Mortgages: June 2005 Archives

I've just been told that starting July 1, 2005, I will have to have explicit written authorization to run credit.



It is not immediately clear to me from the information given whether this extends to non-mortgage credit providers (I've Googled and Yahoo'd and even Asked Jeeves several combinations of words each without success). If it does, this is probably one of the niftiest consumer protection things to come down the pike in a long time. On the other hand, if it's limited to mortgage providers, then it's probably a stab at making life difficult for Internet brokerages, which may do business at a remove of thousands of miles.



An Internet broker employee is talking on the phone with a client, not physically in the client's presence. They can be some of the cheapest loan providers out there, if they are so minded (as I keep saying, a far more important concern is how low a provider is willing to go, not how low they can go). So it becomes a real hardship on their business if they can't run credit without explicit written permission, whereas it's not a major issue with a more traditional brokerage. A loan quote isn't real unless you can lock it right now. Your loan can't be locked without running credit. And I can't run your credit until I send you a form and get it back. No big deal if I'm sitting right there. A real pain if I'm in California and the client is in Florida. I'm not even certain facsimile permission (no original signature) is acceptable, as it's not something that enters into my current business. This means a delay potentially of days while the form gets back to the lender. So life for an Internet broker suddenly gets a lot more challenging.



On the other hand, if it extends to all providers of credit, then it becomes worth the game. Mind you, an adult should be aware of what's going to happen if they give a social security number to a car dealer, furniture store, or anyone else. I've never heard of anyone using it just for liar's poker. Each time somebody runs credit, it's an inquiry - a ding on your credit. Inquiry dings are progressively damaging. There used to be a game among mortgage providers until the new rules a couple years ago - see if they could be the last ones to run your credit before it went under a threshold score, and some would run it multiple times if they could. Anybody running after that would be at a disadvantage.



With the new rules that every consumer should get down on their knees and give thanks to the National Association of Mortgage Brokers for getting through, consumers are now actually permitted to shop around for mortgage rates without getting dinged every time their credit is run - provided they run credit under a business code that say's "inquiry for mortgage." (So make sure your bank or credit union runs it under a mortgage inquiry code, and not a general inquiry code). All of the times it is run within fourteen days by mortgage providers count as exactly one inquiry. This gives consumers the ability to shop as much or more for a mortgage as they would for, say, a toaster oven, without being penalized.



But if the new rules apply to everyone, this is a good thing. Every time I start a loan, I have a set spiel that I go through. "Don't change anything, credit-wise, even if you think it will help. Don't buy anything. Don't charge anything on your credit cards. Make your normal payments. And don't allow anybody to run your credit for any reason. Don't even let them have your social. Because they will run your credit, I guarantee it. On every home loan, one of the last things that will happen before your loan is recorded at the county will be that the lender will run your credit again to make certain nothing has changed. And if anything has changed, you will very likely lose the loan (and the house if it's a purchase). Even if the escrow company has the money or it's actually been disbursed, the lender will pull it back. Until your documents are recorded with the county, don't breathe differently."



For a certain personality type, being told she can't shop for curtains and furniture and paint for her new house is nothing short of torture, and so I've learned to be very explicit. "It's okay to look, to talk to the nice salesfolk, and to get an idea of what you want. But don't actually buy anything. Tell the nice salesman who says he just 'wants to get a head start on your order' that your mortgage loan officer said that you're right on the line, and he if runs your credit and drives you under the line the first consequence to him will be no order. So tell the nice salesman that you're really protecting him by not giving him your social, because if he runs your credit and costs you the loan you'd have to tell your uncle Bruno, who's best friends with Tony Soprano, about it. And we all know what happens then."



Okay, things are not usually that bleak. It's usually just a higher rate you end up with. So your monthly payment is $40 higher, in addition to what you spend on the new stuff that caused money to go into that salesman's pocket. Doesn't that make you feel all Warm And Tingly towards that salesman? Didn't think so. But a certain percentage of the time, this new monthly payment you now have because you Bought Something means you Do Not Qualify for the loan. So: No loan. No house (if it's a purchase). No lower payment (if it's a refinance). No cash out of your equity (if that's what you were trying to do). And so now you've got this stuff, and no house to put it in. Or you've got to tap the vacation or retirement account to pay for it because you're not getting a refinance on reasonable terms. Not to mention all the times these people run credit and hurt people's credit scores without real permission when there's no mortgage loan in the offing. So I can put up with one segment of my industry have a slightly higher bar to jump over if that's the carrot.



Caveat Emptor

UPDATED here

No matter which provider, no matter what type of loan you get, nobody is going to loan you money without the appropriate documentation. The more documentation you have that you are a good risk, the better the rate you are going to get, and the lower your costs are going to be.



Everybody hates filling out forms and providing documentation. There's a billboard two blocks from my house advertising, "Stress free loans." Actually, these signs are all over. And I'll bet they bring in a lot of business. Low documentation loans are easy money - I could do them all day and all night, and make more money, and make the lender more money, while doing less work, than I can by hunkering down and actually serving my clients best interests. Those billboards say "stress free loans" which three words look like an English sentence meaning this will be easy, but the real translation to English reads, "Hello, I am a lowlife scum who wants to take advantage of lazy people who are too ignorant to know better by making a lot of money providing loans at higher interest rates and less favorable terms than they could obtain elsewhere."



