Banking guys....

[Smokey1226]

Eventhough im in Real Estate, ive been told a couple different things as of late about what % you need down for homes. When i went to buy a piece of property, i only needed about 8% down. And one person told me now (because of the economy) they want anywhere from 10-15% minimum?

Just wondering what the truth in that is.

[Silver03SRT]

It all depends on what the value of the land is worth. You could probably get by with 5% down but your interest rate is going to be higher. The bigger the down payment the lower your interest rate.

[Smokey1226]

It all depends on what the value of the land is worth. You could probably get by with 5% down but your interest rate is going to be higher. The bigger the down payment the lower your interest rate.

lol i knew that, but i ment for the regular housing market. Say if you went in to buy a 215k house....what will most banks want down? 1 client told me 15% minimum, another client told me 20%. Beacuse the 2nd client told me they tried to put down 10% and the bank wanted more before they would even aprove the loan!!!! Now im not sure if it was because of their credit or history, but in general i was wondering if it went up.

They were meaning just to get a loan, has nothing to do with lowering payments.

[Crawlin]

value of what you are buying

first time buyer

any kind of special "plans" that you are using

the bank you are using(countrywide was fine with me doing 0% down even just a month ago, but landmark if you did 0% down, paid higher rate than if i had paid 10%)

[wrath]

I'm still approved for a 0% down loan up to a certain dollar amount. After that they want 5%. I think it depends on your credit history and the particular house/neighborhood. They're definitely a lot more picky now than they were even 4 months ago.

I don't know about investment property. It used to be 10%.

I'm pre-approved through both Landmark and Wells-Fargo. Same rate for both. Landmark doesn't tell you what the closing costs are though.

I've heard good things about Guardian and Guaranty. I don't know if I'll go through any of these places though. There seems to be about as much regulation for Mortgage brokers and Real Estate agents in Wisconsin though.

Basically, I'm looking for a place that is least likely to attempt to screw me over. The places that advertise 0% and 5% loans seem to be a little bit more friendly. However, now that Landmark is doing Payday loans they lose some credibility with me.


I use this for a baseline for rates (not the cheapest, not the highest) and it's updated every day so just bookmark it:
http://www.guardiancu.org/Resources/PDFs/Mortgage_rates_internet1.pdf

[Smokey1226]

good info, maybe ill stop in and just talk to the ladies then. One of them is hot so it would be worth the trip.

[0TransAm0]

my friend just bought a house and they wanted 20% but they still let him get it with only 15% but then you have to pay for pmi insurance or something... idk much about it but thats what he told me...

[johnny--2k]

downpayment should not affect the interest rate, just add the PMI payment AFAIK

[WhatsADSM]

Smokey, the amount down will depend greatly on a number of factors and likely will not be the same for all lenders. It depends on a lot of things, primarily though it will be your credit score, income, and home value.

Most of the GSE based lenders (Fannie/Freddie) will require at least 3% down since I believe that is a mandate of to be a GSE based lender.

So in general I will say that in general if you have excellent credit and are looking to buy a "normal" home (read: primary residence, with a payment of less than mid 30ish percent of your gross income) then you will get approved all day long with only 5% down.... and you should also be getting the best rates available. Only down side is that with less than 20% down you will pay PMI which for a 215k house could probably get up to about $100.

With all that said... IMO the best lender out there is Landmark. They have extremely competitive rates, AMAZINGLY LOW closing costs, and lower (than everyone else) PMI charges... I actually have wells fargo right now, but if I had to do it all over it would be landmark in an instant. BTW to whoever said landmark doesn't tell you their closing costs, thats just wrong and it is right on their site: http://www.landmarkcu.com/home/lns.lns_home?
Its $1090 for non-first time home buyers and $495 for first time home buyers... which is the lowest I have found yet for first timers.

