Washington State Mortgages, Made Clear. Buying or Refinancing? Let's find the right loan together.
One of the most valuable things you can do before buying your first home is understand what lenders are actually looking at when they evaluate your application.
Some buyers are surprised to learn they qualify sooner than expected. Others discover there’s some groundwork to do first. Either way, knowing where you stand early gives you options. [Read more…]
Part of what I do as a mortgage advisor is review credit reports — and I’m still surprised how often people think a debt that’s been “charged off” means it’s gone. It isn’t. A charge-off is the creditor writing the debt off their books for accounting and tax purposes — it doesn’t erase what you owe, and it doesn’t mean a mortgage underwriter will ignore it.
A client once asked me to help her mother get a mortgage. A couple years earlier, her mom had voluntarily surrendered a car back to the lender. She assumed that meant a straightforward repossession on her credit report, and that enough time had passed to qualify. What she didn’t realize: the lender had charged off the remaining loan balance after taking the car back, and for mortgage purposes, that balance was now sitting on her credit report as a collection — a separate issue from the repo itself. [Read more…]
It’s not unusual these days to have a lender request a “letter of explanation” from a home buyer or someone who is buying or refinancing their home. A letter of explanation (or LOE) is often used to help provide more information to the underwriter or lender based on information that is disclosed on an application or credit report. LOE’s may address anything from gaps in employment to inquiries on a credit report and is intended to help explain or add support to the transaction. If a borrower has had an extenuating circumstance and is trying to have an exception made to an underwriting guideline, they may be asked to write a LOE.
