Foreign.

Welcome to around the House with Eric G. Your trusted source for all things home improvement.

Whether you're tackling a DIY project, hiring it out, or just trying to keep your home running smoothly, you're in the right place.

With over 30 years of remodeling experience, certified kitchen designer Eric G takes you behind the scenes with expert advice, industry trends and the latest innovations for your home.

Home.

It's everything you need to know without the fluff.

Now here's your host, Eric G. Welcome.

To the Round the House show, the next generation of home improvement.

I'm Eric G. Thanks for joining us today.

If you want to find out more about around the House show, head over to aroundthehouse online.com and back in the co pilot seat today we got John Dudley.

Thanks for coming back on, brother.

Dude, I'm happy to be here having a gas doing this with you.

And we are having a good time.

This is.

And if you don't know who John Dudley is, he was a contractor.

That sheesh.

I met you as a contractor.

Yes, sir.

And we worked together for a number of years and then he drugged me into his band.

And you've heard that music on this show before here.

And we've battled and had a great time together doing stuff and it's, he's just such a great energy to the show.

It's.

Thanks for coming back on, man.

No, back at you, brother.

Really appreciate it.

Always a great time when we're together for sure.

And the fun thing is he's also got site hype design.

So we're, he's the brainchild behind the around the House website and many other peoples out there that we work with.

That's where he's coming from, which is awesome.

But today we thought we'd put our heads together and say there's a lot of people going to be out looking at homes here this next year, especially if we get some interest rates down.

And let's talk about the top 10 mistakes people can make when they're out looking for that home.

Dude, you've seen so many of these mistakes.

You bought a lot of properties.

When was the first house you bought?

How old were you?

I was 20, man.

I bought my first host home in Tacoma, Washington at 20 years old in 1990.

And yeah, yeah, you have no idea what you're in for, especially if you go into it like I did because I was just starting my contracting business 35 years ago.

Wow.

Yeah.

Getting there.

But yeah, so at 20 years old, I was sure I could build the Eiffel tower if I needed to.

And I was way too optimistic going in.

Not considering.

I can't tell you how long I looked at like just glue on my countertops from the brown laminate countertops I had to rip off immediately because it was just making me sick.

The orange shag carpet.

Right.

So I went into it as a remodel and thinking about the equity I could build pretty quickly because I knew the trades and knew what I was doing at 20.

But man, you don't.

Especially in older homes.

That was built in 1939.

It's not super old compared to the 1891 that was.

Huh.

Yeah.

That was a two year project.

But going into older homes, you don't know who's put band aids on any kind of pipes and electrical.

And there's so many things takes us right to the importance of maybe the inspector.

Right.

Maybe think about inspection first.

Inspections are so important.

But I'm going to put something in front of that and it's not even on the list.

But I want to bring this up.

If you're married or you're in a any kind of relationship, before you go flip this house or you go dive into something, that relationship better be rock solid.

You got to be strong.

Yep.

If it's not, or if you think it is and it's not, you better be ready for it because you are going to insert the highest stress on a relationship by remodeling a house that you're living in.

I will second that motion because.

And you knew Michelle.

We were dating like two and a half years at that point and just excited 20 year olds, man.

We were like, wow, we're buying a house.

Like it was crazy.

And we had the best relationship which led to us getting married later down the road.

After a while, a little bit of separation.

Because during that house we did indeed separate.

It was like, no, it's this way.

No, it's.

It's.

Even if you have the best relationship and you think no way we'll get through this.

We're such a great couple.

We communicate so it doesn't matter.

The stress changes everything and the dynamic shifts quickly.

It does.

Heck, I just went through a divorce and it went way quickly.

You think things are good.

They say things are good and deep down they're not.

And Crystal Ball didn't see that.

But that's about communication.

That's just one of those things.

Just make sure guys.

Just make sure that you're in a good spot to do that because maybe you want to stay in the house.

You're in, get that house, have some remodel it so you can move in and be done with it.

Because living in it is tough.

