Free Toilets

Building on last months energy efficiency tip, I wanted to bring up a water conservation tip. The City of Austin has a Toilet Rebate Program to promote High Efficiency Toilets (HETs). I actually just used this program myself for a house that we were renovating. The process was really easy and I replaced two original high usage toilets with two new ones.

Basically you just fill out a form that the City has online. Mail that in and they send you a voucher for the toilets. You take that up to Fergusons and they give you the new toilets and all the parts. The best thing is that they will also rebate the cost of having a plumber install them up to $60 per toilet.

So you really can get the whole job done for free! I'm happy to give a plumber recommendation if you need one.

Here is the link to the City's Site http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/watercon/sftoilet.htm.

can sellers pay for your closing costs?

On conventional loans you'll need to have a 5% down payment to be approved. But you'll also have closing costs associated with the loan that you'll need to pay for at closing.

If you're looking to put out as little cash as possible a great way to accomplish this is to have the seller pay for your closing costs. Conventional loans allow the seller to pay up to 3% of the sales price towards your closing costs. You shouldn't need this much on homes over $200,000, but for homes in the $150,000 range you may need the 3% to cover all of the costs.

It's very straightforward to do and you'll write it into the offer when you put a contract on a home. I'd suggest using a fixed dollar amount on the contract as using a percentage will change if you are negotiating on the sales price. That way both sides know the exact number and can more cleanly negotiate.