[wrath]

Out of the credit unions I've looked at Landmark has the highest APR. 7.01% APR for a 30 year zero down loan. 6.611% APR for a 30 year 5% down loan. Landmark is a scam artist when it comes to displaying their rates. If you go through their loan calculator it comes out as different numbers than displayed on their front page.

Their "low" closing costs aren't guaranteed, or at least they weren't when I got pre-approved in January. The only thing it covers is the "Closing" fee and the "Application" fee. It doesn't cover the associated "Other" closing costs, or at least it didn't.

[WhatsADSM]

Out of the credit unions I've looked at Landmark has the highest APR. 7.01% APR for a 30 year zero down loan. 6.611% APR for a 30 year 5% down loan. Landmark is a scam artist when it comes to displaying their rates. If you go through their loan calculator it comes out as different numbers than displayed on their front page.

Their "low" closing costs aren't guaranteed, or at least they weren't when I got pre-approved in January. The only thing it covers is the "Closing" fee and the "Application" fee. It doesn't cover the associated "Other" closing costs, or at least it didn't.

The rates are always right with the best of them. Rates change daily so I suggest calling each one that day if you want to do an apples-to-apples comparison.

I shopped for a solid 2-3 months all of the different companies and Landmark was consistently the best overall. I only did not go with them because they refused to lock me for more than 60 days, however wells fargo would, but I then had to pay higher PMI costs. I wanted the house so I went with wells fargo.

As for rate. 0% down will always come at a premium, thats true of any lender. However, like I stated before your best rate will come with excellent credit at at least 3% down... and LCU was always basically right on with everyone elses 0-points. Some cases I will admit they were 1/8 percent higher, but that was easily offset by the lower PMI costs if you were putting down less than 20%.

The closing costs for me were exactly as they stated... I could even drag up my old good faith estimates AND closing settlement statements... It was exactly as the website said. Everything included.

To the OP, other places to try that were extremely competitive were:
Pyramax <-- Really good, honest, great rates. Lender
WMM (Wisconsin Wholesale Mortgage) <-- Will always find you the lowest rate, but customer service isn't up to par with the others. Broker.

[Russ Jerome]

I've been a Landmark customer (checking/saving) since they bought
out my old bank (10+ yrs?) and my downstroke had a lot to do with
my % as well as my PMI. May not be right but thats how it was
explained to me.

They were quick to pre aprove me for 200k with nothing down but
when it came to the offer date they backed out of the 0 down.
Left the deal a little confused even though I was willing and able
to make LARGE monthly payments for this specific property.

I've got a pile of expendable monthly income if anybody has good
experiences with a lender who still does 1st time/ zero down like
before the fallout of 07-08.

[Crawlin]

downpayment should not affect the interest rate, just add the PMI payment AFAIK

it does through some(for me) because of the first time buyer thing.

if i didn't want to put money down, i could do the first time buyer, have a lower closing cost, but a higher rate. if i wanted to put the 10% down, i'd just do the normal purchase at the lower rate and just pay the $2000 difference in closing costs.

landmark told me how much my closing costs would be for the house i was looking at. it was on the 2nd or 3rd page of the adobe acrobat/reader file they send you with your preapproval letter.

[WhatsADSM]

I've been a Landmark customer (checking/saving) since they bought
out my old bank (10+ yrs?) and my downstroke had a lot to do with
my % as well as my PMI. May not be right but thats how it was
explained to me.

They were quick to pre aprove me for 200k with nothing down but
when it came to the offer date they backed out of the 0 down.
Left the deal a little confused even though I was willing and able
to make LARGE monthly payments for this specific property.

I've got a pile of expendable monthly income if anybody has good
experiences with a lender who still does 1st time/ zero down like
before the fallout of 07-08.

Russ give a broker a call... Honestly they are the best at finding those niche products (I only say niche because that loan product is REALLY hard to find in this market of generally falling home prices). The brokers deal with a bunch of differently lenders so they should be able to find you something 0% down... But yea expect to pay up the :wow for it.

IMO a place to start would be WMM at 414-431-1980.