The fact is, that for something dealing with this much money, if there is documentation you can produce to prove that you are a better risk and gets you a better rate, you should be eager to present it. If I can spend half an hour instead of fifteen minutes filling out forms and as a reward I save $40 or more every month until the next time I decide to refinance, I want to fill out the extra papers. If I refinance every two years, I have essentially been paid $960 for a quarter hour of work. That works out to $3840 per hour. I don't know about you, the reader, but even when I'm completely inundated with clients, I don't make that kind of money per hour. I don't know any job that pays that much, unless you want to include wealthy investor. And let me tell you, the wealthy investors I've dealt with are eager to spend the extra time filling out said forms. It really is a "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" situation. They know it will Save Them Money, and don't have to be sweet talked into filling out one more form or providing a little more documentation. They've got it already copied for me, and if I want their business, I'd better buckle down and get to work on finding the loan with the best terms possible. If you, the reader, wish to be wealthy, you could do worse than emulate their example.



There are, when you get right down do it, three different levels of documentation. The lowest level of documentation is NINA, which is short for "No Income, No Assets." There are other names for it ("No Ratio" being the most common). This is a loan where the rate you get is purely driven by your credit score (as well as other factors, such as the equity in your home or down payment you're making, but those are constants endemic to the situation, not variables about which I am talking). You're not even documenting that you have a source of income. You're basically saying, "Here I am! Gotta love me!" to the bank, and they really do love you because you're filling their coffers by paying the highest rates for your loan. Guess what? You're still filling out all the forms (or somebody is doing so on your behalf, which they can do to the same extent on other loan types!), and you're still providing all the documentation on the property - how much it's worth, proving you own it, proving the taxes are current, etcetera. Owing to identity theft laws, you can expect to have to provide two things that basically show that you are you. You can expect to deal with problems if the county doesn't show the taxes as current, your landlord or current mortgage holder shows you as being behind or that you have a history of being behind or the county doesn't show you officially in title of record, or any of a host of other potential problems, but hey, at least you didn't have to show that you've got a source of income!



The next level of documentation is a "Stated Income" loan. This is where you document that you've got a source of income, but not that said income is sufficient to justify the loan, so you tell the bank you make that much, and they agree not to verify the actual numbers. This is going to require two additional items: verification of employment, or a testimonial letter if you are self-employed, and reserves. Reserves are quickest to explain. Industry standard is money sufficient to pay the loan, your taxes, and your homeowner's insurance for six months, in a form that is sufficiently liquid such that the money can be accessed, for a long enough period that the bank will believe it isn't borrowed - and the bank will require documentation of its availability if it's in an account type such as 401k where access may be restricted. Verification of your employment is somebody in the HR department filling out a form on your behalf and verifying it over the phone. The testimonial letter for self-employed borrowers comes from your lawyer, accountant, or tax preparer on their letterhead saying that you really do have a legitimate business. It basically reads: "To whom it may concern. John Smith is self-employed as the owner of business X. He has been doing this for Y years. Based upon information provided to me, he will earn the same amount of money this year as last year." The person providing the testimonial must sign the letter. It really is only three sentences, but that person is putting their business on the line for you if it's not true. So they tend to require evidence if you're coming to them for the first time to get this letter written and signed.



The bank is basically looking for two years in the same line of work or at the same company to approve this one. Sub prime lenders may take a year or even six months, although their terms will not be as favorable. What the bank is looking for is evidence that you can really afford the loan. "He's got a source of income, He's got a good credit score, he's making all his payments, he's got money in the bank, okay, we think he's living with his means and can afford to pay us back. We'll lend him the money." There are variants on stated income of which "stated income, stated assets" is the most common, but these carry higher rates, higher charges, or both, in many cases actually end up looking more like a heavily propagandized NINA loan than anything else.



I've heard Stated Income (and NINA) commonly referred to as "liars loans", and they are often used for such, but that is not their intended use. As a matter of fact, people get in a lot of trouble with these loans, and many times it comes back on an unscrupulous loan officer or real estate agent trying to push something through for which their clients really aren't qualified. If you can't afford the payment, am I doing you a favor to qualify you for the loan? I submit that I most emphatically am not. On the other hand, I'll admit to having used the loans for that purpose in the past, but an ethical loan officer using it for this purpose should sit down, tell the people what the real payment is going to be, and make certain they can afford it - sometimes they're renting and their effective cost of housing is going to go down! And in that case, I submit that I probably am helping them if I push the loan through. On the other hand, if you're doing Stated Income or NINA (especially on a purchase) and the loan officer doesn't sit you down and cover what the payment is going to be within a couple dollars per month, and make certain you're okay paying it, this is a red flag in no uncertain terms!



What Stated Income is meant for is self employed people and people working on commission who really do make the money, but have write-offs such that their taxes aren't going to show enough income. Or people who had a bad year, or large losses or high write offs one year, but are still basically solid.



