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Day: May 14, 2013

20% down NOT needed to buy a home in Minnesota

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Minnesota Down Payment mortgage loansSt Paul, MN:   Question.  How much money do you think you need to put down to buy a home?

If you answered anything higher than ZERO, your answer is wrong!

Would it surprise you to learn that most people can get a mortgage with a great rate with just 3.5% down, and in some cases, zero down?  For most people, it is about the same amount of money you would spend on the first month, last month, and damage deposit on a rental property… but now, it is your home.

For some strange reason, the myth you need a huge down payment persists.  It simply isn’t true, yet I hear it all the time. I think it is because we hear it on TV.  I know I have. This is mostly from the talking heads on either coast. Many of those areas are what is known as “high cost” locations.  Anytime you go over $417,000 – you are now a jumbo loan, and jumbo loans are typically 20% down.  But for the rest of us…  Heck no, just 3.5% down!

  • FHA Loans are very popular, and only require 3.5% down
  • Good credit conventional loans only require 5% down
  • VA loans are zero down
  • USDA rural housing loans, for rural parts of the country, are zero down
  • Community programs can many times be used for your down payment to effectively get you zero down

Don’t let misinformation derail your dream of home ownership. Contact a local licensed mortgage professional to get pre-approved today.  Once approved, contact a great Real Estate Agent to find your dream home!

 

Minneapolis Weak and bad credit loans down since 2007

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Minneapolis, MN:  Not much of a shocker here, but weak, and bad credit loans are down dramatically since the lending correction of 2007.   Part of the reason for the housing collapse was an immense community desire to allow everyone to have a home. Clearly, that experiment failed miserably. Simply put,  not everyone who wants a home loan deserves a loan, regardless of what liberal community activists say.

Mortgage loans written today, have some of the highest “quality” seen in underwriting history. New mortgage regulations pretend to provide important protections to borrowers, but have also lead to a permanent increase in the cost of originating loans to all borrowers, and a dramatic decrease in loans to those with poor credit.

deniedBetween 2007 and 2012

  • Home buyers with credit scores higher than 780 declined by 30 percent
  • Home buyers with credit scores between 620 and 680 declined by 90 percent
  • Home buyer with credit scores below 620 were virtually non-existent

Loans harder to get with no incentive

 

All loans are much more difficult to originate, process, and underwrite.  But small loan amounts, and especially small loan amounts combined with credit challenges require a huge amount of time and effort that loan officers can no longer be compensated correctly to work on.

In the past the loan officer and their company were rewarded and compensated for their extra efforts with problem clients. Today, loan officer walk away from them because there simply is no reward or incentive to help challenging clients.

Simply put, if you worked on a project for 10-hours, and got paid the exact same amount as you do on a 1-hour project, would anyone ever work on the 10-hour projects anymore?  Of course not… The government and community activists may disagree, but Loan Officers and lenders are in this business to make a living, not work for free.