For some local small town Maine home buyers the situation goes like this.
If the credit score is healthy enough, the debt ratios of spending 
compared to the cash flowing in each month A OK, they qualify for a home loan.On paper.
Say a Maine State Housing RD home loan for first time house buyers.
And in Northern Maine where home prices are lower, the wages are too.
So the $40,000 price range the Maine bank loan officer points to and says go forth young home buyer.
Seek out a home in Maine for $40K or under. It’s all smiles. For awhile.
The Maine home we find the buyer on radar that catches their fancy, causes the lubdub is a bank repo. Parked in that magic price range limbo mortgage pole space they have to stay under. To make the math add up right. To meet Maine home mortgage loan requirements.
The catch for the twenty two skidoo is repairs. This new Maine home buyer has little cash reserve, lots of ambition. And hopes the loose ends on the house of their dreams can be slowly brought up to speed. Put into shape over time.
Banks that package and sell your Maine home mortgage on the secondary market don’t work that way.
Shake their head sideways and mutter “oh, that, that and my my that too is not good”. When line by line scanning the turn your head and couch. 
The house appraisal report on Maine home deficiencies.
The Maine home is in that sweet spot of the market for a reason.
The roof needs replacement, the baseboard, hot water furnace froze up too.
Not something replaced with a couple twenty dollar bills.
Not a Saturday afternoon of watching a couple you tube videos on how to fix a dead furnace the easy, no cost way with duct tape.
Often the lower price bracket the Maine home buyer qualifies for is thought to be defining the value of the home. Any home.
But the foreclosure Maine home is a deal only if you have some money. Expertise with tools or both to bring it up to secondary mortgage market standards. So a clear to close instruction can be heard to do the transfer of property.
The cash buyer from out of state who does not need a bank, thinking the Maine house is priced so so low compared to what they are used to is hop up and down excited too.
And does not need to make a Maine bank happy before closing to have a real estate closing on a home. They can take their time in getting the Maine home ship shape. No one looking over their shoulder, no mortgage tacked on to the place at the registry of deeds for all to see.
The Maine home loan buyer can look to the seller to say help.
Will you subsidize my home purchase with rebates, concessions added to 
lines normally blank on the HUD-1 settlement statement?
For the big stuff like a Maine home furnace, roof, foundation problems.
And the little stuff like repair of a broken garage window, replacement of rotted front steps.
The GFI electrical outlets in the kitchen and bath they the Maine home buyer will tackle like a might slingshot David.
Not looking or expecting the David size bank to foot the bill. That got the Maine home back in their lap due to a divorce or job layoff or just the original buyer forgot to make house payments. A lot. Too much.
Peeling paint the buyer can get approval to tackle with that wire scraper, the primer, the new layer of matching protective liquid.
That is boring to watch dry but is what is needed to make the low priced Maine home loan fly. Coupled with the just starting out small salary house buyer to pull off a sale. To climb out of the rent rut. To finally leave the family nest they grew up in. To get their own TV channel changer for a home sweet home.
Read the article on “How’s The Real Estate Market, What’s My Maine Home Worth?”
I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker
207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com | MOOERS REALTY 69 North St Houlton ME 04730
