Hello, Just curious. What's a good type of a real estate property for a first time buyer? Many thanks!
Whatever you can afford in the best possible location. Or, a place you can either live in to pay the mortgage and fix up, or a place that can easily rent to cover the mortgage.
Without knowing you, your desires, or your abilities I can only say buy one at 80% of the maximum that the mortgage company is willing to lend you. If you max out you will be straining. Rember the first three cardinal rules in real estate. Location, location, location. If you are handy, buy the worst looking house on a block of nice houses and force some appreciation with sweat equity. If you want to provide more information I may be able to add some specific suggestions
While I appreciate the reason behind your question, unfortunately, unless you are able to ask a more precise question, no answer will be suitable! I'd request that you spend perhaps an hour planning your question. What do I mean by lanning your question? Try to identify various parts in your question, and frame them accordingly... Instead of asking "I'm a first time buyer, how should I go about buying a real estate?", you might want to first identify the various questions that this question is made of: 1. Budget (what budget am I looking at?) 2. Location (am I looking for a premium location or an offbeat location?) 3. Goal (is my goal to buy an asset for resale or to have a great house to live in?) 4. Risk profile (am I a risk taker who is willing to bet on possibly large investments on a real estate which could pay off very well if it succeeds, but could hurt me a lot if it doesn't?) With the above (and possibly a couple of more sub-questions), you now frame your question. It could look like," With a budget of 200 K US$, I wish to buy a real estate on the outskirts of London. I wish to settle in the real estate and am not too bothered about resale value in the short and medium run...I don't with to take much risks...what do you advise?" Answers to the above question could be far more useful Just some thoughts from NS @ RealPedia - tHE Real Estate Directory & WWW Encyclopedia
Buy something that needs work in this best area you can afford, then add value by carrying out that work.