Yeah.

And to be fair, it's a lot of fun and it's very exciting for a couple.

Let's grab a house, paint it the colors we want and.

But I would say keep it simple.

Right.

Don't think that you're going to re plumb the whole place yourself.

And then your wife's angry because date night's canceled for three months.

That's where the problems start.

It's I think when I did my bathroom and we were doing during COVID and the plan was to in that shower because we only had one shower in the house.

So that time we were doing all the tile work and stuff in there.

We were gonna hit the gym.

When they closed the gym during COVID that makes it a little tough.

So I literally took the bathtub out into the garage, took the hot and cold water off the water heater, temporarily made a bathtub surround.

Yeah.

Into a sump pump that kicked on to get it out of there.

And guess what?

It worked.

Yeah.

Coming from a guy that has used paint drop cloths as a shower curtain.

I know exactly what you're talking about.

I know you do.

So it gets you through, but it does its damage.

It does its damage, brother.

I wanted to talk about one of the big important ones here, which is not getting pre approved for mortgage before house hunting.

It is so big out there because you think, oh man, I get credit card ads in the mail all the time.

I got all this stuff.

Just because you think your credit's decent and you're out there doing it, got to make sure that you get the right mortgage and know what you can afford before you go out and do it.

Because just because you can make the house payment doesn't mean that you can make all the other payments that are associated with it.

Especially if you're going to start tearing walls open.

Those costs add up quick.

So you have to figure that stuff.

And it takes a plan to execute.

And make sure you're ready to plan that plan before you buy the.

Let's get the fixer upper for instant equity.

Okay.

Exactly.

Pull back the reins.

And by the way, I want to check hour two of the show out.

Cause we're going to talk about our tips too, of how to start that big remodeling project and what are the right steps.

We'll be talking about that a little later in the next hour.

But really that's one of those things, making sure you can secure financing, that kind of stuff.

And another little side note with that, don't be foolish.

Don't go out and buy that new truck, that new vehicle, that new boat.

Go get four credit cards, right?

They always say get the house first, then go get that, because much easier to get a car loan.

Much easier to go get another credit card if you need one.

If you want to follow Dave Ramsey for that stuff, please do.

But yeah, yeah, totally make sure that you've got to listen to him relentlessly.

In my 20s, like he's been around that long.

Dude, new.

Yeah, yeah.

Such a great source.

Yeah, such a great source.

But dial it in.

Make sure you can get this dialed in and make sure that you're good.

Because if your house is your priority, make it your priority.

Otherwise you're in trouble.

Problem.

Yeah, it'll.

So many people go out and buy that new car, go lease the new car, whatever, and then you go to get the house loan.

They're like, ah, your debt to income is not awesome.

And to be fair, usually because realtors don't want to waste their time either with looky lose and not pointing fingers.

Just saying, generally speaking, a good agent, that's the first thing they're going to say.

Are you pre approved for how much?

So I know what to look for.

So case in point, if your realtor doesn't bring that up and just starts showing you fantasy land.

Careful.

Exactly.

We're gonna go out to break here in a second, so I can't wait to talk about the next one here because I tell you what, it's almost as important as this one.

And there's so many steps to this and especially we'll talk a little bit later about it as well, about how the new rules changed here in the US this last year for realtors.

Johnny, since you've moved down to Columbia.

That's right.

You go looking for a house, you got to go sign the documents to say, here's what we're is what it is versus them just saying, hey, jump in the Lexus and I'll take you around and look at houses.

You got to figure out the cost first.

Yeah, you were talking about that a few weeks back, I think, and yeah.

Excited to readdress that.

Cool.

Yeah, that's a good one.

It's a good one.

All right, guys, if you want to find out more about us, head over to Aroundthe House online dot com.

We'll be right back after these important messages.

We'll be talking about those tips and tricks to buy that next house.

To find out more, head to aroundthehouse online.com and make sure to subscribe to our social media channels.

Around the house will be right back after we convince the smoke detector that dinner is not an emergency.

