How to buy a house in New Orleans, start to finish.

Closing costs in Louisiana run around five percent of the price, which is higher than most states. On a $500,000 house that is roughly $25,000 sitting on top of your down payment. The minimum gets you to the table. The comfortable number adds a first year of insurance and a repair fund.

On a quiet block you have time. On a good street in Uptown or the Garden District a house can go in a weekend, and a seller reading two offers takes the one with a real approval letter attached. Get it before you fall in love with something.

The portals show you what is listed today. They do not show you the double that comes up when a succession finally closes, or the house a neighbor mentions is being cleaned out. A good share of what sells in these neighborhoods moves through conversation before it ever reaches a website.

You sign the Louisiana Residential Agreement to Buy or Sell, and the clock starts on everything at once. Your deposit, a window of about a week to get the loan moving, an inspection and due diligence period, and a closing date. Miss one of those dates and you can lose your position or your deposit.

A general inspection first, then the specialists: termite, sewer lateral, roof, and an electrician if you see knob and tube or a fuse panel. What it misses is what sits behind plaster and under the house. In a home built in 1890 the inspection starts the conversation, it does not end it.

Four things, mostly. The appraisal comes in under. Insurance comes back at a number nobody planned for. Title turns up an heir who never signed anything. Or the lender wants a repair done before it will fund. None of these are rare here. All of them are survivable if you see them early.

You, the seller, a notary, and two witnesses, all in one room. Bring an unexpired photo ID, your name exactly as it will read on the title, your marital status with the date, and certified funds. It usually takes about an hour.

Louisiana runs on a civil code descended from French and Spanish law rather than English common law like the other forty-nine states. For you that means different vocabulary, different documents, and a closing that is a formal legal act rather than a signing appointment. National checklists will not line up.

A Louisiana notary is not a stamp. The notary drafts the act of sale, is responsible for its legal form, and passes it with two witnesses in the room. That is the job an attorney or an escrow officer does elsewhere. Who your notary is matters, and you have a say in it.

Succession is what Louisiana calls probate. Usufruct is the right to use and enjoy a property somebody else owns, often a surviving spouse living in a house the children inherited. Both turn up constantly on older homes, and both can mean the person selling cannot sell all of it yet.

Start flood and wind quotes the day you go under contract, not the week before closing. FEMA no longer requires an elevation certificate under its current rating, but getting one can lower your premium and it cannot raise it. Late insurance is the most common expensive mistake here.