My name is Bxxx (mod cut), I am a loan officer for (mod cut). But anyways, to answer your question about closing costs, there are a number of ways to negotiate, but I typically like to help my borrowers come in with as little money down as possible. If you go FHA, the seller can pay up to 6% of the purchase price of the closing costs, Conventional is 3% until you put 10% down, then the seller is allowed to pay 6%.
But what I like to do is have the realtor negotiate the closing costs and purchase price to whatever each party feels is fair. Then if there is room for the seller to pay more closing costs, just increase the purchase price by the amount of the closing costs that the borrower was going to pay, and move the costs to the seller's side. So essentially, the seller will get the same amount of money after the transaction, and the borrower's closing costs will be financed as part of the loan.
I hope this was clear, let me know if you need me to explain in more detail. But in my experience, that is the easiest way for the borrower to come in with as little cash as possible.