The highest form of documentation is Full Documentation (almost everyone says "full doc" because the unabbreviated phrase is a mouthful). This does not necessarily mean I've got to prove to the bank that you make every penny you actually make, but only that you make enough to justify the loan. The proof the bank will accept is very straightforward. Self-employed borrowers are still going to need that testimonial letter from stated income. They will additionally be asked for their federal income tax packet. This is all of the forms, front and back, that you sent to the IRS last April 15th, and perhaps the April 15th before that, too. It's got to be a signed copy, and it must include copies of any w-2s or 1099s that you get. People in the construction profession, as well as those who may be w-2 employees but work on commission will also need to furnish their taxes, and the bank's underwriter can always require it of anyone. It is to be noted that banks do not have to accept your loan on a stated income basis - they can require that you furnish full documentation.



Those people who are hourly or salaried employees of a company can usually get by the full documentation of income requirement with just w-2 forms. If you are a company employee, the last 30 days worth of pay stubs will also be required.



The basic rationale for this is simple. Very few people tell the IRS that they make more money than they do, because the consequence is higher taxes. So the bank is willing to use tax forms to prove your income. In the case of a w-2 employee, the company is telling the IRS that those are the wages it paid you, and therefore wants a deduction for, and you went and paid taxes on it, so the bank will usually accept that. Similarly, your pay stubs should have year to date pay on them. Here the bank will accept the word, metaphorically speaking, of a third party without a stake in the outcome of the loan.



A subset of the full documentation loan is the streamline refinance. As the name indicates, it is available on refinances only, not purchases. There are a lot of limits on these loans, but when I get to do one it is the easiest of all loans. Basically, it's a case where the same lender is now offering better rates, and no equity is being taken out of the home, and they'll allow you to do it because otherwise you'll take this client elsewhere. 90 percent of a loaf is much better to them than none.



Within the sub-prime mortgage world, they will often take the deposits from 12 consecutive months of bank statements (sometimes 6 or 24), usually discounted by a certain amount, and accept that as proof of income. This is called EZ doc, although there's nothing easy about it and as a matter of experience there are more fights with the underwriter and jumping through hoops here than with any other type of loan documentation. The rates are somewhat higher than for full documentation, but not nearly the rates for stated income. Mind you, sub-prime rates are higher in the first place as well. Furthermore, many of these sub-prime lenders will advertise the fact that "EZ doc rates same as full doc!" I shouldn't have to explain to adults that this translates to English as they don't give the lower rates to true full documentation loans, now should I?



So, on the subject of documentation, I think you should be able to tell that the higher the quality of your income documentation, the lower the rate that you are going to get from a given lender. If you can qualify, a full documentation loan is probably going to save you more than enough money to pay you to do the extra paperwork, which is marginal anyway. The only reason not to do one is if you can't supply proof that you make enough.



And as one final warning: If a loan officer requires originals not only of the forms they ask you to sign (original signatures required - really!), but of your own documentation, it is a BIG RED FLAG. I can't think of any document that lenders will not accept copies of. The only reason to require your originals is that they don't want you able to apply for a loan with someone else, so they're putting an end to your shopping, and once they've got them, good luck trying to get them back (at least until the loan is done so they get paid). A good loan officer needs good readable copies - not your originals.



Caveat Emptor!

UPDATE: This Article has been updated here

California has just replaced the one page federal Good Faith Estimate with a two page Mortgage Loan Disclosure Statement. I haven't seen a lot of abuses of this yet, mostly no doubt because it is so new. I don't even know if there are solid regulations and implementation policies and standards on it yet. I haven't seen anything from the Department of Real Estate in the mail, and all web searches (including with the Department of Real Estate) come up with is a link to various lender's online form, not the regulations for filling it out. So I'm presuming that said regulations are similar to the federal Good Faith Estimate, especially as the only thing a recent seminar we paid for on changes in the business had to say was, "If you give the client a Good Faith Estimate, you will be held to have complied with federal regulations but not state of California regulations." Which implies that California didn't alter the existing federal standards so much as add a few more requirements, the effects of which are to leave all of the games loan providers play with the federal Good Faith Estimate intact, as well as adding a couple more. (See my two part essay on the Good Faith Estimate for a list of the most common of those games)



The first page of this new form is similar to the Federal Good Faith Estimate. The first major difference is that there is no explicit loan or rate quoted at the top, and the broker or lender must disclose whether each given cost of the loan is paid to the broker or to someone else. There is no explicit line item (as there is on the Good Faith Estimate) for "Estimated Closing Costs" to explicitly sum all of the things that are actual fees or costs of the loan, as opposed to reserve requirements or things that are your fees paid in advance, such as property taxes. Your property taxes are the same whether you have lender A, lender B, or no loan at all. Ditto your homeowner's insurance, school taxes (if any) and flood insurance (if any). Setting a form where they are part of a total to be compared, rather than apart from that total, is just offering the loan provider one more opportunity to play games or distract you from the really important information.



