How much money on-hand will i need to save in order to buy our first home?

going through a loan specialist, have no clues yet as to his fees. he said he specializes in 100% financing even with our poor credit rating. too good to be true? he advised that we pay one debt on our credit report for the 'go-ahead' on our application. we did that. ok, we have until the end of june and have put whats left of our income tax refund in the savings account. we have found that the homes in our area in our budget are about $100-120K....estimated taxes are around $2Kyr, and would want to escrow that with the insurance---about how much is insurance? how do we negotiate other costs and fees, like the inspection and closing? will give more information if you ask.

i just need to know what are the fair fees and costs. don't want to be scammed...can't afford to.

12-14 years ago when I bought my home, my hubby & i were pretty much living payday-to-payday & still qualified easily for a $70,000 mortgage. I think most of the fees & escrow were somehow all clumped together so it wasn't really hard.

We collected about $3,000 in gifts for the down payment (tax write-off for the giver!) and we MAY have had about $1,000 in savings...?

Question a real estate agent or your loan guy.

Good Luck!

...

Just a small tip of advice...100% financing is a big thing right now that ends up putting a lot of people in horrible situations. Your payments may go up after a couple of years to an unbelieveable price that you never saw coming. Enough that you could end up having your house foreclosed...It happends a LOT. You may want to wait a couple of years and save up and work on your credit rating. I would say 10% of the cost of the home is a good downpayment. Plus you have to add in at least 500 for inspections and another 500-1000 on curtains if there aren't any already there..Plus your moving expenses (depends on how far and how much your moving).

I am a broker in California, properties here are a little bit more expensive, so I will give you the idea of what we do here.
You can buy 100%, sometimes you can ask the seller to pay for the closing costs (usually is 2-3%) In this market where every one is desesperate to sell, it's a little easy to get the closing costs paid by the seller.

Usually Closing costs incluide:
1% that your broker is going to charge you (ask him if he is going to charge any rebate - commission that he gets from the lender-. Tell him that you DON"T want him to charge you rebate!!!
Escrow & Title Fees: Insurance and regular fees, it goes according to the value of the property, in your case, I will say $1200 total
Lender fee: the lender who is giving you the loan is going to charge you for the process too. and Also, will charge in advance for days of interest (depending on when (day) are you going to close the transaction) let's say another 1000
Insurance and Taxes: Usually we take 1.25% annual for taxes and 0.35% for Insurance.
Inspections: Appraisal, and at least 2 dif inspections: $800

Never think that you are going to loose the property BUT You have to be honest with the guy who is helping you with the loan. Can you really pay the mortgage payment? for how long? If something happens to you, do you have in the bank enough money to survive, at least for 2 months?. If you don't , don't buy the house