r/FirstTimeHomeBuyer: rules, karma requirements and posting culture

Who posts here

The whole premise is that the poster has never done this before. People ask whether an inspection quote is fair, how to compare two loan estimates, or admit they are terrified to buy alone, and they get patient answers. Replies do use terms like PITI, escrow, comps and clear to close, usually with enough context to follow. A basic question is answered, not sent away.

• Renters in their twenties and thirties working out whether they can afford to buy and where.
• Buyers mid-process, stuck on an offer, an inspection finding, underwriting or a closing delay.
• New owners posting their closing-day photo, including many from outside the US.
• Recent owners with a first repair or a what is this photo.
• Homeowners with a few purchases behind them who answer in the comments, often bluntly.

Karma and account requirements

What it takes to get a post through in r/FirstTimeHomeBuyer.

What you can post

What happens to a new post

Where the most recent posts ended up. Sample size: 400.

• Stayed up93%
• Removed by Reddit's filters4%
• Removed by moderators3%
• Deleted by the author<1%

Reddit counts a removal by the subreddit's own AutoModerator rules as a moderator removal, so that share is not all human. Held by AutoModerator means the post is waiting in the mod queue.

What happened when we posted here

We have posted here ourselves. This is how our own posts and comments fared.

Stayed up

99%

Removed by Reddit's filters

2%

Removed by moderators

0%

Period

November 2025 to August 2026

The rules, in the mods' words

1. 1

   Be nice

   Be nice to your fellow redditors! being rude, racist, homophobic, etc. Violating this rule might result in a ban

2. 2

   No selling

   Do not try to sell your house, your services, or anything else here

3. 3

   No industry professionals

   The subreddit is for prospective home buyers and home owners to post and comment. Industry professionals (i.e. realtors, loan officers, insurance agents, etc.) cannot post without prior approval from moderator.

4. 4

   No self-promotion

   Do not try to promote your business, game, YouTube channel or anything else on this subreddit

5. 5

   No troll posts

   Troll posts will get you instantly banned permanently

6. 6

   No memes

   Memes are not allowed on this subreddit

These are the rules as archived in January 2025. Rules change. Check the sidebar before you post.

The culture

r/FirstTimeHomeBuyer has two halves. One is a help desk: about half of posts are flaired Need Advice, with more under Finances, Inspection, Offer and Underwriting. The other is a celebration wall. Got the Keys posts are roughly 30% of the feed and nearly all of the top of it, with the biggest recent ones passing 10,000 and 20,000 points. Posts are about 60% text and 40% images, and the typical post is short, around 75 words.

The comment sections are unusually busy, with a median of about 28 comments per post. Advice threads turn into arguments about renting versus buying, whether a listing price is delusional, and whether to trust anyone your agent recommends. Distrust of agents, lenders and builders is a standing theme, which fits a subreddit that bars those professionals from posting.

The celebration posts have their own conventions. The title gives the place, price and rate, the photo is often a pizza box on the floor of an empty room, and a line or two of backstory does the rest. Posts from Romania, the UK, Ukraine, Canada and elsewhere do as well as American ones. Stories of buying alone, after hardship, or with cash saved over many years travel furthest. The comments on big ones are not all kind: people argue about price, location and whether a condo counts, and several posters mention trimming details after being warned about doxxing.

What lands

• A closing-day post in the standard title format with a photo and a few honest lines about how you got there.
• A dilemma with a clear yes or no and a photo, such as discovering a utility box on the lot of a new build after signing.
• A specific process question with the numbers included: price, down payment, credit score, the two offers you are comparing.
• A strange find in a house you just closed on, with a photo, asking what caused it.
• A plain-spoken warning from your own purchase, like what you wish you had checked before waiving an inspection.

What gets removed or ignored

• Posts by realtors, loan officers, insurance agents and other industry professionals without prior approval.
• Anything selling a house, a service or a product, and promotion of a business, channel or app.
• Generic tips and lessons posts, such as a maintenance tip pointing to a calendar tool or an open prompt asking what nobody warned you about. Several of the moderator removals in our sample were this kind.
• Posts that draw a pile of reports. AutoModerator removes them automatically and tells you to send modmail if it was a mistake.
• Memes and troll posts. The rules say trolling is an instant permanent ban.

The unwritten rules

• Leave out anything that could identify the address. Popular posts attract people trying to find the house, and posters have deleted and reposted because of it.
• Give location, price, rate and down payment up front in an advice post. The first replies will ask for them otherwise.
• Expect opinions on your choices. New builds, high rates, condos and big prices all draw commentary, even on a celebration post.
• Comments are short, about 20 words, and under 2% carry a link. Advice that sounds like a professional pitching gets reported, and enough reports remove a post without a moderator.
• Some Got the Keys posts in the usual format were still removed by moderators in our sample. The evidence does not show why, so follow the format closely.

Self-promotion

Three rules cover it: no selling, no self-promotion, and no industry professionals without prior approval. AutoModerator repeats them on every new post. In practice this is one of the stricter rooms for anyone in real estate, lending or insurance, because the restriction is on who you are, not just on what you link. The subreddit's skepticism toward agents and lenders does the rest of the enforcing. If you work in the industry, ask the moderators first. If you do not, share your own experience and leave products out of it.

How people write here

Typical post length

76 words

Typical title length

8 words

Titles phrased as a question

38%

Typical comment length

20 words

Comments that include a link

2%

Posts that carry a flair

100%

Top keywords

The words and phrases that show up far more often here than in other communities, from recent posts in r/FirstTimeHomeBuyer.

• house 139 posts
• home 149 posts
• closing 77 posts
• lender 38 posts
• inspection 48 posts
• mortgage 49 posts
• loan 51 posts
• realtor 32 posts
• buying 65 posts
• keys 44 posts
• seller 32 posts
• property 36 posts
• buy 58 posts
• closing costs 16 posts
• area 43 posts
• rate 46 posts
• bed bath 13 posts
• rates 35 posts
• payment 41 posts
• buyer 29 posts
• interest 33 posts
• offer 42 posts
• contract 29 posts
• purchase 32 posts
• bath 17 posts
• houses 18 posts
• bought 38 posts
• interest rate 15 posts
• price 40 posts
• rent 27 posts
• lenders 14 posts
• hoa 15 posts
• va loan 8 posts
• repairs 19 posts
• inspections 13 posts
• downpayment 9 posts
• buyers 21 posts
• inspector 14 posts
• interest rates 13 posts
• homes 16 posts

Common questions