When it comes to buying a home, homebuyers are often faced with the dilemma of choosing between an older or newer house. Older homes tend to have larger lots but less storage space, and are more likely to need repairs. On the other hand, newer homes tend to be larger, but have smaller lots, and are more likely to be energy efficient and built according to code. Opinions about buying a new home versus an old one are mixed, and in this market, having a clear idea of what you want is important, as homebuyers must make extremely quick decisions if they want the chance to get their dream home.
Making a checklist of your must-have features can help you identify what you can't live without in a home. As a new buyer, it's important to be careful that older homes might have several hidden, unique, and sometimes strange problems that you might have to solve. Modern homes are built to stricter standards of safety and uniformity than homes of the past. A modern home, for example, will never have lead paint on the walls, or shredded and untreated newspapers as insulation (and a possible fire).
According to the AHS, at a median per square foot, homeowners spent 81 cents per square foot per year on electricity. Often, the first piece of advice potential homebuyers hear is to go talk to a lender to find out exactly how much you can afford for a home. Therefore, when planning to move into a home built around that time, an inspection for those hazardous materials is necessary. Of course, the likelihood that something terrible will happen is low: every year, for example, only 0.276% of housing units have a fire (which means that it is quite unlikely to happen to you).
I'm not here to tell anyone what decision to make regarding buying a home, but I want to give some reasons why I think older homes are an excellent option to consider. Most homeseekers prefer to buy a newly built home or have a professional builder build a custom home. Whether you want an entire house to remodel or just a single room, such as a kitchen, remodeled, it will automatically give you a lower, middle, and higher estimate depending on where you live. That could be exaggerated because nothing is maintenance-free, not even that new Dodge that pulls out of the parking lot, but according to the Census Bureau's most recent American Housing Survey for newly built homes (no more than four years), maintaining new homes costs less. As a homebuyer, you want to find a home that fits your needs perfectly, but that can be difficult when there are so many options available. Creating a checklist of your “must-haves” can help you get through the old house versus the new house debate once and for all.
