Hi All! Quick question for the minds of this board.

How does one go about buying a house without first selling the one you live in? I'm currently in a 2100 sf house in Houston. Bought it for around 180k 7 years ago, current value approx 300k. Still owe about 140k on the house. Would be looking to buy around 300-350k.

The house and the layout are very nice, but the yard is quite small. I'm not actively looking to move, but every once in a while I see a house that I think would make me move. One just popped up down the street from me, and I like it a lot.

The realtor keeps saying I need to sell first, move to a rental, and then find my dream house. I have no interest in doing this, and I know there must be ways of buying and selling at the same time. I'd even be willing to sell for a bit less than market value to make it move more quickly, but don't really want to go through moving twice.

I could most likely float the payments on two houses for a few months if necessary, but wouldn't have the cash for the downpayment on the new house without getting the equity from the first house. What the best way to go about this? I've heard of HELOC and Bridge loans but not really sure about the process.

Thanks for any advice!

wouldn't the "savvy" realtor move be to encourage exactly what you're suggesting so they can get both sales quickly?

We moved into a new house last October, and then we closed on selling our old house in December. It was a little stressful but simple.

Also, OP should look at a HELOC or doing a cashout refi depending on how soon he'd potentially want to buy a new house.

How are you in a position of strength if your current home is under contract? Seems like you would get to a point where you have no more time to negotiate.

Your best position is to have the new home DP in cash ready to go so you are not dependent on the equity in your existing home. Make them two completely separate transactions. Assuming you can qualify for the additional loan too.

Worst case you double up your mortgage payments a few months.

But isn't there a "bridge" loan product for this scenario?

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I'd even be willing to sell for a bit less than market value to make it move more quickly, but don't really want to go through moving twice.

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Is there a catch here that I am missing? This is too easy to have a debate.


1 - Buy home - sell home quickly - move equity to eliminate PMI as soon as possible. Surely a lender could help you with this...unless you are broke.

2 - List home at a quick sale price. Go after home with a contingency.


Tell the realtor absolutely not to selling/renting/buying. That does not benefit him/her enough for foul play to even be an option. This person is probably so financially broke that they cant see the forest through the trees and you should not listen to any advice.

The first thing you need to do is pre-qualify to determine if your debt to income ratio with both mortgages and a HELOC allow this as an option. If that is not possible for you then you it's pretty simple. You have to sell first.

To me the rest doesn't matter until you make that determination.

Qualifying with both loans on your ledger is the cheapest option. If you cannot do that, then a making a contingent offer can be an option but tough to get done in a sellers market and on well priced homes. But, you can always try.

But, if the above options do not work and if you have solid credit and solid assets a bridge loan can be an option. More or less, if your debt to income ratio is too high to qualify for both houses but will be just fine had you sold your house first in can work. And be much cheaper then selling your house for 5% under market value just to make sure it sells fast. Much cheaper then something like OpenDoor who will buy the house under market value and charge high fees. and likely cheaper and a hell of a more convenient then moving twice. It is NOT as cheap as just selling in the typical order but cheaper then the other alternatives.

Several options.

1. Sell and then buy. While simultaneous closings are doable they are extremely high stress transactions. I am seeing much more "lease backs". You sell and get funds but agree with the buyer to lease and stay in home for a short period of time, say 10-14 days to ease the stress. You still have to buy on contingency but if you had at least on the market and preferably contract you can be successful.

2. Buy first and qualify to make two payments if necessary. Make a low payment but know in a few months you can significantly pay down the note. Most lenders will let you recast you payment to reflect the new balance.

3. Get a HELOC/Bridge loan on the old house and make the down payment you want. As said you would need to qualify with old payment +HELOC payment + new home payment

We did it in 2013. Not sure if any rules/regulations have changed since then.

We bought the new house and used a 401k loan for the down payment. Moved out of the old house completely, repainted it, and listed it. Sold it a few months later. Used the proceeds to pay off the 401k loan.

However, for those few months we were paying 2 mortgages and making minimum payments on the 401k loan. Kinda scary but it worked out fine. Of course you have to qualify for both mortgages.

I would not rent.

I just helped a user on this board buy a new house (got a 2% commission rebate at closing), then sell his existing house (for a $1,200 flat fee to me), in that order. Lots of options available with various lenders. I don't want to overstep my bounds if you've already got set up with a Realtor, but I'm happy to discuss with you if you'd like.

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Get a HELOC/Bridge loan on the old house and make the down payment you want. As said you would need to qualify with old payment +HELOC payment + new home payment

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To be clear, the reason for the bridge is often because you do NOT qualify with both payments. We do bridge loans with higher debt to income ratios then are allowed by Fannie/Freddie all the time.

As Jamie (Red Pear Realty) mentioned, he just helped us through this same process (buy first/sell after). We had initially planned on selling first and then buying, but the perfect house popped up and we didn't want to let it slip away. We reached out to Jaime and he got us in touch with a great lender that had the option of doing a recast with the equity that we would have after the sale of our house. It actually worked out great for us, because our home sold so quickly that we would have had to move into a rental if we had try to sell first.

Happy to share more about our experience. For anyone looking for a realtor check out Red Pear Realty. Jamie was great for us and saved us a good chunk of change!

I am going the contingent offer route right now. The benefit I have is that the house I'm under contract to buy is a new build (no one living in it). Contingency is that I must close by 4/15. Fingers crossed for a quick sale of my current home. Just went on the market on Tuesday.

This is the house for sale in Schertz if anyone is interested. ;-)

Schertz, TX

Sell your house with a lease back clause. My parents sold their house (this was like 2003) and continued to live in (while paying rent to future owners) for like 2 months.