A real estate agent, or Realtor® can help save you time, effort and money in your search for the right home.  Real estate professionals have access to home buying tools, familiarity with the local real estate market, skills, realtionships and experience that the average home buyer does not have.

    The real estate agent's role is to guide you through the home buying process and help you find the home that best suits your needs and price range. Real estate agents aren't absolutely necessary in every real estate transaction, but they can be very benficial to you in helping you:

• Helping you determine how much home you can afford.
• Helping you get pre-approved for the mortgage you'll need.
• Understanding the myriad paperwork and legal requirements
• helping you find a neighborhood that suits your lifestyle and your fmaily
• Finding the home that most closely meets your needs and desires
• Researching property values in your chosen area so you make the "right offer price"
• Negotiating the final price and getting the proper contract document signed.
• Assisting you in selecting a qualified home inspector, if needed.
• Helping you understand the offers a builder of new homes might offer and advising you on which ones may or may not "add value" to the home shen its time to sell it.
• Coordinating the closing process.
• Providing advice to you after your purchase on all sorts of home-ownership topics.

Before you start looking for a home, then, take the time to find a qualified Realtor® that you feel comfortable dealing with and make use of the skills he or she can use to help you make the right decisions in buying a home.