I think it's done now.

Welcome back to the around the House show, the next generation of home improvement.

I'm Eric G. Thanks for joining us today.

If you want to find out more about us, make sure you follow us on all the social media channels.

Make sure you check out our YouTube.

We got some great videos coming out as well as just head over to the website aroundthe house online.com.

all those links are right there.

We got some new pages coming up here that Johnny and I will be talking about a little bit later.

We've got some fun coming up.

Yes, sir.

We've been talking, right, we've been talking today about how to get that new house.

What are the steps that, that you need to do so you don't make those big mistakes?

Because there are so many things you gotta be careful with out there.

And the next one here is a big one.

And that's underestimating or just ignoring the total ownership costs.

Now say that if you go on to Zillow, they do, like many of the websites, they do a decent job.

But take a look at the taxes.

Like I've been looking at new houses out there going, okay, mine's going on the market.

Actually, it's on the market now.

So you want to make sure to check that out.

I'll post that up on the social media pages.

So if you haven't seen my house for sale, go take a peek at it.

But really, those total ownership costs are big.

So I was looking at a house here that was in that, let's say it was a 650,000, $700,000 range.

Pretty cheap for my expensive area here in Portland.

Some houses I was looking about, the property taxes were $600 a month.

I was looking at other ones that were up north of me, $1,200 a month.

So wait a minute.

So I'm going to pay an extra $600 a month in taxes?

Yeah.

That come out of my payment.

It's insanity up there.

It's.

I actually was just talking about this with my mom yesterday who lives in Lake Taps up, Seattle area.

Yeah.

Theirs are insane.

I couldn't believe it.

And that I told her my friend Bryce is living in San Diego now.

She's like, how do they afford the property taxes?

I was like, it's A pretty damn good question, Ma.

The guy works at the zoo.

I don't know.

I would almost say my buddy who lives in SoCal, Brandon Ison, who is my buddy, who is on.

Who is one of my old producers of the show.

My board op now he's at.

Geez, probably the number two talk radio station in the country at WBBM in Chicago.

And his taxes are less than yours.

Your mom's seriously in Orange County.

And he's.

Yeah.

His taxes are probably 10% of what your mom's are there.

Wow.

That's surprising to me.

Yeah.

And I have no idea about that area with.

To that respect, but I do know that I lived up there for 20 years, and I was just infuriated with the.

Like, you're kidding me, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think his property taxes on that place are in the in thousand or two dollars a year versus.

Wow.

Yeah.

Probably your mom's probably in the 800 to 900 bucks a month category.

So for sure she's on Taps Island.

Like.

No, it's.

No, she's in the thousands of dollars a month.

Yeah, exactly.

It's ridiculous.

And homeowner fees on top of that.

So there's another to consider.

There we go.

Those HOA fees can get crazy.

And here's the problem.

You got to watch out for out there, guys.

And this is a big one.

You're like, oh, I'm gonna get the townhouse.

I love the townhouse.

I don't want a yard.

I don't want this stuff.

That's awesome.

You're paying into the hoa.

But many times with townhouses and condos, the building is managed by the hoa.

Now, one of the big things I'm seeing out here is that you're seeing these big builders to limit their liability, they're creating and managing the HOA.

So we're going to manage the HOA for the first 10 years, we're going to manage the Hoa that now has to deal with exterior warranty claims on the building.

Yep.

Huh.

So you see where this is going?

Yeah.

We'll send a guy over there to throw some caulking in that.

We're gonna kick that can down the curb, because maybe they didn't do the exterior.

Right.

But if we throw enough caulk and paint on every couple years that we're gonna charge you for.

Yeah.

That can turn into some dirty pool real quick.

And did you do the math on that?

Like you're saying in townhomes and gated communities, things like that.

And there's what?

100 units, 150 units.

Whatever those guys are, they're making some coin man here.

Great example.

My girlfriend's place here in.

In kind of Tigard area of Portland.

She's got a really large townhome.

It's bigger than my house.

