There's a particular kind of phone call I hate making. It's the one where I have to tell a buyer that the home they've already mentally moved into isn't going to work out. I've made that call for a low appraisal, for an inspection that turned up more than anyone …

Every week someone asks me some version of the same question: is this a good time to buy, or should I wait? Usually they've read a national headline about the housing market and they're trying to figure out whether it applies here in the Valley. Often it doesn't.

So …

Most first-time buyers I meet think there are two kinds of home loans: the one you get if you have great credit, and the one you get if you don't. That's not how it works. There are a lot of loan programs out there, and the right one for you …

Your offer got accepted. Congratulations, that's a real milestone. Now comes the part nobody warns you about: the stretch between "we got it" and "here are your keys." In Texas that window usually runs 30 to 45 days, and what you do in the first week of it matters more …

If you've spent any time looking at homes online, you've hit the wall. You find a house you like, you go to see all the photos or the full details, and the site stops you and asks you to create an account. It's a little annoying. A lot of …

Buying a luxury home is not just a bigger version of buying a regular house. The financing works differently, the inventory hides in places the public sites never show you, and the negotiation math at this level rewards patience in a way most buyers don't expect. I pulled the last …

Almost every first-time buyer I meet in the Rio Grande Valley asks me the same thing before anything else: what credit score do you need to buy a house in Texas? It makes sense. People think there's one magic number, and if they're under it, the door is closed. That's …

A buyer I worked with last month offered $18,000 under list price on a home in Mission, TX. The seller's agent laughed. Three weeks later that seller called us back, accepted the offer, and threw in $5,000 toward closing costs.

That is not a fluke. That is the …

Yesterday I was at a final walk through on a home in Mission, TX. Closing was the next morning. The buyers thought everything was good to go. We walked into the primary bathroom and there was no mirror on the wall. Just bare drywall where it used to hang.

I hear it almost every week. Someone is ready to buy a home in McAllen, Mission, or Edinburg — they know the neighborhood they want, they've done the math on a monthly payment — and then they stop themselves. "I don't have 20% saved yet." So they wait. …