There is a sum of all the things the client is paying to the broker versus paid to others. I wonder if this might not backfire on the lending and packaging houses that got this part added. They're going to show a line of fees paid almost entirely to them, whereas the only things paid to or from an actual broker are origination fees (if any), processing fee (my processor works for me or for the brokerage, not the lender), and broker's rebate to client (if any, and which if it exists is something paid by me the broker to you the client - a good thing in most client's opinion). Psychologically a telling advantage, even if it doesn't really mean anything.



At the bottom of page one, there are subtotals for fees paid to others and fees paid to brokers, and then an overall total. Then there's a section which says "Compensation to Broker," explicitly adding "(Not Paid Out of Loan Proceeds)". In other words, this isn't coming out of your pocket, although they could certainly give you better terms by reducing their compensation in the vast majority of cases. But the fact that one broker is making more than another (or is required to state explicitly what they make where a direct lender or "packaging house" originating their own loans is not) does not mean you're not getting a better loan from them. Some brokers get discounts others do not. Some brokers disclose honestly and completely, others do not. Examine the loan you are getting - all of the terms, rates and conditions, and decide based upon those which loan is better. That's what makes a difference to you. The rest is a matador's red cape - a distraction from what is important.



Once again, this isn't important to you, the client, but it has in passing performed a service to many workers in the loan industry. Many lenders give bigger brokers a volume rebate, over and above the basic per loan rebate, and the brokers were keeping this a secret from even their own workers lest they have to increase compensation. Now these brokers have to disclose it to the clients. This means the brokers have to tell the loan officers about it so they can disclose it. Now that all loan officers know about it instead of only a few, those who are high producers and have leverage can say, "I'm helping you make all this money. I want part of it."



Page two of this two-page form starts with section I, which is a short accounting of the money. My inclination is not to trust this any more than anything on the Good Faith Estimate. In other words, whether this is accurate is likely to be a function of your particular loan officer's good will more than anything else. Once again, the only form where there are real penalties for being inaccurate is the HUD-1, which comes at the end of the loan, not the beginning. But it's a good intention, nonetheless, and perhaps one of these years it'll actually mean something even if your loan officer is Simon LeGreedy or has a nose fourteen miles long. Proposed loan amount less costs, less other stuff of yours that's getting paid off, less the purchase price of the home or payoff of existing loan. The idea is to give you an explicit "you're going to get this much cash" or "you must pay this much cash to make this balance"



Section II is something I want to draw your attention to: Proposed interest rate is a good thing to have, although there is no more guarantee that this is the rate you're going to get than a federal Good Faith Estimate. But it has a choice of two things to check off "Fixed Rate" or "Initial Variable Rate". Just because Fixed Rate is checked does not mean the loan they are discussing is fixed rate for the full duration of the loan. Let me repeat that: Just because Fixed Rate is checked does not mean the loan they are discussing is fixed rate for the full duration of the loan. It might be fixed for thirty years - or it might be fixed for three months. This is a good place for unscrupulous loan officers to offer misleading information verbally, while checking the correct box doesn't usually mean a whole lot.



Section III is proposed term of the loan. If something less than 360 months is written here (or whatever the amortization of the loan is in years), it's telling you there's a balloon at the end. Once again, there is no way to verify that if 360 months is what is written, it's real.



Section IV is proposed loan payment. Ideally it's computed based upon the amounts given in the previous three sections. Verify that it at least makes mathematical sense by running these numbers through an amortization calculator, or doing the calculation yourself. Many loan officers will play games with the payment because people shop loans based upon payment.



Section V: does the loan have a prepayment penalty, and on what basis? I'm glad to see this section here. I'll be even gladder if and when I see evidence the answers mean anything in the sense of legal penalties for lying. Lying about prepayment penalties has been rampant for a long time. Lying about prepayment penalties is a good way to make an absolutely awful loan look pretty good. Lying about prepayment penalties gets someone to sign up with the loan provider who lies because of this. And when you find out at the end of the loan process, when they present the loan documents, that they were lying (if you even notice, which many are expert at making sure you don't!), you may not have any good alternatives to signing those documents anyway.



Section VI basically tells you the lender cannot require credit life insurance or disability insurance. Many lenders would if they could. Not that disability insurance is a bad idea - quite the opposite in fact (I'm of two minds on credit life insurance, and this is not the place for that essay).



Section VII requires you the client to tell them, the lender about all the other liens on the property and hints at penalties for dishonesty. Not that the lender or broker is going to take your word for it, of course. But the gall of requiring a consumer to be accurate on this or face penalties, pay for the loan, etcetera when many brokers and lenders could submit the form to the Pulitzer committee for consideration in the category for best short fiction amazes me.



