Mortgage Referrals
Advice on where to go to get a mortgage. A borrower can always select a loan provider by throwing a dart at the Yellow Pages. A referral is of value if it raises the probability of a good outcome above that from throwing the dart. The four major sources of referrals are real estate sales agents, other borrowers, Internet referral sites, and builders. Real Estate Sales Agents: Home purchasers accept more referrals from real estate sales agents than from all other sources combined. Sales agent referrals generally are to individual loan officers or brokers, as opposed to firms. An agent with great confidence in a loan officer will continue to refer clients even when the loan officer switches firms. Sales agents have the same interest as buyers in completing transactions. Hence, they refer clients to loan providers who can generally be depended upon to close on time. This is the agent's major concern, and it is a concern of borrowers as well. Sales agents have no comparable interest in the mortgage price or whether the borrower is placed in the right kind of mortgage. However, the agent doesn't want the price to be so far out of line or the service provided so abysmal that the borrower throws a fit and blames the agent. Other Borrowers: Referrals from other borrowers are usually based on a single transaction. Internet Referral Sites: These Web sites provide price information for a large number of lenders and mortgage brokers, usually listed by state. They also provide quick entree to the Web sites of each loan provider listed. Builder Referrals: Builder referrals are usually to a lender with whom the builder has a financial arrangement. Hence, they are suspect. In some cases, preferred lenders price loans above the market and kick back some of the excess to the builder. Self-Referrals: Responding to self-referrals (solicitations) usually is a bad idea. Not all lenders who solicit are predators, but all predators solicit.
Popular Mortgage Terms
Same as term Bridge Loan: A short-term loan, usually from a bank, that 'bridges' the period between the closing of a home purchase and the closing of a home sale. To qualify for a bridge ...
A borrower who does not meet the underwriting requirements of mainstream lenders. Sub-prime borrowers pay more than prime borrowers and are sometimes taken advantage of. ...
In connection with a home, the value of the home less the balance of outstanding mortgage loans on the home. ...
Mortgages typically amortize over time through fixed value installment payments. However, there's a type of mortgage that doesn't: the Balloon Mortgage. It's called this way because, with ...
A computer-driven process for informing the loan applicant very quickly, sometimes within a few minutes, whether the application will be approved, denied, or forwarded to an underwriter. ...
Fees collected by a loan officer from a borrower that are lower than the target fees specified by the lender or mortgage broker who employs the loan officer. An underage is the opposite ...
A charge imposed by the lender if the borrower pays off the loan early. The charge is usually expressed as a percent of the loan balance at the time of prepayment or a specified number of ...
A condominium project with features that lenders view as favorable in terms of their risk exposure on loans secured by individual condo units. The requirements of warrantability include ...
Every ARM is tied to an interest rate index. An index has three relevant features:availibility, level, volatility. All the common ARM indexes are readily available from a published source, ...

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