First time buyer advice in Seattle area

[Matthew Hintzke]

Hey!

I am a 28 yo who has lived in the Seattle area for the past 15-20 years and have seen this area's prices go out of control in the last few years especially.  My wife, new daughter, and I are looking to purchase somewhere in the Woodinville, Bothel, Snohomish areas as they are really the only places within our budget.  I mostly wanted to ask for people's advice on 1) How are other first time home buyers able to compete in this market? and 2) What kind of loan do you think I should try to get. I know I should just go to a lender, but before I try to do that I wanted some unbiased advice from here if possible.  Here is our info:

Credit score: 750+

Household Income: ~210k

Downpayment funds: 30-40k depending on how much we want to stretch our budget

Debt: I have about $25k left in student loans that I have vigorously been paying off $1000/month (started at around $70k) since I graduated 5 years ago. Also have about $35k in loans for an SUV  (probably didn't need the 4Runner, I know)

From what I've read, I can get a conventional loan as long as I put at least 5% down, correct? So I think I could afford something between $500-600k and get us the 3-4 bedrooms we are looking for.  Are there any major benefits with doing the conventional over and FHA? I read refinancing can be easier with FHA and you could put down less (3.5%) which gives us more to work with for any maintenance/repair costs.

The easy answer might just be to "go see a lender", but I just figured I would get some advice from the experienced people here.

Thanks for any input,

Matt