Section VIII is about Article 7, which covers loan amounts so small as to be irrelevant for all practical purposes in California. There's also a bit about whether or not a broker is lending their own money. This is potentially both confusing and interesting, but beyond the scope of this essay. It's good that they are requiring license numbers now. In California, you can easily look them up for past violations online at http://www2.dre.ca.gov/PublicASP/pplinfo.asp (many other states have similar registries). Not that someone without past violations is pure, and not that someone with them necessarily intends to do anything dirty to you. But it's good information to know. Another good place to check them out is with the Better Business Bureau, which compiles information on every business, members or not, at http://www.bbb.org/ You'll need a business name and address, phone number, or web site. Now, if they've got one strike against them, they could easily have been caught in circumstances beyond their control. But a pattern of abuses is a clear warning. A few days ago, I decided to risk $50 for a business card order with a company that has a truly awful rating BBB rating. The cards arrived two days later and I couldn't be happier with any aspect of the transaction. But my next order from them won't be any bigger until they have established a track record with me (and also I with them so they can see a long history of orders they want to keep coming, and which will stop if their service isn't satisfactory).



Section IX explicitly tells you, the client, that this is not a loan commitment. This is good, so far as it goes. I've spoken to many otherwise intelligent people who somehow had acquired the idea that because a loan provider filled out a Good Faith Estimate, it meant the loan was a Done Deal. It most certainly does not mean anything of the sort. No real estate loan officer EVER writes a loan commitment, and it's been that way for at least a couple of decades. Loan commitments are the exclusive province of the underwriter, who is intentionally and for anti-fraud reasons isolated from the client (i.e. the underwriter is not allowed to communicate with you directly). The most an ethical loan officer will say is "my experience does not show me anything that should cause you to have a problem"



Now, here's the rub, and an indication of what this section really should say. Does it not stand to reason that if the loan is not a Done Deal at all, it most particularly is not a done deal on the exact stated terms?



Caveat Emptor.



UPDATE: The Jawa Report solicits trackback pings for postings of our choice, so here is one. Thank you!

UPDATE: This article has been updated here

Mortgage - Questions you must ask every provider on every loan.

(This list is trying to be as exhaustive as possible, but is likely missing some important questions. If I missed one, send it to me: dm at )



What is the rate?



What is the amortization period?



Is there a possibility that the note will be due in full before the amortization pays it off? (Vaguely equivalent to "is there a balloon?" but a broader question)



Is the payment interest only, or principal and interest?



(if interest only) how long is it interest only, and what happens afterward?



Is there any possibility of negative amortization (the balance increasing) if I make the minimum payment? (if yes, warning!)



Is the nominal rate different from the real rate of interest I am being charged?



How long is the rate fixed for?



(If fixed for less than the full period of the loan) What is the rate based upon when it adjusts, what is the margin, and how often does it adjust?



What is the industry standard name for this loan type?



Is the rate you are quoting me based upon full documentation, stated income, NINA or EZ Doc?



(If full or EZ doc) Assuming I have other monthly payments of $X, how much monthly income do I have to document in order to qualify? (If this is more than you make, Warning!)



How many points TOTAL will I have to pay to get that rate.



How many points of origination will I be charged?



How many discount points will I have to pay?



What are the closing costs I will have to pay?



(because they are allowed to omit third party costs from all estimates and totals, you must add the answers to the next three questions to the previous question unless the provider specifically includes them)



How much will the appraisal fee be?



How much will total title charges be?



How much will the escrow fee be.



Who will my title company be?



Who will my escrow company be?

(If escrow company is not owned by title company, i.e. same name, be prepared for unknown additional title charges).



How much, total, will I be expected to pay out of my pocket?



How much, total, will be added to my mortgage balance?



With everything added to my mortgage balance, what will my payment be?



How long of a rate lock is included with this quote?

-------------



After you have finished talking to this person, go check out the numbers. If you have a calculator that can handle mortgage calculations, use it. If you're able to do the calculations yourself, even better. Otherwise, do a web search for payment calculators or mortgage calculators or amortization calculators, and try out a couple of different ones (because some web calculators on lenders sites are programmed to lie!). This is math - there is only one right answer! The numbers should come out the same except for rounding errors! If the difference is more than five dollars in any case, that's a red flag! (You should also make certain the reason for the difference is not operator error. For instance, automobile payment calculators assume a different first payment than mortgage calculators, but student loan calculators should be compatible with mortgages.)





Caveat Emptor

UPDATE: This article has been updated here

Every so often, I get a call out of the blue that starts something like this "Hello, I'm shopping for a mortgage. Just tell me your lowest rate."



I try to do the ethical thing, finding out on what sort of loan and all of the ancillary information that would actually make this useful information.



"No. Just tell me your lowest rate."



Every so often, I'll admit, I'm seriously tempted to quote them the lowest rate available on a month-to-month loan where the teaser rate has to be purchased with three and a half points - a loan such that I'd consider going homeless if that was all that was available.



Then I sigh inwardly and try to explain that unless I know the answers to a few question about the kind of loan that would be best for him, that's like being told the ultimate answer to the ultimate question about life, the universe, and everything is 42, without being told what base it's in, much less what the ultimate question is, so that that he, the consumer, has some way of knowing whether the answer may be appropriate.



"If you won't help me, I'm hanging up. *Click*"



And then one of my neighboring co-workers wants to know who that was, and this is what I tell them:



"Some Poor Guy who's terrified of salespeople setting himself up to get rooked for the five millionth time."



