Downtown Minneapolis Condos - Stop Paying Rent Forever! 
Five Helpful Tips To Help Save First-time Downtown Minneapolis Condo buyers Money… And Anxiety!
With interest rates hovering around their thirty year lows, a multitude of flexible and low cost loan programs are available, as well as a wide variety of assistance programs that can help virtually anybody experience the joy of Downtown Minneapolis Condo ownership.
In short, the economic environment simply couldn’t be better to buy your first Downtown Minneapolis Condo. However, if you have always been a renter, then you probably aren’t as well informed of the intimate processes of obtaining a condo mortgage as you’d like to be.
To guide you through this exciting but often confusing time, this report details six tips that will help make your purchase a much smoother experience, save you money and eliminate your anxieties.
Get Pre-qualified
Before you make one single decision regarding a Downtown Minneapolis Condo purchase, get pre-qualified by a mortgage professional. Pre-qualification is free and will give you a definite advantage in the buying process. During the evaluation stage, it will clarify your financial situation, indicating how much condo you can afford. This may influence your decision for location, narrowing your search.
Condo-buyers that are pre-qualified have increased leverage with Realtors and sellers in Downtown Minneapolis Condos, over buyers who are not. Essentially, a pre-qualified buyer becomes a "cash" buyer.
Choose the Perfect Loan Program
Don’t Become Fixated On The Interest Rate Alone! Be careful! The lowest interest rate does not always translate to the best deal. Look at the loan programs that are being offered, not just the rate. There are several factors that have to be taken into account when evaluating programs: the loan type (fixed or adjustable), the loan term (15 year or 30 year), the rate and the down payment requirement.
Adjustable Rate Mortgage’s (ARM’s) are typically very low at the beginning but can escalate quickly. These are good for short-term purchases, but long-term mortgage holders are typically better off with a fixed rate. If you can afford it, you may consider a fifteen-year mortgage.
Typically the monthly payments are only 20% higher, and you cut off half the duration of your loan. Additionally, your credit will play a big part in what program will be offered to you. "A" paper, lender lingo for an applicant who has perfect credit, may find a 6.5% rate with only 10% down. But if you have some credit history problems, sometimes referred to as "B" or "C" paper, you may find that to receive the prime rate, you need 20% down. So shop around!
Clean Up Your Credit
By getting pre-qualified, you will be made aware of any potential credit problems in your credit history. Don’t despair if the credit report is not stellar. Even if an incident cannot be taken off the report, by knowing the background of your financial history, your lender may be able to put your financial situation in a better light when submitting the actual loan application.
Review your credit report carefully. It is very common for non-payments to be listed that are not even yours. Your mortgage professional will help you address problems showing up on the credit report. Many times, a simple letter to the creditor explaining the circumstances at the time of the incident will rectify the situation. However this may take a few months, so start early.
Get A Realtor
As a first time Downtown Minneapolis Condo buyer, the biggest mistake you can make is believing that you can save money if you do not use a Realtor. Although the seller pays the commissions, some listing agents will tell you they can represent both you and the seller fairly. While in some cases this may certainly be true, it’s better to be safe than sorry.
Get a real estate agent that represents your interests solely. A buyer agent will make sure the Downtown Minneapolis Condo is inspected properly, do diligence on any hidden discovery and more times than not, the money they save you on negotiating the price of your new condo will more than off-set any reduction in price due to the commissions not being paid by the seller.
What Do You Want In Your Downtown Minneapolis Condo?
There will be many decisions as you start this process. Your Realtor will take you to several different Downtown Minneapolis Condos. Some you will like; some you won’t, but most will land somewhere in between.
"You love this condo except it doesn’t have…" or "That condo would be perfect if it only had…" will be common phrases during this process.
Decide now what features you feel are "necessities" in a condo and which features are items that would be "nice to have." This list will no doubt change the farther along you go, but the list will be extremely useful as you begin to look at condos. It will also be useful to the Realtor so he can better qualify the Downtown Minneapolis Condos that he shows you.
There is a lot of free information available to you about buying, selling or investing in condos. For complete information about the Downtown Minneapolis Condos including current condos for sale, property values and more please visit the most complete website online dedicated to everything about condos. So please feel free to contact me with any of your mortgage questions and I will me more than glad to answer your questions. Call me on my cell at 612-735-6834 or email me at mike@mikeweiland.com.
There is a lot of free information available to you about buying, selling or investing in Minneapolis Condos or Minneapolis Lofts. For complete information about the Downtown Minneapolis condo market including current condos lofts for sale, values, and more please visit the most complete website online www.LivingInDowntownMinneapolis.com dedicated to everything Downtown Minneapolis Condos. Contact Mike Weiland & Elke Stephan of The Weiland Group of Keller Williams with any of your real estate or mortgage related questions by filling out the form below.
P.S. Free weekly list of Downtown Minneapolis Condos including private listings and foreclosures in the most popular locations call the 24 Hour Recorded Information Hotline Now for details...1-888-391-9039 Ext. 126 or visit www.LivingInDowntownMinneapolis.com
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