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1 | Timestamp | Name | What is your email address? | How old are you? | What is your gender? | Please rate your level of technological proficiency (out of 10): | Have you bought (or attempted to buy) a house in the last five years? | Tell me about your overall experience buying a house. What were the best things? The worst things? Were there things you wish you could have changed? | What did you like and not like about the process of buying a property? | Are there parts of the process that you wish you could complete online? | Are there any parts of the process you wouldn’t feel comfortable being virtual? | What is your experience with the real estate agent that you used? What were the benefits of using a real estate agent? | Were there parts of using a real estate agent that you did not like or find frustrating? | If answered yes to the above question, please explain. | Did you use a website or a platform during any point in the process (i.e. Zillow, Realtor.com)? If so, how did you use them? What did you find useful or frustrating about them? | Talk about a time when you lost a property that you really wanted. What were some things that you wish were different about that particular process? | Is there any additional information you would like us to know? | |||||||||
2 | 9/11/2021 20:49:09 | Jade | j.trinh57@gmail.com | 25-35 | Female | 8 | Successfully Bought | I had a very knowledgeable agent. She got me into new houses before they were listed publicly. She explained everything and was realistic. | The paperwork | Yes | My credit check. And viewings of homes. | Great. She got into houses not listed yet. She helped me bid on what's a realistic amount | No | No | M/a | |||||||||||
3 | 9/12/2021 10:24:33 | Ann Alexandrowicz | annpatalexa@gmail.com | 25-35 | Female | 9 | Successfully Bought | The first time we were buying a house, 2016, we bought well below our means and our agent just couldn't get that concept in her head. Our approval letter was that we could afford 500K, but we capped it at 175K. She sent us listings for beautiful houses that we didn't want to afford. We ended up finding our house on Zillow and went to an open house without her. We bought that house and agreed when it gets over 200K we'll sell and upgrade. We assumed it would take 8-10 years. In 2021 we sold the house for 240K and worked with the worst agent you could find. I found all the houses we saw on zillow. He sent us one batch of houses. Half the houses I had already sent him saying we want to see. The house we ended up buying I found, and we put a bid in the day we saw it cause of the crazy bubble in 2021. We ended up getting the house. | The agents were the worse. They either didn't have time or the didn't listen. Or both. | I wish I could schedule a visit without an agent. My agents had so many other clients that they were the hold up in scheduling. in 2021 we lost out on four houses because the realtor was busy or non-responsive. | Actually seeing the house. I don't think you get the same feel from a virtual walk through that you would get from actually walking the house. | I can't think of any benefits. | Yes | They were not responsive and made excuses on why we couldn't see a house. They would not listen to what we wanted. And assumed because we were selling a house in a poor neighborhood we couldn't afford the nice ones. | Zillow | The problem was we lost out on properties because our agent was too busy to make the appointments. | I'd rather get my realtor license then deal with another one of these people. | |||||||||
4 | 9/12/2021 14:44:40 | Sandie | Sandra.Burke@gmail.com | 35-45 | Female | 8 | Successfully Bought | We hated the process, it was easy to get disheartened. Our real estate agent was awesome and made the situation bearable. | I hate dealing with cash flippers. They’re everywhere in our area, so it’s always a gamble trying to see a home. One flipped home we saw, they threw a vinyl flooring down over a completely unleveled floor that felt like it was a breath from collapsing. You would’ve never known from the photos, which were virtually staged so it was hard to see what was real. Also bidding against cash flippers is always nightmare. It’s impossible to compete. Our seller was also a disaster handyman, it took 3 months to close on the details after our inspection. | General negotiations and paperwork. | Touring the property, and inspections | The benefits were huge for us, because he had a really great network of folks to work with. We were looking at fixer upper houses and the inspector he recommended was beyond top notch. He caught everything wrong with the house, which put us in a great spot for our offers. He also contacted a contractor to do a walk through so we could get an idea of budget scope for renovations, no fee or strings attached. We also had an issue at closing with the seller, and he worked throughout the week between Christmas and New Years to make sure we closed on time. Without his help, the deal definitely would have fallen apart. | Yes | Our first real estate agent was a bad fit. He wanted to sell us a condo when we had 0 interest in anything that wasn’t a single family. It took us 3 weeks of trying to work with him before we cut ties and found another agent. Our next agent was awesome but not the most experienced, he also took a lot on good faith from sellers agents that we were dubious about. | We used every website we could find properties on. It was useful to see listings but also frustratingly outdated quickly. There was also no consistency, some properties listed on some sites and not others. | We got into 4 bidding wars, but we only decided to really go after 2 of the 4. The first house we lost, we spent a lot of time agonizing over how much was a fair amount to offer for a home that needed as much work as it did. Our original real estate agent wasn’t a very good fit for us, I’m fairly certain he knew the other offer on the table was a cash flipper. We felt really caught off guard when they went with the other offer and didn’t even give us a chance to negotiate. The second house we lost, we found the listing late when they already had at least 2 other offers. Our new real estate agent was a rockstar, he let us know about what he generally thought ballpark would be and we all decided on a strategy. The seller ended up going with someone who had a similar career path as she did, a personal decision rather than a business decision. It stung but we felt better about it than the first house we lost. The next two we lost, we’d stuck to our budget with our offers and lost out to cash offer flippers again. It was so disheartening to see those properties being listed for 100K more 3 months later. | ||||||||||