Nice big townhome, garage, Everything else.

But there's.

It's almost like a duplex in that.

It's just two buildings next to each other.

Two stories, good size.

A lot of that in Utah.

My little brother.

Don't do it.

Don't do it.

I know it works.

But she's.

It's a six year old building.

Yeah.

And they're already coming by going.

Because they had the cheap painters, the cheap caulking on the siding.

It's all splitting.

And they were knocking on the door going, would you prefer to have the whole house painted or would you like to.

I'm like, come through and it's six years old.

Come through and touch it up.

Yeah.

There's no way with concrete siding and all the cool stuff that you see out there that you should be repainting things at six years.

You shouldn't have to touch that for at least double.

Almost three times that amount of time or it was done wrong.

That's from a contractor, folks.

Absolutely.

So you got to watch out for that stuff.

And if they have lawsuits and stuff, you can get tied up.

I've seen people with townhomes in bigger complexes where they get the lawsuits going on and it's.

I really can't sell it because we don't know if we're gonna have to each put in $50,000 for them to fix the water intrusion, mold issues, whatever it is.

Yep.

Huge issues with that in the Northwest.

What was it, I don't know, maybe 15 years ago with the whole.

Yeah, I won't mention brands, concrete, fiberboard stuff.

Yeah.

Had an L and a P. And I'm trying something like that.

There's a lot of different things going.

On out there that went on for a long time.

And a lot of people sighting, falling off the house, moisture issues, mold issues.

And they just pushed it, pushed it, kicked the can like you said.

And by the way, here's my prediction.

I'm going to make a big prediction.

Mold issues are going to be the next lawsuits like asbestos, for sure.

Water intrusion companies that go in and do it.

That is going to be the next one on the television instead of the.

Have you worked with asbestos?

Please call the blah, blah, blah, law firm molds.

The next one.

It's coming and it should be.

I can't believe it's not.

To be honest.

So many health issues created by that.

And if you got kids.

Oh, no.

Yeah.

And it's bad.

So anyway, goes back to the dad.

We got to get through this list.

Otherwise, you guys, we're make this a two hour show.

I know.

I'll be quiet.

Speaking of that, good timing, Johnny.

Skipping the professional home inspection.

Now, here is one thing on the home inspection you need to realize check your local or state laws with this.

But generally speaking, it's different from state to state.

But if you're paying $500 for a home inspector, their liability in the contract is $500.

Yep.

So they are a second set of eyes, but they are not the experts coming in that will find everything.

They will see stuff, but they can also miss a lot as well.

And so it's really depending on how good your inspector is and what they're capable of finding.

And sometimes they'll find it.

Many times they don't.

That being said, I would say just a word to the wise.

Don't count on your buddy that does tile for a living and says he can inspect your foundation.

And in fact, that said, as a general contractor, I knew anything that could go wrong with a home, but I wouldn't do it even for my friends.

I'm like, dude, pay the money, get the inspector.

I don't know what to look for.

I know what to look for.

But those guys do it every day, all day.

Right.

Stick to what you're good at.

And I don't want to be when you find out it was infested with termites.

I don't want you punching me in the face.

Please get an inspector.

Love you.

I'll take a second look.

I'll walk around it with him.

But pay a pro.

Absolutely.

Now, the next one we come up here is going to be controversial, which I want you to stick around for because I know there's going to be some people they're going to.

I. I can hear the ice starting to roll already.

We'll talk about that just as soon as around the House returns.

Welcome back to the around the house show.

The next generation of home improvement.

I'm Eric G. Thanks for joining me today, guys.

Well, I tell you what, we're gonna have to start doing these live one of these days because it gets pretty crazy in between these commercial breaks that we're talking about.

We start playing around with the mixing board or having a good time and I start hitting buttons like this and then I start Talking to John, we'll.

Put a special little inner circle spot on the website.

Yeah, exactly.

We're gonna have to do something there.

We've been talking today about making sure that you don't make those 10 big mistakes when you're buying that house.

