I've never owned a home, and i heard there are ways to benefit from being a first time home owner.

If your credit score is below 620 you will need to do some credit repair before you even think of moving forward. If you are going to look just goto open houses and make sure you are telling the agents in the open houses that you are not ready because you are repairing your credit...it should take you about a year and you'll be ready to go assuming your scores are in the mid 600's. Good luck!!

As far as the banks are concerned, first time home-buyers are riskier borrowers. You may be able to find some local government down payment assistance for cheap. However, if you don't qualify with the bank it does not matter. If your credit is clean but have a low score, you may get approved for an FHA loan (most lenders can do them). FHA does not consider score.

Don't lose hope if you're looking to buy a home. There are so many different ways to fund a home now, just about anyone with any kind of credit can get into a home, regardless of credit situation.

Of course, some will cost you more money in the long run, but a home it's still one of the best investments that you can make, so, in many cases, it's worth it, especially for the first year of ownership.

You should shop around, and ask different lenders what kind of programs they have, and if they can help. Try to find a lender that specializes in bad credit mortgages. You can find some bad credit mortgage lenders listed on this page on and off:

http://www.axalda.info/bad-credit-mortgage.html