5 Blunders Veterans Make Using The VA Loan

Today we're breaking down the top five VA home loan blunders we see veterans make when purchasing a property. So the number one thing that we see is people either choosing a house that is too expensive or too big or on the flip side purchasing a property that's too small. You really need to assess what your needs are at that time and what the future has in store for you plus understanding what type of property actually sells the best in that area. So let's say if you're looking like some areas offer studio condos. Does it make sense to purchase a studio condo today because of its resale might be a little bit more difficult or do you go for a two-bedroom or three-bedroom two-bath because it's easier to sell that property? That's number one. Number two when it comes to that what people fail to realize as well is that the bigger the house is the more the utility cost of a property is plus the maintenance upkeep of that property also grows significantly right from anywhere from you need to pay more for heating and air conditioning or water electricity and gas versus also having to maybe buy additional lawn care equipment just because you may need a rider because the land is much bigger and you're going to have to dedicate also more time to maintaining the property and if you need to fix things like a roof bigger properties it's going to be a lot more expensive to do that. So those are things you need to keep in mind when purchasing a home along with the flip side is what if a property is going to be too small and you then need to move. A lot of people that have locked in properties with low interest rates the challenge that they're facing is that if they move today it's going to be more expensive to downsize because of where rates are but now they're thinking about adding additions to the property but again thinking through what it is that your end goal is going to be if it's going to be you know having multiple kids you want to be able to get multiple bedrooms maybe up front which then that leads us to understanding the market research which is another big piece that veterans fail to do at least from from the things that we see and then that's where regrets come from so it's and also to that if you're PCSing across the country you may not know that market but that's why you really have to dive in and research it but even knowing local markets can be difficult like for example myself I moved a couple neighborhoods over and I did not realize all the amenities that come with the neighborhood for the area and all the different programs they have within the school districts like which ended up being extremely important but again that's something that I didn't even realize going through that process but this is why doing the research ahead of time understanding where the school districts are there's plenty of tools that are out there no matter if you're doing the research yourself or working with a realtor then you really have to kind of like dive dive into what's important for you and checking the area out for some veterans they're not able to check those areas out especially if you're PCSing across the country and you just don't have the time because you have to spend money out of pocket and then we also have just veterans that are looking to transition across the country no matter if it's because they have you know 100 percent permanent total disability rating and they have flexibility to live anywhere which again too many options also is going to be a downside because it makes it a lot harder to kind of narrow that part in also understanding drive time of location so if you need to get somewhere let's say because you you're stationed somewhere or your work is at a certain point you'll be you should be checking what the traffic looks like in the morning for your start time and also your departing time which you can do easily on a lot of search engines they'll actually allow you to pick different start times that you're leaving to see what the traffic pattern looks like again giving you an overall good idea of how much time you're going to be stuck in traffic another one that I see a lot of now this is thanks to a lot of viewers that are out there that schedule calls with us to be able to go through their financial situation or are currently under contract on a property and they're running into issues and there's a lot of experts that are out there so the one thing I'll tell you is having the right agent lender team that really specializes in VA home loans and I'm not talking about people that do VA home loans or agents that work with veterans you really need to be a subject matter expert right that's what we do on the channel we really break down how the VA home loan works the ins and outs when is it the right time when is it not the right time because the more information you have the better you're equipped to make the right decision but when I talk to a lot of veterans they feel like they get pushed into different things right lenders are very aggressive agents are very aggressive with trying to get them into purchasing a home our philosophy is a little bit different it's your money we'll do what you want to do we serve at the pleasure because it is a big decision to purchase a property now for some people right they do need a little bit more encouragement to be able to get it into it but it should just be more encouragement and more information so you make that decision the process of making offers on a VA home loan I feel are a little bit different and this is my personal experience when it comes to this because even when I purchased the property and again I do this day in day out I had pushback from the buyer or listing agent about getting a VA home loan which I think again it's kind of it's mind-blowing even in today's time because the VA loan has a lot of stigma around it veterans face challenges because of that when they make offers in competitive markets because maybe they're not putting any money down which again is a huge benefit of the VA home loan program which you can take advantage of especially if you have a 10% or greater VA disability rating then you don't have to pay the VA funding fee but again everyone's financial picture is different and again sometimes it might make sense to put a big chunk of money down but again everyone's experience is going to be a little different when it comes to that another piece that I want to touch on as well is going to be understanding your VA disability compensation and how it affects your property taxes because people don't do the necessary research and then they end up not getting the exemption when they thought they did now I did a whole video on it both how to use VA disability to qualify for a property and I also did a video on how to research that but make sure that you call like recently we had a veteran that said hey I don't have to pay property taxes at all and the reality was they did have to pay property taxes but they got a refund on their taxes when they filed them which I thought was a little odd because if you think about it you pay taxes into the system so if they're giving you a refund of a part of your taxes at some point you had to pay taxes on that or deduct it from taxable income so you're really not getting the full benefit this is why again you got to research call the county it is extremely important another big piece of it is going to be understanding the upfront cost of homeownership and then what are the closing costs now in general closing costs across the country are about two to three percent you work with bigger like banks that charge origination and discount points you're talking five six percent which I see a lot of veterans do again we did a whole video on that how veterans overpaid about 155 billion in my eyes in junk fees which they didn't have to pay so you know if you guys are looking to give out money let me know but when it comes to the upfront cost typically what you're going to have is going to have the appraisal fee that you have to pay for up front and that ranges based on where you're at and if you pay too much don't worry you're going to get a refund of it if you pay too little they're going to charge you that additional money at closing because the appraisal is a third party lender orders the appraisal from the VA VA has an independent contract there's been certified by the VA to do the appraisals to do the appraisal so just kind of keep that in mind another thing is the home inspection now home inspection is not required to use on a VA home loan but it is highly recommended I highly recommend it I did one on my place and I also encourage you especially if it's your first property make sure that you go to that inspection there's a lot of things that are going to be wrong with the property they're going to send you like a 30 30 to 40 page report telling you everything that's wrong but when you're there they'll break it down for you and you can ask a lot of questions especially if you haven't owned a home before or even if you own a property it's just good to know what if there's maybe foundation issues but that's something that's really easy to fix the report's going to make it seem very dramatic but the reality might be that it might only cost a couple hundred dollars to fix and in a competitive market you really need to understand where you sit within within that space so you're not left in the dust and you could have been a homeowner so hope you guys got some good value out of the video make sure you guys hit the like and subscribe button and I'll catch you guys soon