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Join us next time for more home tips and make sure to visit aerobroom.com it's one of those things that it can be controversial as well.

And this is one here.

And it's funny, I'll talk to many friends about buying a house and so many people go, oh, that realtor or that broker is just ripping me off for their percentage.

And.

And guess what?

They're the ones that get taken advantage of.

Yeah.

Because they don't know what they're doing and it's dangerous.

You know what you have you always bought with that or have you done something?

That's why I made my wife a realtor.

So it after a couple of properties, it made sense for my wife to get into.

Ex wife into.

Into real estate made the most sense.

And that worked out really well for us.

But yeah, generally speaking, you're like, how could these realtor fees be so high?

They only spent 17 hours driving us around.

Yeah.

No.

But then they see the real estate lawyers bill and go, I should have had the realtor.

Yeah, totally.

We're back to pay the pros.

Yeah.

If you'd.

Here's one thing, brother, that I realized talking to other people, like in the Pacific Northwest, where you and I have lived, realtors and the escrow and all that stuff is really handled between the realtors and a title company.

You get into states like New Jersey and the lawyers get involved.

You actually have.

The real estate lawyer is part of the process.

So the realtor works through it, the lawyer does it, then it goes into closing.

And it's crazy, but it's so wild that other states are so different.

So if you're moving before you even figure that out, make sure you understand what's going on over there, because that could be problematic if you don't understand the process and having that real estate person to walk you through there, that professional, like you said, let the pros help you through it, because it can.

Be problematic for real, and especially if you're running it, because at that point, I don't know anything about the Jersey real estate, but that's the point of escrow.

Right.

They've got the legal team, they're looking at that stuff.

So if I'm in Jersey, that's going through two sets of attorneys that I'm paying for.

I don't like that idea.

But at the same time, I don't want to get shot in the foot either.

It's the price you pay for doing business.

I think the key point here is recognize that going in.

Hey, guys, this is.

They're going to tack it on the mortgage.

Sure.

And you're going to go, oh, it's only another 76 bucks a month or 200 or whatever.

Turn it up.

But understand that and understand it beforehand, because you're going to get all excited about a house you found that you love and you think it's only 600K.

And at the end of the deal, it's 100, 825.

And you're like, what happened?

Maybe not that drastic, but.

Oh, but let's understand the entire process going in, and you will save yourself money and a lot of headaches and a lot of sleepless nights, man, it's worth it.

That seems like a good transition to number five here, which is setting an unrealistic budget or buying at the top of your means.

Ding.

Seriously, it's one of those things, you look at it, just go, wow, okay, do I want the big house?

Yeah.

At my age, in my 50s, do I want to make the big house payments?

Yeah, not as much.

Not as much.

Maybe a small cabin on the beach instead.

Exactly.

We were having this discussion.

Girlfriend and I have a discussion here recently about this going.

I was talking to Elise and she's like, do we really need a big house?

And I'm like actually, no, we really don't.

There's two of us.

Yeah.

No, if you have too many bedrooms and family wants to come back and live with you so you don't want to make it that comfortable.

And it's always joke about your spare bedroom.

When you have the spare bedroom for guests, make sure it's comfortable for three or four days.

Yeah.

Not seven.

Yep, yep.

You want to get a movement.

It's great.

Yeah.

Been great visiting my house for more than a week.

That's for dang sure.

Generally speaking, 90% of the year it's just a dust collector anyway.

Yeah.

Be aware.

Yeah, it's funny.

And it was funny.

We're talking about this yesterday as I was walking through the.

The, this last weekend, the parade of homes in Kennewick, Washington.

If you're listening at 610k on a country there in the tri Cities.

I was up there walking through the.

The parade of homes with my buddy Ty, who's another contractor up there.

And you've met Ty before, he was the guitar player in my other band.

That was so anyway, him and I are good friends and so we walked through and did that and we were talking about how clients will go, oh, I want to design out that bathroom for my friend, 5 year old and put the little mini fixtures and stuff in it.

