As a first time home buyer, you’ll undoubtedly want to lap up as much information as possible to prepare yourself for what lies ahead.

Sure, the process of buying a home can be exciting – but it can often be just as terrifying. One of the first things that you might want to do will be to get in touch with a mortgage broker. These financial experts aren’t just friendly – they can often help you to minimise the stress that you feel during a home purchase (especially when borrowing money from a bank).

With a mortgage broker on hand to help with your home loan application, you’ll appreciate the option to:

1. Receive information about the application process, as well as how interest rates work and how to find the right type of mortgage for your needs

2. Take advantage of grants and incentives; many of which are exclusively available to first time home buyers

3. Enjoy the support from an industry insider – and one that will likely have a firm understanding of what banks are looking for in their customers

4. Receive pre-approval on a home loan, allowing you to get the go ahead from your bank, find the home of your dreams and then proceed with your mortgage application

It’s not just home loan brokers that can bring a huge amount of benefits to the table either; in fact there are plenty of online resources that can also help you to save yourself money, or to know where you stand as far as your finances are concerned.

And what are they, you ask?

Well, a mortgage calculator can be one of the most beneficial online tools to use, especially if you’d like to estimate how much you could afford to borrow – or what your interest rates might add onto your monthly repayments.

And with a calculator, you could even compare a few home loans based on their particular criteria and save yourself the need to get in touch with a variety of lenders in the process.

Just take the details from a bank’s website, such as their deposit requirements, the duration of repayments that they permit and the current interest rate for a deal - and the calculator will take care of the rest.

It really is as simple as that.

And it doesn’t stop there either

From hiring a mortgage broker to take care of the technical tasks associated with comparing loans and mortgages, right through to using a home loan calculator to ensure that you stay on top of your finances – there are plenty of ways to minimise the stress that you feel during the home buying process, whilst maximising your enjoyment and peace of mind!

The final thing to consider is that as lonely and daunting as things might feel right now; you are doing something that tens of thousands of others have done before you and that can be a pretty reassuring fact in and of itself.

So, rather than going into your application terrified, why not hire an expert to offer help and advice? You could even take care of a bit of the research yourself, so that you don’t go into the process without a clue – and everything else should soon fall into place.