All right, so this video is all about the biggest mistakes to avoid when purchasing a home in the city of Winchester, California. We're gonna go over my top five biggest mistakes. Let's go ahead and get into it.

Hey, guys. Hey, again, my name is Justin Short. I am a realtor and team leader with the Short Real Estate Team here at Keller Williams in Temecula, and this video is all about the top five biggest mistakes to avoid when purchasing a home in the city of Winchester. I've lived here in the area for a really long time, so over 25 years now, and I've sold real estate here locally for 12, almost 13 years. So I think, I think I can give you a really good perspective on, you know, one, what it's like to actually live here, and two, you know, some of the things that I see with my clients and, you know, that's, that's kind of what's bringing up some of these mistakes that you wanna make sure that you avoid if you are gonna be purchasing a home in Winchester.

But before I get to all the information, if you are liking real estate videos like this, please do me a favor. Please hit like, and please s- subscribe to the channel. Obviously, it helps me, and it helps my channels. We try to continue to grow it, and then we have new videos that we put out each and every week, and they're all just local-based information just like this. We talk about the cities of Temecula, Murrieta, Menifee, obviously Winchester, Wildomar, just kind of the local surrounding real estate market here. We have, you know, best neighborhoods and worst neighborhoods, um, you know, market updates that we put out each and every month, but all just kinda local-based info. So if you want more, that's the best way to stay on top of that.

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So cool. All right, let's go ahead and get into it. Again, we're gonna talk about the top five biggest mistakes to avoid when purchasing a home in the city of Winchester, and I'll start with number one. Uh, this is one that comes up a lot, especially for people that are relocating here or they, they don't already live locally, right? They're mo- moving here, whether it's from other parts of California, other parts of Southern California, or other states. Um, a lot of areas do not have this, but when you purchase a home in Winchester, you wanna make sure that you pay attention to the total amount of property taxes that, uh, you will be paying when you purchase the property.

So what, what that means is across the board, the base... more or less, I mean, I'm kind of making some s- assumptions, and there, there's some small, very minute differences, but more or less for throughout the county that we're in, we're in Riverside County, the entire county pays about the same base tax rate, and that's right about 1.1%, okay? So whether it's, you know, from Winchester to Temecula to the city of Riverside, whatever it is, it's all gonna be right about 1.1% regardless of neighborhood. Um, more or less about the same.

It's... However, what is unique to this area is in addition to that base tax rate, different areas, different neighborhoods, different lots can have extra special assessment taxes that you will pay each and every year that are part of your property taxes. Uh, so what those special assessments are, those are u- usually bonds that the builders, you know, these builders come in, they build a thousand-home community, right? They're building not just houses, they're building, um, you know, streets, they're building parks, they're putting in sewers, gutters, utilities, uh, sometimes schools, all those different types of things, and there's costs to do that.

So a lot of times what they've started to do over the last 20 years plus now is take some of that cost for that infrastructure and pass that cost on to the homeowners in the form of these special assessments. Um, it's very common for homes in this area to have special assessments, but you have... b- but you may have very low, very little special assessment, extra fees and taxes, or you might have very high.

Um, you can look at two homes, this happens a lot in Winchester, where you look at two homes on one side of the street compared to the other. Uh, one home might have very, very low taxes. You might have an extra, you know, $100 a year in special assessments, like 10 bucks a month. It's very, very minimal. Um, and the other side right across the street might have $4,000 a year in extra taxes. So that's an extra $350 a month, and that, that's a big deal. So you wanna make sure you're paying attention to those.

When you look at new construction, they don't always pitch it kinda how I'm pitching it. They'll, they'll tell you the tax rate is this, um, and they kinda leave ... Sometimes they can leave out what these special assessments are. Um, these are just, these are important things to know, uh, that are not very common in most other parts of the country. So if you are looking at homes, you wanna make sure you're paying attention to what those property taxes are, and the question that you wanna ask is, what is the total property tax for this property, including all special assessments? Uh, so that's how you make sure that you get the correct information. So something that you definitely wanna pay attention to.

Um, number two on my list of mistakes to avoid, it'd be a mistake if you did not pay attention to what school district the properties that you're looking at is, uh, zoned for. So in Winchester, this is not very common in, in our area, but in the city of Winchester, it's a very large city, and in, in that very large city, uh, there are three different public school districts that you might be assigned to. It's all geographically based, right? So you have more or less there's... You have a northern part of Winchester, you have a southern part of Winchester, and in that, all that entire northern portion is gonna be zoned for the Perris Valley Unified School District. The, more or less, that entire southern section of Winchester is gonna be zoned for either the Temecula Valley Unified School District or the Murrieta Valley Unified School District.

So if you don't have kids, you might not, not necessarily care about this. However, if you do have kids, uh, this is... I think this is an important thing to know because the schools in Temecula and Murrieta Valley School District, they tend to be rated higher. Um, you know, you can do your own research online, kind of see what's out there. But, uh, Temecula Valley Unified School District and Murrieta Valley Unified School District tend to have higher ratings overall than the Perris Valley Unified School District.

Not only that, it, it, this... You may not actually, you know, have kids or you don't care about school districts, whatever. However, when you're buying a piece of real estate, you're buying a house, you know, you are... I'm sure most people are buying that with the intention that over time, that home's gonna go up in value. Well, homes that are zoned for a top school district are more likely to go up in value.

So I think it's, it's a pretty good bet to make that homes that are zoned for that Temecula Valley or Unif- or Murrieta Valley Unified School District are more likely to appreciate over time because s- two school districts are rated higher. They're gonna see more people that are drawn to those school districts. You know, it's just, it's a big- bigger buyer pool. Some people are very picky on the school districts. Um, so even if you don't necessarily care about it, it is something to think about. Think about what that's gonna do to resell in the future and long-term appreciation. So definitely something to pay attention to.

All right, so number three on my list of mistakes of when buying a home in the city of Winchester, it's gonna be solar mistakes. So if you're not, if you guys are not super knowledgeable a- about this, when you purchase a home in Winchester, a very, very high percentage of those homes have solar panels that are already, uh, on the property, or a lot of people just like the idea of adding solar panels to your property, you know, o- once you purchase it.

Solar can be a really good thing. I actually have solar panels on my house. We have... Actually, I actually added a few panels a couple years ago, so we have a pretty good sized system. I think solar can be a really good thing, and it can, it can add value to your property. Um, you know, when, uh, if you get the right type of system, and there, there can be real, real benefits to it, right?

However, um, what, what the conversat- conversation that I have with a lot of my clients is, you know, they usually, they like the idea of solar. But I think that's pretty more or less people kind of accept that and kind of like the idea of buying a hous- house with solar panels. Like I said, it can be a good thing. However, when you're looking at homes, just because a home has solar panels on it does not mean that it's, it's a benefit, does not mean that h- at that home is wor- worth more than a home down the street, et cetera.

So, um, if a home has solar, you really gotta get into the nitty-gritty and really pay attention, ask some questions about, you know, what that means and really decide for yourself, is it a true benefit? Is it, like, kind of a net neutral? Is it nothing? Is it, you know, not good or bad necessarily, or is it a negative for me and my, my family?

So, okay, give you a little bit of... I'll give you some, give you some long-winded information here...