It's all right.

Cool.

When they're bigger in three years, can I just get a contract for the remodel of the remodel?

You're going to want to change it again.

Happy to do that for you, sir.

See you in three years.

$30,000 for this and it's going to be 45 and four more years when you want to change it back.

Yeah.

So it's one of those things.

Now the next one is big.

We've all done it, but we've always had to dial it back.

Falling in love with the first house or rushing the decision.

Now rushing the decision can be a market trend.

Absolutely.

Where it just hit the market today.

Do you want it or not?

Yeah, I've been in that spot more than a few times.

It like you say, it depends on the market and people are making above list price cash offers.

You got your arm behind your back, you're like, oh, okay, gotta go.

If you really love it.

Back to making the plan, looking at your budget, being realistic and there's a lot of houses in the world so sometimes you just gotta let it go.

Yep.

Yeah, there's been a few I've been looking at now I'm like, oh man, that's perfect.

Timing's way off.

But I'm like, ooh, that's a cool house.

Yeah, for sure.

That's a cool house.

So that stuff adds up quick.

Now, rushing the decision, like you said, that's a market thing.

But really make sure you do your due diligence.

Sometimes in crazy market times, they'll go, hey, there's not even time for an inspection period.

You want it or not, as is.

And that's a very real problem because all the inspectors are booked as well.

They're like, yeah, home inspection is two weeks out.

You're like, it's going to be sold tomorrow.

So, yeah, definitely an issue to consider.

But when the market's.

If you've got that house with a bad foundation, knob and tube wiring, galvanized plumbing, and you drop it out there for $30,000 less than what is probably valued, and you get the bidding war and you're like, no inspection.

Do you want it or not?

Yeah.

Then the prices go up in the bidding war and you.

As the owner goes, sweet.

Didn't have to fix that.

So be careful.

There might be a reason they've priced it that way.

There's always a reason.

If I've learned.

If I've learned Nothing after my 55 years of living, it's that you truly do get what you pay for.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

You might get the crazy deal.

But does happen.

Always work on it.

It's.

There's a reason why it's priced that way, and there's a big reason.

So the next one here.

Not shopping around for mortgage rates or lenders.

Here's one thing that I've learned, and I don't like many of the online lenders because I like to have somebody I can call on their cell phone.

Yeah.

And say, brother, where we at?

If you don't have that relationship, you can get in trouble.

Yeah.

After purchasing several properties, we had a guy we used for 15 years.

Right.

He'd find us some money always.

And we knew we could trust him.

Is a big deal.

You're buying your first house or even your second house.

I would only say.

And I hope the realtors don't get mad at me, but don't take the first.

Don't take the realtor's cousin.

They're like, here's the guy you go to for a mortgage.

Not true.

Contractor too, by the way.

Yep.

Not true.

There's a ton of options out there.

You don't want to get stuck with a bad girlfriend.

Keep looking.

It's just like a remodel you get a few bids, go to a few places for mortgage and lending.

Absolutely.

And we come back here from break.

I've got a tip for all you small business owners out there because that is a whole other layer of complication when you're trying to get that loan.

And maybe you have your own construction company or anything else like that because you've really spent your entire time trying to pay less taxes less.

But that can hurt you when you're buying a house.

We'll talk about that just as soon as around the House returns don't go anywhere.

Welcome back to the around the House Show.

Before we get started, I wanted to personally thank our sponsor of this hour.

Make sure you check them out@arrow broom.com that's a e r o broom.com.

all right, G, take it from here.

Welcome back to the around the House show, the next generation of home improvement.

I'm Eric G. Thanks for joining me today.

In the co pilot seat today we got John Dudley, man, thanks for coming on the show today.

Always fun to be hammering this stuff out with you because I tell you what, we have a good time together.

And so many memories together.

So many stories to tell.

Hard to not get carried.

We'll never go on the radio, too.

Like that time in Vegas.

We played the show.

Yeah, let's.

Yeah, we'll leave that one out.