Another example: Quite some time ago, I was dropping some papers off with a prospective client, a salesman in a different industry. Somebody came up to him and asked, "How much for an Acme Widget Master 1234?"



"$X" was the reply. The guy walked off immediately. I asked my prospect, "Aren't you going to try and stop him? And I thought an Acme Widget Master 1234A56 cost $X+Y. They on sale?"



"Dan, I know you're new to the sales game, so I'll give you some help. That Guy is not my target market. He thinks he knows everything he needs to, and thinks he knows how to get the best price. He may actually know what he's doing and not need my expertise. But he wasn't going to give me the opportunity to explain that this was the price for the base model Widget Master 1234, and the Widget 789 with a couple options for about the same price is probably going to make him happier. You're not my target market, either - you know enough about these to be able to figure your needs pretty accurately. You came in and told me what characteristics you needed it to possess, which is why I told you about the A56 and quoted you that price. I was grateful gave me a chance at your business, but I didn't expect to be able to beat Major Catalog Company. All they're selling is the item. I'm selling not only the item, but also my knowledge and immediate availability, and help setting it up and technical support. Sure, That Guy is probably going to end up with something that frustrates the hell out of him at a price higher than he thought he'd pay, but he's terrified of me. He's not going to give me the opportunity to talk, and until that changes I refuse to waste my time trying."



One final example, even earlier: When my wife and I were newlyweds, we needed a household Major Item because our previous Major Item had failed. We went to several places shopping, among which were stores A and B.



Salesman at A: "You say you need type X? Oh, those are terrible, but if you spend $1000 modifying your home, you'll really love this product. Energy efficient, does a great job, and it's cheaper than the competition. No we don't have any of type X, but like I said, you don't really want those. They are awful."



Salesman at B: "You say you need type X? I'm sorry, but we don't carry any of those. I'm sorry but there's not enough demand, although I understand your situation. Tell me, have you found any anywhere? At C and also at D? What did you think of the alternatives? Thank you for helping me."



Several years later, we had need of a Different Major Item. I had kept the B salesman's card, and we went back and ended up buying from him, although we did shop elsewhere. We tried to go back again for Another Major Item recently, but he had moved on and we were disappointed, but talked with the salesperson who was there, and although we ended up buying elsewhere that time, I could see a cultural influence at work and we will continue to make a point of shopping there.



We haven't gone back to store A since the first conversation.



My point is this: Had I been Mr. Some Poor Guy, or That Guy, I would have bought from the A salesman - it was the cheapest product. Then another A salesman. And yet another A salesman. And been unsatisfied and unhappy, and generally angry at the need to spend a lot of extra money and frustration dealing with it each time - why didn't they tell him? Why weren't they simply honest? It must be because all sales scum are dishonest crooks!



Unfortunately, the real problem is not so much that the A salesman was a crook (he was a misinformed high pressure employing menace to society, but he did tell me I'd have to spend the $1000 extra), but that the strategy the customer employed is counter-productive, and does pretty much guarantee you're going to get conned - he wouldn't give the A salesman a chance to tell him about the $1000. I encourage keeping your guard up, but a request for context is an attempt to find you a product that meets your needs without costing you more than necessary. Wait until somebody actually tries to sucker punch you before you go for the right hook to the jaw followed by the one-two to the kidneys. Because the A salesmen (and women) play this game every day, and they're incredibly good at it, and it's going to be one of them that counters with a karate blow to the throat that scores a knockout (and the sale). Messrs. Some Poor Guy and That Guy are the sort who keeps the A salesmen in Lamborghinis.



The B salesman is good at a different kind of game. Typically make less money, especially at first, and so it is not the model taught by the How To Succeed in Sales Super School, and he's not the Superstar Sales Hotshot that corporate sales managers seek out to help increase their next quarterly bonus for staff productivity, but he's out there if you look, and a lot of companies from the corner shop up to the big corporations understand his value to their bottom line. Where A salesman is always hard at work looking for the next score (and is always a drain on their advertising budget, in whatever form), B salesman gets to the point where he's handling all he can with what comes to him, even generating spillover to other members of the staff. Even when he gets to the point where he's constantly saturated in business, he doesn't get stressed, he doesn't burn out, and he's not a source of problems.



Now, how would you like to find B salesmen reliably?



First, you're going to have to look hard. He's probably not going to be the first one you talk to. You're going to have to do some serious shopping. He's probably busy somewhere talking to a repeat client, not one of the vultures who are waiting around the sales floor to swoop down on you and grasp you in their greedy little talons. Second, don't expect a saint. Yes, he'll ask for the order, he may even use some pressure to try to get it. If he's not especially busy now, he's cultivating habits for later, and frankly, nobody wants to spend more time selling to a given client than is really necessary. They want to make efficient use of their time, and use the extra to either make more money with other sales, or just have fun. They are there to Make Money, not because they think standing around the sale floor (or whatever they do to generate clients) is The Most Fun They've Had With Their Pants On. They may like or even love their clients (I do the vast majority of mine), but if they weren't Making Money they wouldn't be there. The reality is that if they don't sell enough to make a living, they're not there anymore. There is a point, in all transactions, and with all customers, that it just is not worth dealing with them anymore. The sales person has things he'd rather be doing, whether it is dealing with a repeat customer's much larger transaction, spending time with the family, or just watching the game on TV at home. This point comes a lot sooner for a waffle iron than a house or a home loan, but there is a point where even the most desperate real estate agent stops initiating, stops returning, and finally stops accepting phone calls.



