Establishing A Budget 

Another preparatory step to finding the home of your dreams is to establish a budget. While that is anything but exciting, the results will be well worth the effort! 

• The development of a household budget is a desirable activity both before you make a real estate purchase as well as consistently during your ownership. 
• By preparing a budget while you are looking at homes, you can better focus on mortgage payment goals and how the home will affect your total expenses.
• Maintaining a budget can help prevent potential financial disasters as well as point you in a money saving direction so you have more funds available for those things you need and want.
• You will need a little time to develop a budget.
• Most importantly, get everyone involved in spending involved in developing the budget.
• Be realistic in your budget assessment. Make provisions for possible increases in some items [for example, insurance, taxes, school tuition]
• Then look for ways to get control over your budget.

 Items Needed to Develop a Budget

• All current monthly loan payments.
• All other monthly expenses [such as child care, dues, etc.]
• Records of variable expenses [for example, utilities, food and car repair] from the last 12 months. This will give you an estimate of your monthly expenses.
• Records of annual or semi-annual expenses [such as insurance and taxes].
• An estimate of what your new mortgage payment will be. Our loan officers  can determine this for you for free and at no obligation!
• Records of non-fixed expenses [for example, medical expenditures, new tires]. This will give an estimate of average expenses of this type.
• Records or an estimate of personal expenses. [entertainment, travel, etc.]
• Get a current copy of your credit report. Go to www.equifax.com, www.transunion.com,  or www.experian.com.

 Prudential Gary Greene, Realtors and The Martin Team are dedicated to building and preserving wealth in home ownership. We want your move to be an enjoyable experience and we sincerely hope these tips to happy homeownership are worthwhile.

 Thank you so much again for visiting our web site at www.friendswood-realestate.com and we hope you continue to use it as your real estate resource center.

Successfully,

Alinda Martin
281 - 482 - 7700