You don't need to be ready today. You need to know what ready looks like.

There's no single cutoff, but here's the practical landscape. FHA financing is the most forgiving of thin or bruised credit. Conventional loans reward higher scores with better pricing. The state's ONE Mortgage program generally looks for a minimum score around 640, with a higher bar for two- and three-family properties, and MassHousing programs sit in similar territory.

More important than the number: your score moves. Paying down revolving balances below about 30% of each card's limit, disputing errors, and simply not opening anything new can move a file meaningfully in a few months. Pull your reports free from all three bureaus before a lender does.

Plan for three buckets:

• Down payment. 3% to 5% is common for first-time buyers with conventional financing; FHA sets its floor at 3.5%. Twenty percent is not required and, in this market, rarely how first homes get bought.
• Closing costs. Budget roughly 2% to 4% of the price for lender fees, the appraisal, attorney fees, title insurance, recording fees, and prepaid taxes and insurance placed in escrow. Massachusetts buyers catch one break here: the state's deed excise tax, $4.56 per $1,000 of price, is customarily paid by the seller.
• Reserves. A few months of payments left over after closing. Lenders like to see it, and so will you the first time a water heater fails.

Gift funds from family are allowed on most loan programs, but they need a paper trail and a signed gift letter. Don't let a relative hand you cash a week before closing without telling your lender first.

MassHousing down payment assistance. Up to $30,000 in down payment help, available in every city and town in Massachusetts, but only in combination with a MassHousing mortgage. It's structured as a second mortgage, and an approved lender determines which product and amount you qualify for. The state has periodically run expanded, limited-window versions at 0% interest, so timing can matter.

ONE Mortgage, from the Massachusetts Housing Partnership. A 30-year fixed loan offered through more than 40 participating lenders with as little as 3% down and — the headline feature — no private mortgage insurance, which can save hundreds of dollars a month compared with a conventional low-down-payment loan. Income limits apply and lower-income borrowers may receive an additional subsidy.

Operation Welcome Home for veterans, active-duty service members and Gold Star families, plus city and regional programs that come and go with funding cycles.

Most of these require an approved homebuyer education course — typically an 8-hour class, available online. Take it early; it's often the thing that delays a file. Program terms and dollar amounts change during the year, so verify current details with a participating lender or at masshousing.com rather than relying on any article, including this one.

The honest answer is that it depends on how long you'll stay. Buying carries real transaction costs on both ends, so a purchase you exit in two years often loses to renting. Past roughly five years, the math usually flips: your principal payment becomes forced savings, your housing cost stops rising with the rental market, and you capture whatever appreciation the market delivers.

The other half nobody mentions — as an owner you also absorb the roof, the heating system and the tax bill. Compare a total monthly payment including taxes, insurance and maintenance against your rent, not just principal and interest.

A pre-qualification is an opinion based on what you told a lender. A pre-approval means a lender has actually collected and reviewed pay stubs, W-2s, tax returns, bank statements and your credit report, and has issued a letter committing to a loan amount subject to the property and final underwriting.

In a competitive situation, a listing agent reads those letters carefully. A strong pre-approval from a lender they've heard of is worth real money in negotiation. A screenshot from an app is not.

All three can work. What matters more than the category is whether the loan officer answers their phone on a Saturday, whether they've closed deals with the state programs you're using, and whether they'll speak directly with a listing agent to vouch for your file. Get quotes from at least two — Freddie Mac's own advice to buyers is that shopping multiple lenders can save thousands over a loan's life.

Compare the total picture: rate, points, lender fees, and how mortgage insurance is structured. The lowest rate on the flyer is sometimes the most expensive loan on the closing statement.

Yes. Since August 2024, a buyer working with an agent who participates in an MLS must sign a written buyer agreement before touring homes. The agreement spells out what the agent will do for you and how they're paid.

Read it and ask questions about the term length and the compensation section. A reasonable agent will explain both plainly and will happily start with a short initial term so you can see how you work together. Massachusetts also requires an agency disclosure at your first personal meeting about a specific property — that one is a disclosure, not a contract.