There is a cultural difference between the A salesman and the B salesman - they usually don't work in the same place. I've never seen a place that didn't have a strong preponderance of one or the other. There will usually be at least one A salesman on every staff, no matter how B culture the place is. But he'll find another job at an A culture establishment before too long. There are places that are so A culture that the B salesman just can't stand going to work there, so there typically aren't any B salesmen.



How to determine if someone is an A salesman or a B salesman



First off, a B salesman will always ask what you need it for, whatever the item. He may spend quite a bit of time asking about all the stuff you need, what your tradeoffs are, and all sorts of other information. This is a good sign. He's probably not looking for weaponry to force you to accept the El Cheapo Sterno can of fuel for the Bargain Price of only $9999.99, A Fraction Of The Cost (a very large fraction of 99 cents, but still a fraction). I've worked (briefly) with people who can sell ice to Eskimos at exorbitant prices, and if he's that sort, he probably doesn't need the information. Those sales people go straight for the kill. The more time he spends asking you about what you need or what you want or what your tradeoffs are, the happier you should be. The larger and more important the transaction, the more time he should spend asking you this stuff.



When he makes a recommendation or starts telling you about a product, he'll remember enough of what you told him to paraphrase it back to you, "Now, as I remember, you were telling me you were looking for something that A. Well, this item does A. And as I recall, you told me you were looking for B but had a budget of C. Well, I'm afraid all of out widgets with B cost more than C, but this one appears to meet all of your other needs. If you really need B, here's a widget that does B also, although it costs X more than C," or "I'm afraid we don't have any that do D, but I'd like to know if you've found any place that does?" Once he's shown it to you, he'll ask, "So does this do everything you're looking for, or does it fall short?" as well as questions like "So if you had this, you think you'd be happy, right?"



B salesmen will answer your questions clearly, directly, and forthrightly, and ask if this information answered the questions. He will be happy to give amplifications and clarifications, not keep repeating the same phrases.



Every sales person knows - because the sales manager makes sure he knows - that if the client leaves the premises, gets off the phone, whatever, a sale becomes much less likely. Every sales program I've ever heard of goes over and over and over this, ad nauseum. So it's not like it's any great secret. The B salesman knows it as well as the A. And they'll apply some pressure to get the sale now, whether it's considerable (B salesman) or an avalanche (A salesman). The B salesman won't trash the opposing products, though - he'll simply try to tell you where his is better, why it meets your needs, and why you should Buy Now.



It is always a clue that you're dealing with an A salesman if he finally tells you, in desperation as a last resort, "If you find a better price, come back and I'll beat it." First off, the fact that there's suddenly room on the price means it may be overpriced in the first place. Second, the reason the A salesman says that is that he really doesn't know - or care - what you want, and he's figuring to replace it (in most cases) What He Showed You with Something Cheaper That Seems About The Same when you come back. Finally, if a B salesman doesn't quote you a Pretty Damned Good Deal in the first place so he can Get This Transaction Onto The Books and go home, he knows he's going to lose customers, which are then not going to come back to him because he treated them right, and not going to tell others about him because he treated them right.



Getting back to the first shopping trip my new wife and I made together, in search of Major Item, along about the ninth or tenth store when we'd just bought what we needed, my wife said, "There is no in-between with you, is there?"



"Huh?" I replied brilliantly, having no clue what she was getting at. Remember, we were newlyweds at the time.



"These sales people. You're either the nicest guy possible or the worst (expletive) I've ever met. It's a side of you I haven't seen."



I was well aware that she had led a somewhat sheltered life until a few months before we met, and there are obligations that one has to educate your family in case you're not around. "Let me guess. You're talking about how I was joking and pleasant with B, C, and D, but cut A and G off cold, chewed E out, told F to get out of my face, and was hard on H but then friendly, and friendly again while asking pointed questions when we came back to buy?"



"Yeah."



"Beloved, B, C, and D were doing the best to help us find what we needed. They asked us intelligent questions about what we needed before showing us an item. They answered the questions I asked instead of trying to distract my attention, didn't push more than they should have, and in general were behaving like our needs were what was important. They knew you were there and were respectful to you, but they realized I was the one who was going to have to be sold, so I was the most important person in the room. Not them.



"H was a miscommunication that got cleared up. And you should ask questions again to make certain you understand just before you buy. She knew that she was likely to get the sale once we came back, and even more likely when she showed us she knew what she was doing. The questions were to make certain there were no more miscommunications - she knows what she's selling better than I do. It would be very easy for any kind of a sales person to misdirect a question while we're in the midst of the hunt. When I'm ready to buy, I'm going to make certain I understand everything I need to know about this Major Item, so I'm asking the questions in a different way to make misdirection or pat phrases obvious. H knew this, and gave me straight answers without evasions. And her product met our needs. So that's where I wanted to buy. As to why I was mean to the others, you know I'm always willing to be an (expletive) in a good cause, right?" She nodded.