We'll leave that one behind us.

Not that we did anything wrong.

No.

Yeah, we played in Vegas together.

That was a fun little street gig.

Actually, the correct response should have been we went to Vegas.

Fair point, fair point.

You're not wrong.

You're not wrong.

All right, guys, we're talking.

And by the way, little legal disclaimer here, this is not tax advice, so don't take me as the tax guy.

That's why I hire professionals.

But if you're a small business owner out there and you're going to go buy a home, take some special care to get this figured out because it is going to be much more difficult than if you're somebody with a W2 where you're working as an employee because as a small business owner, realistically, you want to pay as little taxes as you can and give it to the tax man, which means you're writing a lot of stuff off the side of that nickel is that your now income is lower, which means you can't afford to buy a house no matter how much money you make.

So plan ahead for these things.

Now there are tricks that you can ask about, like if you've got a Sole proprietorship or an LLC or something like that.

Talks with your.

Ask your tax professionals.

Would I be better to go into an S corp where then I can get a W2 as a business owner?

For instance, now I've got a paycheck now the company can be writing things off, doing what it has to do and I'm still getting a paycheck.

For instance, ask around, make sure you got that formatted correctly.

Plan ahead a year or two if you're going to buy a house so you can make sure that you've got the income.

Yeah.

Because if you're just writing everything off, you can.

You might have less income than you think you do because that's what the bank's going to look at.

Been there, done that, man.

Construction business.

You're doing whatever, a million bucks a year and you want it to look like you made 30k because you know, you don't really want to give a third of it away.

Yeah.

And then you're like, oh man, I can't even qualify for a cell phone.

Exactly.

Yeah.

I can't even buy the insurance for the house, let alone the house.

Right.

You got to be careful with that one.

Now here's an interesting one too.

Overlooking long term needs and location factors.

So like future resale value, your commute time, the school district for the kids.

My favorite word for realtors.

This is an up and coming neighborhood, which means you're in a crap hole.

But plenty of those in Hilltop.

But they get better from time to time.

You can get lucky.

You can buy something, pennies on the dollar if it turns around in the right time.

Look what Detroit's doing now compared to what it was a decade ago.

Oh, totally.

Yep.

Now Portland, Oregon is much more like Detroit and Detroit is much more like Portland, Oregon was.

Or Seattle for.

Or Seattle.

Exactly.

So really, if that's your approach, I mean my recommendation and I used to do, I would sit online and stare at houses for fun consistently.

Because I loved it and I loved watching the market.

And it's just like watching a stock.

You're like, okay, when it takes a dive, is it coming back?

Because sometimes they don't.

And it's the same way with neighborhoods and areas.

And man, spend a year watching the market, first of all watching mortgage rates and slowly look for where you want to be.

What looks like it's up and coming, new restaurants popping up, new other buildings being remodeled.

It's happening in again, to use the St. Thomas example, right now the whole downtown is getting gentrified and those are Million dollar properties without a roof.

It's crazy down there.

But you also know there's billion dollar hedge funds pumping money into downtown restoring these buildings.

That's a good sign.

Okay.

Yeah, absolutely.

Right now it's interesting.

Portland, Oregon, where I'm at here, the vacancy rate for those.

Those guys.

Happy.

I don't have commercial buildings in Portland, Oregon.

Yeah.

Because I tell you what, they have the highest vacancy rate in the country.

You guys are having fires in the street up there.

Come on.

Oh, yeah.

Really?

Downtown is.

Yeah, let's put a nice office down there.

Yeah.

It's crazy.

I can't imagine Seattle's much better either.

And those were two like prime markets for so.

For decades.

Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely.

So you look at that and just go, whoo.

It's.

It just keeps getting worse and worse.

You go downtown and there's big towers that are mostly empty.

Lights off.

Yeah.

And it's scary.

So just understand what those market things are and where they're going and watch traffic.

And that's the one thing too.

If you're worried about commutes, man.

