Can I actually buy a house right now?

This is the most common story I hear. You called a lender, or a friend of a friend ran your numbers, or you looked at the score in your banking app and decided the answer was obvious. Then you stopped looking, and months went by.

I want to be honest with you. Sometimes the answer really is not yet. But not yet has a date attached to it, and my job is to show you that date and the exact steps between here and there. What I will not do is let you sit for two years on information that was wrong the day you got it.

Almost every no I unwind comes from one of these. None of them are character flaws. They are just things nobody explains until it is too late.

This is the part that changed. If you were told no on last year's prices, run the math again.

In Orlando, the median sale price for townhomes and condos was $226,250 in August 2026, down 9.5 percent year over year, with 8.3 months of supply. That is a real entry point inside the city that most first-time buyers never look at. In Kissimmee, townhomes and condos had a median of $288,500, down 6.9 percent, with 13.1 months of supply, which is deep enough inventory to give you actual negotiating room.

In Clermont, single-family homes had a median of $442,490, down 11.1 percent year over year, and townhomes and condos came in at $353,000, down 7.1 percent. Up in Windermere, sellers accepted 95.1 percent of list price on average, the lowest share of any market on this site. Across this corridor the market moved, and it moved in your favor.

Here is the real order. Most people try to start at step five, which is why it feels overwhelming.

These are standard program parameters, and they are more forgiving than most people expect. Conventional loans generally start around a 620 credit score. FHA allows 3.5 percent down for buyers at 580 and above. VA and USDA both allow zero down for buyers who qualify, and USDA matters here because parts of Lake County and Polk County are eligible.

One important caveat. Individual lenders add their own overlays on top of the program minimum, so a program floor is not the same thing as an approval. This is exactly why I want you talking to a lender who explains their overlays out loud instead of just quoting you a rate.

First-time buyer assistance programs do exist in these counties. Amounts and eligibility change, sometimes mid-year, so I will not quote you a figure that might be wrong by the time you read this. I will walk you through what you currently qualify for.

You need a down payment, closing costs, an inspection, an appraisal and the first year of homeowners insurance and taxes, which are usually collected into escrow. What none of those numbers are is fixed, because they move with the price, the program, the county and whether the seller or builder is contributing.

I am not going to print a fake closing cost estimate here. Instead, use the free tools on this site with your own numbers. The buying power calculator shows what price range your income and debts support. The mortgage calculator shows the monthly payment on a specific price. The credit tracker shows you where your score stands and what is holding it down. They are the same tools I use with clients.