What Steps Must You Take After The Seller Accepts Your Offer?

It might take a seller 24 hours to respond if you've put in an offer on a house, and you might feel nervous as you wait for this response. The seller will eventually respond, though, and you might be excited to learn that they accepted your offer. After this occurs, what do you need to do? A real estate agent will help you know, and here are some of the primary steps you will have to take once the seller accepts your offer.

Submit Your Earnest Money

Most buyers offer deposits with the offers they make. Agents call this earnest money. You do not have to actually produce the money until the seller accepts the offer, though, so you can feel comfortable making such an offer intially. When writing your offer, you can state the amount you want to provide as your earnest money. The amount varies and can be anywhere from $500 to thousands of dollars.

Call Your Lender

The next thing you must do is to call your lender. Your lender is the institution that offered the preapproval for you before you started viewing homes. The lender will need a copy of the purchase offer that you and the seller agreed upon, and they might also need other things. You will need to comply with your lender's requests, as they will begin working on processing your mortgage. Your real estate agent can help you find the answers to any questions that your lender might have during this time.

Get Going on the Inspections

If you asked for any inspections on the property, you will need to start working on these. First, you will need to decide what inspection companies to hire. Next, you must hire them and schedule appointments. You might want to schedule these at times when you can be there. If you cannot be present, ask your agent if they are willing to go instead of you.

Keep Up on the Other Activities

During this time, many steps must occur, including an appraisal. As a buyer, you will need to keep up with these activities. For example, after the appraisal occurs, you might want to review it to see if the house is worth the amount you offered. After the inspector assesses the home, you might want to go back to the negotiation table to deal with any issues they discovered.

There are many steps that must occur after the seller accepts your offer, and your real estate agent can assist with all of these.