Massachusetts uses a two-contract sequence that surprises buyers from other states:

• The Offer to Purchase. Binding when accepted, usually accompanied by a modest deposit — $1,000 is a common convention. It sets price, dates, and any contingencies for inspection and financing.
• The inspection period. Typically a short window, often around a week, to inspect and either proceed, renegotiate, or withdraw under the terms you negotiated.
• The Purchase and Sale agreement. Signed roughly two weeks after offer acceptance, prepared and reviewed by attorneys, and accompanied by a larger deposit — 5% of the price total is the customary local expectation, though it's negotiable.
• Mortgage commitment, appraisal, title exam, walkthrough, closing. Usually 30 to 60 days from accepted offer to keys.

Budget in the neighborhood of $600 to $1,000 for a general home inspection on a typical North Shore single family, more for a large or complicated property, and plan on add-ons where they apply: radon testing, a sewer scope on older properties, water testing on a private well, and lead paint considerations on the enormous stock of pre-1978 housing here.

Every house will produce a list. The skill is separating structure, water, heat and safety — the things that cost thousands — from the cosmetic and the merely old. A good inspector explains the difference out loud while you walk.

Massachusetts closings involve attorneys. The closing attorney is generally selected by and represents the lender, handling the title exam, the title insurance policy and the settlement. That attorney is not your attorney.

For a first purchase, hiring your own attorney to review and negotiate the Purchase and Sale agreement is money well spent. The standard form is drafted from the seller's perspective; the rider is where your protections live. Also consider an owner's title insurance policy — it's optional, purchased once at closing, and it protects your equity rather than the bank's.

• File for the residential exemption or any abatement your city offers, where applicable, and confirm your tax bill is coming to you rather than a prior escrow.
• Verify your homeowners policy took effect at closing and that any escrow account is funded correctly.
• Change the locks, test every smoke and carbon monoxide detector, and find your water shutoff before you need it.
• Keep every closing document. Your HUD/closing disclosure matters at tax time and again whenever you sell.
• Start a repair fund. A reasonable rule of thumb is 1% of the home's value per year set aside for maintenance.

Far less than most renters assume. Conventional first-time buyer programs start around 3% down and FHA sets its floor at 3.5%, so a $450,000 condo in Salem can require somewhere in the range of $13,500 to $15,750 down rather than $90,000. Add 2% to 4% for closing costs, and remember that MassHousing down payment assistance of up to $30,000 exists statewide when paired with a MassHousing mortgage.

For most state and federal programs, it means you haven't owned a home in the past three years. That surprises a lot of people who owned previously and assume they're disqualified. Rules vary slightly by program, so ask a participating lender about your specific situation.

Compensation is negotiable and is now spelled out in writing between you and your agent before you tour homes. In many transactions the seller still offers compensation that covers the buyer's agent, but it is no longer automatic and it can be part of what gets negotiated in your offer. Any agent you work with should show you exactly how they're paid in your deal, in plain language, before you're committed to anything.

Condos generally get you into desirable North Shore locations at a lower price and hand off exterior maintenance, at the cost of a monthly fee and association rules. Single families cost more up front and you own every problem, but you control the property and the land. One caution: a lender will review a condo association's finances, owner-occupancy ratio and reserves, and a weak association can kill financing on an otherwise perfect unit.

It can be, and rental income may help you qualify. Be clear-eyed that becoming a landlord is a job — vacancies, repairs, and Massachusetts tenant law all come with it. Down payment requirements and credit minimums are often higher on multifamily properties too. Worth exploring with a lender before you fall in love with the idea.

From first conversation to keys, a prepared buyer commonly runs three to six months: a few weeks to get fully pre-approved, a few weeks to a few months of active searching, then 30 to 60 days from accepted offer to closing. Buyers starting from scratch on savings and credit should plan in years, not months — which is exactly why the stages above exist.

Then start now anyway. The buyers who get the best outcomes are the ones who spent two quiet years fixing credit, building savings and watching their target neighborhoods until they knew a good price when they saw one. Set up a search, learn the towns, and check in when something changes. There's no cost and no obligation to any of it.