How can I buy a house with bad credit and no money down?

Well first you should not and anyone that would sell you one would be silly.

If you asked this 4 years ago, there would have been a dozen lenders that may do something ( at least with a little down) but most of the high risk lenders have gone bankrupt, I heard today that one of the bigger lenders was selling out becuae of the losses.

So you may find a rent to own, or an agreement for a contrct for deed.
Or perhaps a private owner that woul take the risk.

Being in this situation myself not so long ago, I'd suggest you go to:

1) www.annualcreditreport.com and get copies of your credit report and your spouses if you have one.

2) FICO.com : With Score Watch®, you could be celebrating soon and browse their forums and read what they offer there.

Check your credit report double carefully for incorrect items, items that should no longer be showing on your credit report,double reporting, identity theft, etc.

Then for those bad accounts you have on your credit report that are legit, I'd suggest using some of the tools that you can find on that website to clean your credit up.

After you got your credit cleaned up, I say(if you can manage money well, yes you may have bad credit, but just because you made mistakes in the past or whatever situation came about causing the problems, doesn't mean it will happen again or that you haven't learned) get a small credit card. Having some credit, and different types of credit helps your credit rating. Maybe even a small loan at your bank or credit union.

Then save, save, save. Without EXCELLENT credit, I doubt you find anything with no down payment. Not traditional financing anyhow.

You can see if you are eligible for a FHA/HUD loan. Borrowers who qualify can get as low as 3% down requirement and there is places to help with down payments, some even offer grants. I can't think of the website right off hand, but Google and I'm sure you can find some.

Unless you have truly learned how to manage your finances so that you don't neglect your credit as you have in the past OR you are out of the situation that put the burden on you that caused it, I wouldn't suggest taking such a big step. Owning a house is more expensive then the monthly payment.

Most places suggest you have like six months(some say even longer)worth of living expenses in savings to cover when something happens out of your control. At the very least I'd save a couple months. You never know what is going to happen. I learned the hard way. At 19 I went and bought a new house, 6 months later I walked into work to find that the owner had arrived over night and shut the location down to consolidate the two locations to the other plant. No warning or nothing. I had nothing put back. Sure I got a severence pay equal to 2 weeks, and my unused vacation of 2 weeks cashed out and got unemployment after that. However, that didn't last long and unemployment barely covers your expenses to search for your jobs that you are required to search for. Unemployed = Higher Expense. Job Searching Expenses, Home More = Using more utilities, eating more food(or in my case because I seldom ate breakfast or lunch when working, when I was home all day, I usually ate 3 meals)

Good luck.