When you decide to buy your first home or move from your current house to a bigger one, more desirable area or closer to work you have to start doing a property search. This can take a long time to do, but here are some handy tips to getting it done more efficiently.

The first thing you need to do is work out your price range by calculating the size of the deposit available to you and then speaking to a mortgage broker or lender to see what you can borrow based on your deposit and your earnings.

Now you know your budget you can begin looking for properties within that range. You need to decide what type of property you want to live in. Do you want a house, an apartment, a flat, a bungalow? How many bedrooms do you want? Do you require a large kitchen or living room? Are you prepared to do any required renovation or decorating or do you want a property you can move into straight away with no work?

These are all important questions that you need to answer so you can brief an estate agent on exactly what you are looking for. They will then let you know about properties that match your requirements and not waste your time with homes you have no interest in.

Location is your next decision. It used to be that you’d have to drive or walk around certain areas and take note of which properties were up for sale and by whom. With the internet this is no longer necessary, you can simply search for either properties for sale or estate agents within the areas you are interested in moving to.

This is where you can begin narrowing your search, saving a lot of time for yourself. Let’s say you wish to live in Manchester. Searching on the internet for “estate agents Manchester” or “Manchester property for sale” will return a lot of results and it will take a long time to filter through them.

Narrowing your search to certain areas of the city will reduce the number of properties or agents and save you time. So you should search for “estate agents Manchester city centre” or narrow it even further such as “estate agents northern quarter”.

These searches will give you a shortlist of estate agents specialising in the area you desire to live in (or property for sale in those areas if you replace “estate agents” with “property for sale”).

Contact the estate agents with your price range and ask them to send you updates of properties for sale within it and a lot of the leg work is taken away from you. The agents will be motivated to find you the right property a they will take a commission from the seller if they sell the property to you.

It is still important to visit the area and properties you like as you cannot possibly get a real feel for them without doing, but using the internet to cut down on the number of locations is a great way to save time and expense.

By working out what you can afford, setting the requirements for the property you want to live in and narrowing your search for that property in terms of location as much as possible you will find your new home a lot quicker and, in the end, you’ll be a lot happier with your final choice.

Author Bio: Ben Greenwood is writing on behalf of Shepherd Gilmour, Manchester estate agents specialising in Manchester property for sale.

Category: Real Estate
Keywords: property for sale, property to buy, house hunting, estate agents