5 | 9/12/2021 16:06:14 | Laura Boot | laura@boot.family | 25-35 | Female | 7 | Successfully Bought | The house buying experience was stressful because of the magnitude of the financial impact. That’s probably the hardest part - feeling confident in the decision and dealing with the anxieties and frustrations of all that comes with home buying and ownership even after spending so much money. | I didn’t like how stressful it was but I loved getting to see a lot of real estate - that was terrific. | I wish we could have seen better photos of more properties - we found ours because it was photographed poorly and we were patient enough to go see it in person but I think all places that are photographed poorly take more time to sell. That being said, I wish that more places were photographed better and more consistently so I could have had an even evaluative process online. | I would never buy it without seeing it in person but I would put in an offer. | The agent made things much simpler and I loved that. I really like our real estate agent Baha’is off her local knowledge (I’m not from the area we live and value that local knowledge). | No | Zillow snd Redfin just to find and source properties and listings. | The property we lost was just not meant to be - the seller was unhappy with our negotiations from the start and never planned to go through with the deal. | |||||||||||
6 | 9/12/2021 17:39:17 | Erica Vanstone | Ejvanstone@gmail.com | 35-45 | Female | 8 | Successfully Bought | It was challenging to buy in the neighborhood I was interested in because it was so popular. Luckily, I bought before the pandemic when prices weren’t too high. There’s nothing I would have changed except for the houses available, which isn’t something folks can control. | I liked visiting houses a lot! I did not like the number of houses available at the time. | No, I was satisfied with what I could do online. | I actually think it was important to visit the houses in person. So, visiting houses. | She knew what I was interested in and did a hood job filtering out houses she didn’t think we would like. | No | We bought a foreclosure property so her expertise was helpful. | Yes Zillow. I hate that Zillow automatically sends you emails—there were way too many emails and it was overwhelming. | I did not experience that. Probably because the market was much better for buyers then. | My answers are based around the fact that I was specifically looking for a fixer upper, and I know that might not be typical. So going in person was important, a lower price was important, and character was important. | |||||||||
7 | 9/12/2021 19:46:03 | Mistyann Schram-Miller | Blythe7887@aol.com | 35-45 | Female | 6 | Successfully Bought | It was a 1031 exchange. Did not like the following: Having to use an exchange company and pay a fee. Having to go through multiple lenders to get the correct type of loan after having been approved (not just Pre-approved, approved). Having to dig up information regarding property on my own (how old were the outbuildings, where the heck was the well). Having no true comps in the area. Liked: that the photos were up to date. When we finally did find a lender, the rep was extremely communicative and almost always available. When new issues came up, she worked with us and was extremely responsive. The exchange rep was also the same. Our realm was a better negotiator than us. | The time frame with the back and forth. Having to pose a question to my Realitor and waiting for the other Realitor to get back with an answer. | I can’t really think of any. We did complete all documents online except the closing….maybe make corrections on those documents without having to wait doe the Realitor’s team to correct and resend. | I think that in person is better for the initial walkthrough and final walkthrough…and revisiting the property. I guess the phone calls could be done virtually, but using a cell allows for more freedom. | Definitely a better negotiator. He was a little awkward and my husband didn’t like him, but in the end we received a better deal in the inflated market because we had become emotionally invested. | Yes | The back and forth. I would ask my Realitor a question, he would ask their Realitor the question, their Realitor would relay to their clients….it just took time and I was impatient. Sometime there were spelling errors on forms or missing info that had to be put in that was inadvertently forgotten. | Multiple platforms to search because some would have different information, for example, we would use on site because it offered a topographical map or another because it showed the property lines or another because it showed the flood maps. | 2015 we lost a house to a cash bidder as we were using a VA loan. | I can’t think of any right now. | |||||||||
8 | 9/13/2021 10:25:59 | Mike L | mjlanciano@gmail.com | 25-35 | Male | 10 | Successfully Bought | Our process was relatively painless. I dont know that I would have changed anything. Grabbing all of the financial documentation was a little tedious but only because it was from so many different places. | I didn't like the lack of understanding of what our monthly payment was going to be until the final sale. It was really hard because they give you a fairly large range but with rte adjustments it's hard to pin it down until everything is done. | We had a mobile app that allowed us to scan documents securely and upload them so most of it was done online. | I dont know if this counts, but I wanted to be in person for the inspection to see how it was conducted and to make sure I understood what they were looking at and if I saw the same things. It was something I dont think I would have wanted to do virtually. | Our real estate agent was really good and came recommended from a friend who also used them. They were super knowledgeable about the area and helped us narrow down what we were looking for. He was also super adamant that we saw "a lot" of houses so that we didnt just fall in love with one and not get a good value. | No | We used Zillow, Redfin, and a few others but it was simply to find houses to go see. The frustrating part about them was that a lot of the photos were misleading. For example, they should shoot like 8'x8' rooms with a wide angle lens that made it look huge and it felt like you were standing in a prison cell. I feel like functional layouts (blueprint style) would have been way more helpful because there are things we would immediately have crossed off the list. Also, how "out of date" the photos are would have helped with some of the properties. | We bought our house in 2017 when the market was a little cold so we didnt lose any property that we saw and liked. | Nope. | ||||||||||