When I was living in Gig Harbor, Washington and traveling up to downtown Seattle, I had a two hour commute in one hour.

I was sitting on the ferry.

Yeah.

I didn't have the ferry from Tacoma and it used to take me from North End Tacoma to Ballard where I had to get to two and a half hours sometimes.

Yeah.

So five hours a day on the road.

Some states that don't add on to their freeway lanes.

Today is probably your best traffic because next year it's going to be worse.

Yeah.

Yuck.

I don't know.

Just be careful with that one.

That's an expensive one.

And then the other one here too, that's on the list that's important is pay attention to insurance.

If you're in St. Thomas, if you're in Southern California, if you're in.

If you're looking for earthquake insurance in San Francisco, it can be a little tough.

Yeah.

Florida, places like that.

Yeah.

So make sure you understand that.

Get some quotes beforehand.

Understand it.

Yeah, for sure.

The additional costs and areas like you mentioned.

And then again figuring that into your overall budget because that'll snag you.

You think you're looking for a $500,000 house, but really you might want to start looking at 350.

Yeah.

And if you can't get an insured, you might not be able to find a bank to.

Yep.

Or you gotta put a bigger down payment.

Where's your 60% down?

Yep.

Yep.

So be really careful with that.

And then of course, just watching your credit score, making sure you're good, that's a big one right there.

Making sure that you're looking decent, make sure you got it.

Making sure that you don't have any fraud going on.

And then you're gonna be pretty good to go because that's where those mistakes really can happen.

And all of a sudden you're in there and you're like, oh, wait a minute.

It's not the funnest exercise, but it's really a matter of trying to not get excited, even though I love the excitement of it.

And really being honest with yourself and your spouse if that's what's happening.

Just being realistic and being honest and not getting caught in the clouds going, I want the one with the cool skylights.

You gotta pull back.

And it's.

I know it's difficult.

I have made the mistake, which is why I can preach to it.

Absolutely.

And then guys, again on this, purchasing a home, make sure if you're in a relationship or whatever else is going to sound like Dr. Laura or something right here, but just make sure you're in a good spot.

Because so many people, I got a lot of friends right now that are going through stuff that are where they're gone through a divorce or they're going through a divorce.

I have more friends going through divorce now than I think I've ever seen right now.

Rough time.

And I feel bad for him and I can't judge, I just went through one.

And long story short is make sure that you've got that kind of negotiated out beforehand.

Because what happens if, you know, you've got a two income household and you got to go buy them out or they got to buy you out.

I got a buddy going through one right now and I know she's trying to get the house.

She can't buy him out of the 15 years that he's put into that.

So they're going to have a big awakening when they go, okay, you got to do that and you're not.

She doesn't get the money for that.

She doesn't have near the income.

Even if they award her some kind of maintenance or something like that, ain't no way she's going to be able to afford that place.

And that's.

Oh, make sure you don't get painted in that corner.

Because literally it's a painted in the corner.

Yeah.

It is a brutal truth.

If you get looking at it and go, I don't know, are we gonna make it not the time to go.

A new house is like a kid.

It ain't gonna go.

Having a kid ain't gonna fix it.

Having a new house ain't gonna fix it.

Just make sure you got it dialed in and you'll be much better off or less.

Or at least make sure you get some prenups on there to make sure that you guys know, you know what it is.

And it's funny.

Here's my little.

Here's my little thing.

Dr. Eric, go.

Dr. Eric, go.

Here's the funny thing.

There's no waiting period to really go get a marriage license.

But in some states like Washington, there's a 90 day waiting period for the divorce.

Mike shouldn't.

Fair enough.

If you create a company, you tell it, okay, I've got this corporation.

How are we going to break it up when it's done?

I think that we should make it where if it goes sideways, you've already pre negotiated that when they give you the marriage license, maybe just slip that.

Into the let's go buy a home plan.

Yeah, there we go.

They're in some attorney fees there.

Absolutely.

There we go.

All right, guys, thanks for tuning in today to our number one of the around the house show.

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