Home ownership is one of the biggest emotional and financial decisions you'll ever make, so prepare yourself to make a knowledgeable decision. Although buying a home almost always seems like a great idea, it is important to understand what homeownership involves. Of course, being a homeowner is something to be proud of but it also means having to invest money, time and energy and take on added responsibilities. So, before you decide to buy a home, make sure you're ready.

When most of us consider becoming homeowners, we immediately think of how wonderful it will be. It is true that there are a lot of good reasons for wanting to buy a home. Here are some of the main advantages of owing a home:

• Financial Security: if housing prices rise, your home can provide you with some financial security due to capital appreciation
• Flexibility: you can decorate or renovate your home to meet your own family/s personal tastes and needs
• Stability: having a place of your own
  
  The downsides: main disadvantages of owning a home:
  
• Financial Stress: coming with the down payment, meeting regular mortgage payments and other ongoing costs will tie up a lot of your cash and can put considerable stress on your finances
• Maintenance, keeping your home in good shape requires time and money
• Higher costs: you may pay more each month for housing than you did as a renter. There are also extra costs for maintenance and property taxes
• More responsibility: you alone are responsible for payments, repairs and maintenance.
  

Advantages of Buying:

• Buying a home is a sound investment. When you carefully choose a home you can afford, the payoff will be great. With each monthly mortgage payment, you are building equity in place of your own. The more mortgage payments you make, the more equity you will have and as you build up equity in your current home, it is usually easier to afford another home in the future.
• Unlike most other things you buy, a home can actually appreciate or increase in value (although there is no guarantee that your home's value will grow).
• Since a portion of your monthly payments pays down the amount of the mortgage, eventually you will be mortgage free. Rent on the other hand never goes away and cannot be recovered. Once paid, the rent is gone.
• As a home owner, you can decorate, renovate and improve your home to suit your taste and increase its value (also known as sweat equity).
• In some cases, the cost of owning your home may be cheaper than renting.

Disadvantages:

• Home ownership may have drawbacks. Compared to renting, you can expect to pay more per month for your mortgage. Also, do not forget the added costs of home repairs and maintenance
• Your home might increase in value as time goes by, but do not count on getting a big return quickly.
• After you have bought a home, you may not have as much flexibility in choosing a new location or job.

So is home ownership right for you?

Speak to Joanna for a personal and confidential evaluation of your unique situation. Using financial & mortgage calculation tools, market information, trends and experience, Joanna can help provide you guidance, insight and advice for your current situation to ensure you make an informed decision on home ownership. It may not always make sense and doing your homework in advance can save you a lot of time, money and headaches in the future, so call today!

After you've decided that home ownership is the way to go, it is now time to start assembling your home buying team – the group of people that are going to help you find, finance, inspect/repair (if required), and close the home of your dreams. The first instinct many people have is to venture out on the home search alone as there is an abundance of information available in newspapers & home magazines (i.e. Resale Homes, Toronto Star, Homes & Land, Real Estate Exchange, etc.), advertisements & flyers that get sent to your home, and especially the internet (agent websites & MLS.ca). While these are great places to start, they are essentially just a start.

Your first goal should to be to find and select a Realtor of choice for your desired area and/or property type and usually the other pieces of the real estate puzzle will fit together. A good Realtor should be able to provide you with all the connections you need (described in the next section) to facilitate and help you navigate through the home buying process. Your Realtor is also a resource of knowledge and information, in addition to being a gatekeeper of data and statistics not readily available to the public. It is vital that you have an agent on your side working to protect your interest whether you are buying new or used – most importantly, it is at no cost to you since the seller pays for the services of a Buyer Agent and they only get paid for performance, so if they don't do a good job to find you what you are looking for, they don't get paid!