Should I start talking to a realtor?

[Blake Williams]

Hi everyone, here's a little background on what I'm doing.

I'm 24 years old and my goal is to purchase my first property before the year is out.  I'd like to use the fha program to get a 4 family home.  I'd be living in one unit and renting out the other 3.

My main concern is that my expected source of financing (a bank that I currently work for) won't give me a loan until I am a full time employee.  I am working full time, but because I wasn't hired that way they won't do it until it's official which I expect to be in a few months.

Because I'm very new at this, I was thinking that a realtor would be good for helping me to find a property that fits what I'm looking for.  I'm just wondering if I should wait until the bank is actually willing to give me the loan because if the realtor finds something that fits soon I won't be able to do anything about it for a few months.