9 | 9/14/2021 15:00:51 | Kevin | k.moorejr9@gmail.com | 25-35 | Male | 10 | Successfully Bought | The best was probably the picking process. Going through listings, reviewing features and pros and cons. Attending open houses and getting a better feel for the homes in general. I bought in an area that I was comfortable with, but didn't know by heart since I was not from the area. The worst thing was trying to find time to step away from work to handle the paperwork, phone calls, and meetings - while trying to ensure that I made up the hours / work. I don't know that I would have changed much PRIOR to buying the house | Mostly trying to find people to do things like perform inspections, appraise the house, file paperwork and getting insurance. Insurance was probably the worst part, as it was a headache to find a quote and not jump through hoops of people trying to sell you on the fact that they've got better rates/service. | 100%. So much signing, reviewing, reading that needed to be done in person. I'd. personally be really interested in a process that could start with a person, and then go online. Since then introductions would be made, and a comfort level could be established. I'd also love it if the steps were connected together - but that's such a long shot unless you're using something like Rocket Mortgage. Having to log into different systems to fill out connected pieces of paperwork is a pain in the butt. | Inspections and showings. 100% need to get a feel for a place that I'm living in. I don't have the spacial awareness to be able to tell that from photos or videos. Plus, lighting is key to see in person - since it changes dramatically depending on the time of day. | Technically I didn't use one - we found the listing and contacted the sellers agent. | Yep. Zillow, Realtor.com, Redfin. Loved having the photos and estimates there for reference. I also used Maryland State SDAT (system of record for housing) to look up info on the property. I found that detail MORE useful than Zillow/other commercial sites. I did love the feature where you could draw radii on a map to indicate what areas/neighborhoods/blocks you were interested in property in though. | I can't really recall. I wasn't truly in a rush to buy, but we found this house - originally it was off market under contract - and just kept an eye on it because it fit so many of the checkboxes. | There's a lot I wish I did AFTER I bought. I wish I did more work on the house before moving in, and getting a contractor to do more of the smaller pieces that I wanted done taken care of. We also bought with little room for negotiation, since the house was a short sale, the sellers would not make any fixes whatsoever. They took on some closing costs, but beyond that, we knew we were buying and going to have to deal with some issues. | |||||||||||
10 | 9/14/2021 16:48:39 | Christine | Cls5508@gmail.com | 25-35 | Female | 7 | Tried to Buy | We tried purchasing a home this past year, but was unsuccessful given the extremely competitive market. We had a very helpful realtor which made the experience as good as it could have been, but didn’t feel comfortable competing for houses not worth the value we would be paying. The market also only allowed us to look at a house once or twice (sometimes for less than 15 minutes) before it was sold. (Houses were not on the market longer than a week). Long story short- best part, our realtor; worst part: the competitive market. | Did not like feeling so rushed into such a big purchased due to the market being so competitive. Can’t say I enjoyed any of the process since we were unsuccessful in purchasing a home…. Except maybe looking at and touring houses. | In terms of getting preapproved and changing offer letters based on the current house we were putting an offer on, we did that all over the phone. Unfortunately the mortgage lender we used was through a credit union and he only was available Monday - Friday until 5. It would have been very nice to go online and get preapproval papers, etc while we were actively bidding on houses. Also using apps like realtor- getting to preview the houses and all the financials (cost, taxes, history) was very beneficial | Touring the house, seeing the neighborhood, etc. | He was great- very knowledgeable about all parts of the process and made us feel comfortable (never pressured us to put an offer on a house). He also knew a lot about houses and construction and gave honest opinions if he thought houses were worth it. He also set up all of our viewings/tours and always provided additional information he was able to get from other realtors. | No | Yes - previewed houses using the photos provided, as well as the location, and was able to get background info on the house before touring it. Most useful was all of the information provided including: the price and tax history, estimated monthly costs, photos, and school district info. | Our offer was accepted on a house and we asked for seller’s assist after the inspection showed many issues. The seller decided to change it to being sold as is, and wouldn’t allow additional inspections. (Still not sure if it was all handled “legally” or not….) He basically forced us out of the deal because he had sellers remorse and wish he got more money from our offer. I wish we knew the process better to know when and what to ask for, and what can legally be done at different parts of the process. (The realtors on either side had never seen a situation like this, so hoping it’s just a bizarre experience we don’t have to deal with again in the future). | |||||||||||
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