MW I'm moving from a big city to a small town. Should I start looking for a home now - or wait?

By Aarthi Swaminathan

"We have good credit, and some savings, but we don't have a job locked in yet in the town."

Dear Big Move,

My wife and I are about to move from a big city to a rural town within the state a year from now. The move is permanent. We're thinking of buying our first house there. We're relocating because we're getting older, and we are sick of too many people and never-ending traffic.

We have good credit, and some savings, but we don't have a job locked in yet. Not really sure what we will do for work, but we are up for anything. We're visiting the town in a few months. When we're there, should we get a loan under our estimated income and use that loan to look for a house so we can get the ball rolling?

We plan to talk to a real-estate agent there in a few months so we can save time.

Bye-bye big city

The Big Move is a MarketWatch column looking at the ins and outs of real estate - from navigating the search for a new home to applying for a mortgage.

Do you have a question about buying or selling a home? Do you want to know where your next move should be? Email Aarthi Swaminathan at TheBigMove@marketwatch.com.

Dear Bye-bye,

Don't put the cart before the house. Get the job, apply for the mortgage and then start the house hunt.

I get the desire to jump-start the home-buying process. You want to make sure your ducks are all lined up so that when you pack up your boxes and move a year from now, you have a permanent dream home ready and waiting for you. According to real-estate platform Zillow (Z), buying a home takes about four to five months - or even longer.

Of course, you deserve credit for planning ahead. Planning ahead allows you to be more deliberate in your search and, more importantly, helps you avoid making costly mistakes - hasty decisions like not shopping around mortgage lenders to get the best rate, or making an inflated offer on the first house you see because it seemed good enough (it's probably not).

You're in a rush to settle things - that's exactly what you want to avoid. Shopping around for a mortgage saves people an average of $80,024 over the life of a 30-year, fixed-rate home loan, according to LendingTree (TREE).

But looking for houses even before you get a job or relocate is a risky move that will be very hard to pull off. You don't even have a job offer, so you don't know what your income will be. You're just playing around with made-up numbers - or worse, misleading numbers - if you are thinking about using your current job and income to qualify.

Here are three main reasons you should wait until you get a job:

-- Lenders require proof of stable income to get you approved for a mortgage.

-- Applying now will cause a hard inquiry into your credit, which could hurt you when you reapply after you get your job.

-- If you apply now with estimated income and you end up earning a lot less, that will really shrink your budget for the house.

Consider a rental apartment

Find a rental, then take it from there. When you visit this town in a few months, find a place to rent for a year or however long the lease is. Learn more about the town, which parts you like and don't like, and whether you want to live there forever.

Talk to locals, and identify the experienced real-estate agents who have worked with first-time home buyers. Some agents have particular experience with Federal Housing Administration loans, which are typically used by first-time buyers

Don't stop there, because there's a lot more to do. When you're talking to agents, figure out how much homes usually go for and whether the market is a buyer's or seller's market; that lets you figure out how much leverage you have when house hunting.

While you're renting, you may also be able to save more money, which can go toward a down payment. Clean up your credit report and even improve your score if possible, so you can get better loan terms when you finally apply.

Pay off your existing debts, if possible, to lower your debt-to-income ratio, which also matters to lenders and affects how much you can borrow. You can pay off high-interest loans like your credit cards. And avoid new, large purchases like a car or furniture that may hurt your credit score.

Remember, it's not a race to buy a house. In fact, renting first is a smart move; sometimes, people move to a smaller town after living in a big city for decades, and then regret it because there isn't that much to do or it isn't as walkable as a big metropolis. I interviewed a couple who were in this situation for this story earlier this year.

You don't want to rush into buying a house - one of the biggest purchases one makes in their life - and then regret it for the rest of your time there.

You have time, so use it wisely.

By emailing your questions, you agree to having them published anonymously on MarketWatch. By submitting your story to Dow Jones & Company, the publisher of MarketWatch, you understand and agree that we may use your story, or versions of it, in all media and platforms, including via third parties.

-Aarthi Swaminathan

This content was created by MarketWatch, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. MarketWatch is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 20, 2025 15:31 ET (19:31 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.