What To Look For When Buying A New Home

Buying a new home is an exciting time, and also a time that can prove to be stressful. With so much to consider and lives that are already full, this exciting time can quickly morph into a stressful and demanding exercise.  

There are things you can do to lower the levels of stress involved and one of the most basic ways to do this is to set your expectations and become aware of what to look for when buying a new home. We’ve put together a quick list of ways you can make this process an enjoyable and rewarding experience.

Choosing a home is a highly personal decision so it is important to think about the different aspects of a home, rank their level of importance to your needs and consider which aspects are negotiable to you and which ones are deal-breakers.

BELOW ARE THE TOP 5 CONSIDERATIONS WE ADVISE THAT YOU TAKE NOTE OF WHEN VIEWING PROPERTIES:

1. SIZE OF THE HOUSE AND PROPERTY

Before you even start looking for a home, you’ll want to have a firm idea of the amount of bedrooms, bathrooms and size of the car accommodation you’ll need for now and what you may need in the future. You may want to consider a second lounge room or a separate living space if you have young adult children or parents who live with you. Large houses require more maintenance and cleaning than smaller residences, so if you’re time poor, work long hours or have a demanding schedule; the size of the house and yard are going to need to be key considerations.

One of the biggest advantages of a smaller home is that they are less costly to furnish, as you won’t find yourself needing a second lounge, TV or furniture for the additional rooms. This can assist you to get ahead on the mortgage more quickly if you’re moving into your first home.

While a house on acreage may sound genuinely appealing, it may not be a practical solution for those without the capacity to maintain the property grounds or without the support of others to assist. Think about how you want to live in the property - would a house set further back from the road, offering more privacy be a better solution, or would you rather avoid the maintenance required of a big lawn all together? A happy medium may be a larger yard that has hardscaping areas like patios, decks or built in bbq and entertainment areas and dedicated low-maintenance garden beds..

The key is to imagine how you want to LIVE and whether the property can help support your ideal lifestyle.

2. THE EXTERIOR OF THE HOME

Every home requires maintenance - that is a certainty. The amount of time and money you spend on maintenance can be heavily influenced by the home’s exterior materials. Timber homes require repainting and brick homes can get concrete cancer. While these are two common issues, repainted homes can conceal a plethora of structural damage that will cost you significantly in the long term and concrete cancer is not entirely obvious to the untrained eye.

The condition of the roof is also one of the biggest considerations, given how expensive it can be to replace one.  Ask the real estate agent how old the roof is, check for rust, broken tiles and check inside the home for obvious signs of water damage or breaches.

Foundations are another hugely important factor to consider when buying a new home. Uneven foundations can lead to problems such as creaky or bouncy floorboards, sticking doors and windows, slow drainage and in some scenarios, can render the home unsafe to live in. If you’ve fallen in love with a home on timber stumps, you’ll want to look for gaps between the floor and skirting board, cracks in the cornices and walls, doors and windows that stick and even draughts in rooms from the floor or ceiling. These are all signs of a home on uneven or compromised foundations. Don’t be afraid to go under the house to inspect it yourself - timber stumps should meet the floor beams and have a physical barrier between the stump and the home to protect the home from termites.

Termite damage in homes can present as flaking or spongey timber, bubbling, cracked or peeling paint, discarded wings from alates (flying/migrating termites), stiff windows and doors, tunnels in wood and hollow sounding timber. Once infested, termite populations can grow at alarming rates and are hugely destructive pests.

If you want to make changes to the exterior of the house and you’ve fallen in love with an older home, you’ll want to find out whether it is subject to a Heritage Overlay as this will affect what you can and can’t do to the exterior of the home.

Any home that you are considering should be subjected to a thorough building and pest inspection before you begin to imagine your life and living there. That way you can set aside the emotional input at first in favour of gathering all of the facts about the condition of the home itself.

3. MAKE SURE IT WORKS

This seems obvious, but some of it is commonly overlooked...

Test out the lights throughout the home and the exterior, check the exhaust fan in the bathroom, flush the toilet, turn on the taps and even the shower. Look into the cupboards for signs of water damage or leaks and mould and turn the oven, stove and rangehood on (don’t forget to turn all of these off as well!)

In the living rooms, look at where the antenna points are in relation to the windows. Are they directly opposite the window? Is the window on the west side of the house and will sitting down in front of the TV after work be an issue as the sun sets through the window with full glare on the TV?

Check to see whether the house has reverse cycle air conditioning - does it heat AND cool? Is the external unit protected from the elements? Do all the taps get hot water access quickly or are you wasting litres of water just waiting for the hot water to kick in? Do the doors and windows open AND shut with ease? Check the garage doors for smooth operation - garage doors that stick or jar can be a very costly expense to replace or fix.

It is important to take stock of what is and isn’t working in the home as all of these will become your cost when you buy the home and instead of being a small investment of cost, you may find that a portion of or all of your home may need rewiring or plumbing works or expensive fixtures may need replacing.

4. LOCATION

While this may seem obvious, this consideration is not all about prestige but rather lifestyle. What facilities do you need close to you to live the lifestyle you want to live with as much ease as possible? A home close to schools is the most obvious choice, but having a supermarket within walking distance may prove to be a lifesaver for individuals with busy lifestyles and parents with less time to spare throughout the day. If you work long hours, it makes sense to consider a property that is located closer to your work, so that you can limit the amount of hours in a day that you are travelling. Who wants to buy a home they barely get to live in?

Neighbourhood safety is another aspect of location that new home buyers should be considering. What are the crime rates in the suburb you are looking at? You may feel more comfortable living in an area with a slightly higher crime rate if your home has a high fence, security doors and windows and a separate lockable garage. Be aware that an area might be flagged as having a higher crime rate when in fact the crime is concentrated in a singular area (like the industrial portion of the suburb and not the residential area at all). If you love the home, talk to the neighbours and ask them what their experiences have been.

5. BUDGET VS LIST

Before you go looking for a home, write a list of things you are looking for in a new home. The next step after that is to break that list into what is negotiable and what isn’t.

Set a reasonable ceiling on what you can afford to spend comfortably and then start researching the locations that can accommodate your budget and list. When you have a good idea about what you are capable of buying, this is the time to see a broker for a pre-approval on a home loan. Once you have these basics in place, that is the time to approach a real estate agency and start inspecting homes and checking through your list.

Use this guide to help your new home buying process be an enjoyable and exhilarating experience, and happy house hunting!

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