the loan officer

Jumping back to real life seriousness and our new life of home ownership, I want to talk about our experiences with the loan officer we used, Lisa Stelter Graf at RCU.

We chose her because an overwhelming majority of her reviews were overwhelmingly positive. Her financial institution, RCU, also does a majority of the loans in the Eau Claire area. That, and she got us approved at the rate we were looking for haha.

Still living in Michigan, we were working with her long distance, and it couldn't have been easier. From the quoting of rates, to getting the approval, to the paperwork, to helping facilitate the closing, she was on the ball, and there were virtually no hiccups.

Initially she seemed kind of aloof, but I soon realized that success in her industry isn't achieved by hounding and selling and hounding some more. Instead, her recipe seems to be letting her track record speak for itself, being a resource when needed, and injecting herself into the conversation only when necessary.

Upon meeting her in person, shortly before the offer on the house was made, our right choice in mortgage provider was confirmed. Since, RCU has been nothing shorty of fantastic to work with. As my review of the realtor was longer and much more in depth, our experience with Lisa was that much more streamlined, and I think that's reflected here.

Overall, the process of securing a lender and an approved application was easy. The wealth of information on the internet, while informative, can serve to confuse the typical American home buyer. The main thing you should do is take your time, read everything, take your time, and read everything.

If at any point anybody you're dealing with tells you not to worry about it or that you can read it later, you have the wrong person involved. Because at the end of the day, everybody you deal with when buying a home, or really doing anything, wants you to do it with them.

Now, whether they want to capture your business as soon as possible with less than savory intentions or they want to capture your business in a reasonable time frame with you walking away happy to recommend them to a friend is the thing. Lisa Stelter Graf is the latter.

the realtor

So we bought a house and we got a realtor. Heckyeahwoman was responsible for selecting him or her. Ultimately, she went with a him. Dave Tracy with RE/MAX if you're wondering. Yes, we're actually using real names now. Trying to give legit reviews here, folks. And speaking of reviews, he did actually get great reviews, according to my wife. So she did a great job in selecting our dude.

Anyway, yeah, we were initially confident in working with him. We soon found that he was kind of pushy about us signing the actual contract. But with the signing of the contract, and then with actually signing off on the offer sheets in that back and forth exchange, he was a little bit pushier than we thought necessary.

He's gotta eat, he's got a wife, I think he's got a kid; I get it. We could have always told him to chill the fuck out, but we wanted the house as badly as he wanted the sale. So it wound up working out.

Worth noting, he did work for us for a bit before the contract was signed, due to our moving out of state situation. His "I don't normally do this, but..." platitude didn't impress me at all. He did have a fair cancellation/contract termination policy though.

Technically, he or she is supposed to work for you more than a realtor, who is presumably working for the seller. In reality, they are working for themselves - much like anybody you will come across in the mortgage/housing industry. Also much like in life, no matter where you go, what you do, there are going to be people trying to fuck you. And not the good kind of fucking either.

To be fair, I don't feel as if our dude tried to fuck us. And I don't think he did. Maybe more of pushing to close the deal slightly at our expense - with the "at our expense" part being nothing more than cutting corners in the process. The cost of doing business, if that makes sense.

With him specializing in relocations and first-time home buyers, you'd think he'd be extra thorough or patient. Not totally the case.

Because we were moving from out of state, we did a remote closing, at our place in Michigan. Luckily Mr. Tracy was kind enough to do the final walk-through. Though he did miss a few things, like the flat screen wall mount left on the wall, as well as the empty Bose speaker wall mounts, yep, also left on the wall. Unfortunately our old-ass CRT isn't easily mountable. Also, the final cleaning wasn't what we expected.

We will definitely be there at the next final walk through, lesson learned.

When we did the inspection, a few of the outlets in the basement weren't working; the mental notes we made to have them checked out slipped our minds and we moved into the house with them still not working. Would have been nice to have him follow up on that for us. Obviously buyer beware, but still.

Having spent a good portion of my professional career in sales, not real estate, I was disappointed with the process. It could have been just that - the real estate process, or it could have been our dude's less aggressive approach, or it could have been him just getting worked by the sellers. I can't help but feel I would have negotiated better.

At the end of the day, I don't think I would use him again. That is less of a knock on him, than me thinking that we could have done it better ourselves. But we don't have our real estate licenses, so that's another thing for another time.

Now if I had friends that were dead set on acquiring a realtor or buyer's agent, I would pass on his name, with caveats. The main caveat would be: if you're a first time home buyer, sign up with him, but get much more involved and don't be afraid to tell him to chill.

Again, this was our first time buying a house and using a buyer's agent/realtor, so our inexperience obviously influenced our perception of how things went down.

Finally, for what it's worth, I have a general rule about not trusting a dude with a goatee. Kinda stupid, but he definitely had a goatee.