condos and co-ops especially those that are much older say 20 - 25 years old
to ensure that they are financially sound to go through the rigorous inspection and the financial
needs to ensure that the upkeep the maintenance of the the condo is kind of in line with what the
Surfside bill is now requesting now I have a very detailed video that talks about the Surfside bill
and the consequences and what to kind of watch out for I'm going to link to it at the end of the
video so if you haven't watched it yet you can just link through it there number seven is not
really anticipating what the new property taxes are going to be because you're looking at what the
current owner is paying and that is most likely not going to be what you'd be paying because as
soon as you purchase a home the taxes get reset here in Florida if you purchase a house and you
Homestead it the taxes can't go up any more than three percent a year if it's Homestead if it's not
Homestead it can't go up any more than 10 percent a year just generally speaking if you take 1.2
percent of the purchase price of the house that should get you relatively close to what you can
expect to pay on taxes I will say this the tax appraisers are going to tell you that it is really
difficult to guesstimate what the taxes are going to be because there's just so much that goes into
it but I feel that 1.2 percent or 1.3 percent even if you want to be more conservative is going to
give you a much better idea of what your tax is going to be like versus what the previous owner
is paying because as we talked about it could have been Homestead they may have owned this home six
seven years now with home values having shut up so much over the last two to three years especially
we can expect those that are purchasing a home to be paying far more in property taxes versus
the previous owner of the house number eight is forgetting to consider maintenance and repair
costs so if you purchase a home and let's just say it's in a non-hoa community who's going to take
care of the lawn maybe you have a pool it's going to take care of the pool there's costs involved
unless you're willing to do those yourself now maybe you purchased in an HOA community and it's
maintenance free then you don't really have to worry about it because your HOA fees already
covering that and hopefully you've accounted for that in your budget but in a non-hoa community
who's responsible for it is you now your home when I went through the home inspection may have
been in working order for the most part right but let's just say the air conditioner is 10 years old
eventually you're going to have to switch it out for a new air conditioner if the roof is 15 years
old and you were able to get home insurance on it eventually you're going to have to switch that out
if it's a tile roof they say that the lifespan there could be 20 , 25 years or so so determine
what the life of the roof is going to be and also understand what the roof costs are so that you can
start saving money to get a new roof in place when the time is there Windows a lot of the older homes
have original windows in them new windows are going to be be very expensive to get I myself am
thinking about getting hurricane proof windows and I'm getting quotes in the hundred thousand dollar
range I would say about 80K to 120K depending on which company is quoting it for me okay but the
point being is it's going to be very expensive for me to switch that out and those are costs
that you just need to anticipate you might want to just put up shutters which is going to be
far less expensive than hurricane proof windows but there's a cost involved in getting shutters
so know what needs to be replaced when have a budget ready and start anticipating those costs
so that you have enough time to actually save for them so it doesn't just hit you over the head
number nine is not knowing what budget you could be shopping in when you're looking for a home and
maybe that should have been the first point that I should have talked about but I'm doing it now
so a lot of buyers that I'm working with are going to be financing and they're coming here
they're looking for a home but they don't have a pre-approval so they don't really know what
their budget is going to be like but they can get financing for my suggestion is get a pre-approval
through mortgage broker which is going to a help you understand what budget you could be
shopping in so that you don't waste your own time right but also let's just say you start looking
at homes and you're really interested in one of them you're going to need to have a pre-approval
in order to put an offer in and so if it becomes a multiple office situation and there's a time
crunch to getting the offers in you're going to be ready to do that if you're now having to chase a
pre-approval that's just going to put you behind number 10 is not getting a buyer's agent to help
supports you in your quest or purchasing a new home because maybe you don't see the value in
working with the bias agent or perhaps it's just much easier for you to go through these
open houses and look on your own but you want a biased agent to help support you
for one they if you get the right person they will have market knowledge in terms of prices
in the community that can help you understand the community they can really help Define the
neighborhood based on your interest but also give you other suggestions to consider within
your budget and kind of your lifestyle needs now they can also help you understand whether or not
the list price is fair value they'll do a comp analysis they'll be able to tap into data that
you won't have access to your bias agent is going to analyze the landscape for that
particular neighborhood that street to help you determine the best way forward when it comes to
placing an offer and in Florida you do not pay the buyer's agent it's the seller that pays the
bias agent once the deal goes through this video is meant to help you avoid some of the pitfalls
when purchasing a home here in Florida I hope you found value in this video if you liked it
do me a favor like this video does help out the channel now if you're looking to purchase in the
Sarasota or Manatee County region I would love to be your realtor of choice call me email me
anytime I truly love hearing from all of you and talking to you on the phone or via email
thank you so much for watching today I always always appreciate when you guys do take care