MOCAMBRAS.org

John J. Sheehan says:

I got this book, because I and my wife was preparing to buy our first and I wanted the book to guide me, and therefore prevent me from making any big mistakes to ensure I knew what was happening at each step of the road. I read the entire section to buy a home (5 / 6 of the book) and up to half of this section to sell the house just to see the other side of things (the remaining 1 / 6 of the book). I personally found the book provided enough details to be frustrating.

And the book will go over all the options available, but will not explore them in sufficient depth to help you make the right decision. For example, the user will tell you to connect to multiple lenders and evaluation of all costs involved (loan fees and if there is a pre-payment of fines, not just in the interest rate), but will not tell you how to really decide which loan to pick up. This book will tell you to be able to negotiate some fees have to pay with a mortgage to be waived by the lender or some of the fees to be paid by the seller, but will not tell you how to spot these fees from the true, non-negotiable fees. There is a debate for the selection of different types of houses (such as condo, townhouse or traditional house), but not to discuss the economic advantages of one over the other. I’ve heard of houses appreciate faster, but I do not know if this is just an old wives tale if there is some truth to that. I still do not. Moreover, the book does nothing to anticipate future market trends, which is partly understandable because this is very difficult, but not to take a stab at it, the book is very current (2006).

Basically, the authors do considerable work to review all your options, but they do not advise you about what is best and * * option would be for you. Maybe this is impossible because everyone situation is quite different, but I would like to see some of the specific situation of direct advice, even if some of the futility of the book for me because it was not me in detail the situation. Everyone in a state may be different, but that there is a lot of different situations (which has just begun / family to move subject to the first house / upgrade the family home / family reduce the size of the house upon retirement or due to unfortunate financial circumstances – covering 95% of people) . This will take more but there are pages and pages of savings and this is my biggest gripe.

This book is organized by the steps in buying a home (ie looking for a home / presentation / access to funding / closing), but If you actually sit down and read directly through as I did, you’ll end up reading the same things over and over again. This makes the book better if you just want to read the chapter you are interested in the chapters that stand alone, but make it more frustrating if you read it front to back (there will be always saying: “Yes, I know, you told me so already, almost verbatim” ). Do not retrieve things would also like to edit pages to explore the gritty discussed in more detail. I even found cases where the tables were full-page in the book twice in two separate chapters! Completely unchanged, only when the book was printed twice, we were once again rehashing the things they have already covered!

In conclusion, I would have rather had concrete advice rather then the overview given here (Although I think the best edited book could have been both in the same amount of space). The only other book I read that was even close to this was Suze Orman young, gorgeous, and broke. This book has provided advice and very tangible told you exactly what is the best things you can do, and gave you and prioritization for the (401K, and credit card debt and a house down payment, and Roth IRA). Any concrete advice here. Authors often go off the advice with this contract, “to talk to your agent.” This advice is good, but then Why’d I get this book in the first place? Moreover, I believe that the provision of concrete advice you have to know the truth of the matter and I am not sure of the author’s understanding of how housing Orman understanding of personal finance.

I have been harsh so far, because that is what highlights to me, But I must say this book is not a waste of time, and this review disproportinately focus on the negatives. Sum, but I do not think there is a lot of information here that you can not get it for free elsewhere, such as Yahoo and evidence of real estate. In addition, you can connect online all your figures (such as salary and the burden of debt) the right to calculators on the Internet (to tell you the maximum mortgage payment you can). To do so only if you really want that information packaged in book form, I would not buy this.

Other slightly wacky, choose:

1. In the first part of the book is useless fluff. It covers things such as “Do you want 3 bedrooms or more” and “Do you want the fireplace.” I think it should be expected, but for me it was not necessary. That parts easy. Tell me how to get the best mortgage! Tell me how to get the best price!

2. All examples that are from the state of Indiana, where it should be the book. And writers often say things like “this is how it’s done in the state of Indiana, but may be different in your state so you should check.” I brought the book for you to tell me! And should include a supplement to these things tell you how it is the case for all 50 states instead of saying things sames 3 times to get the number of pages up. Moreover, whenever they get in these matters (usually legal issues, such as what information the seller is required to disclose to potential buyers) so do not tell you how to know whether sufficient motives to investigate the matter yourself.
Rating: 2 / 5

A. Tummala says:

This is really one for the first time buyer. Easy to read and understand. And checked to buy a house for dolls from the library, and was a little overwhelmed. Stupid user has the better, and is pre-determined good.
Evaluation: 4 / 5

Red says:

I am in the process of buying my house first. This book gives an overview of this process from the ground up. If you’re starting from the “Level 0″ as I was, an excellent place to start.
Assessment: 5 / 5