"Well, A wanted to make the sale he wanted to make. Our needs weren't important. E thought she could get away with a lie, and I called her on it. I know she's going to make other sales, but not tonight. Penalty Box. F tried to use you as leverage against me. This would be acceptable though not welcome if I thought he was trying to meet our needs, but he wasn't. I told him we had to have X and his item didn't. And G didn't have a clue about X. The appropriate thing would have been to get help or tell me he didn't know but he'd find out and then go find out. He was wasting our time. And now we've got our Major Item, and we're going to go home and be happy with it and not waste any more time on this whole issue."



And we did. She still lets me do the most of the major shopping. But if a meteor hit me, she'd be a much savvier customer now than she was before I explained it. She's not afraid to deal with sales people. Which puts an end, in all senses of the term, to the Ultimate Consumer Horror Story.



Caveat Emptor.

This post was actually ready and schedule for tomorrow night, but with the mighty Instapundit actually blogging on the subject, and David Bernstein of The Volokh Conspiracy and Bill Quick of Daily Pundit I thought I'd strike while the iron is lukewarm and reschedule tonight's post for tomorrow! I also am working on an article analysing the Negative Amortization loan in depth which should be posted withing a couple weeks. The relevant information on Negative Amortization loans is several paragraphs down in the section on Alt A loans. I'll also redact some personal marketing information from a letter I've been sending out for about three months now and post it later today.





There are actually several distinct marketplaces consumers can obtain their funds from, and several types of providers. John the wealthy highly salaried person with great credit and a substantial down payment should not and usually does not obtain his mortgage from the same funds providers as his twin brother Jim, the self-employed, always-broke person with terrible credit and no down payment. They may deal with the same employee at the same business, but the funds and parameters for using those funds, are entirely different.



In order to make sense later on, I've first got to acquaint you with two concepts: yield spread and pre-payment penalty. The yield spread is what then lender pays the person or company who does the paperwork for your loan in order to give them an incentive to choose that lender, as well as any of several other reasons. The yield spread is based upon the rate of the loan, the type of the loan, etcetera



Prepayment penalty is a penalty you agree to pay if you sell your home or refinance before a certain period of time has passed. Industry standard is six months interest, with some lenders making this 80 percent of six months interest. Usually (not always) they will let you pay a certain amount over the normal, agreed upon principal per year without triggering the penalty, but if you sell or refinance out of their loan, the penalty is always triggered for the duration of the penalty. Some lenders will actually phase it out in stages, although this is not common.



Lest it be not plain to you, a prepayment penalty is a thing to avoid if you reasonably can. Let's say you get transferred and need to sell the house in six months, and that you have a $200,000 loan at 6%. That's six thousand dollars less that you will receive from the sale of your home, not to mention that the average person refinances every two years, which is typically the shortest pre-payment penalty. If you need to refinance within two years, that's six thousand dollars of your equity gone for no good purpose. Mind you, if you need the loan, and it gets you the loan, so be it. It's still a thing to avoid.



The top of the food chain from the point of view of consumers are the so-called A paper lenders. This market is controlled by the two federally chartered giants, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Lenders who participate in these markets lend in full accordance with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac rules, because they want to be able to sell the loan to them. In many cases, they actually do sell them seamlessly by retaining the servicing rights, and the consumer never knows they have done it. In others, they retain the loans entire, and in still others, they sell them off entire. They do this for many reasons, but mostly to raise cash so they can do more loans. In any case, the only difference it should make to you, the consumer, is where to address the check and who to make it out to. Unlike the other markets, if the lender pays a yield spread in this market it does not automatically mean that there will be a pre-payment penalty. Although they will pay a higher yield spread if the loan officer sticks the client with a pre-payment penalty (and the longer the prepayment penalty is, the more they will pay). WARNING! Many loan officers will not tell you about it unless asked ("Why bring up a reason not to choose your loan?" is a direct quote I've heard any number of times) and some will flat out lie even if you ask. This is not ethical, but they know they can almost certainly get away with it. There really is no reason why an A paper loan should have a prepayment penalty, except that a loan officer wanted to get paid more.



It is not difficult to qualify for an A paper loan. As long as you're not taking equity out of the home, they can go through with credit scores as low as 620 (full documentation) or 660 (stated income), although there are caveats. Despite what you read in Internet pop-ups, according to National Mortgage Reporting a 660 credit score is more than forty points below the national average. So even someone with modestly below average credit can still qualify for an A paper loan. There are minimum equity requirements, however. And it doesn't matter if you are King Midas who has never failed to pay a bill immediately in full or someone who barely staggers over the line into qualification by the computer models put out by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. This is it. The top. You all have the exact same rate choices. There is nothing better.



The next niche below A paper is called A minus. The rates are a little bit higher, and there are prepayment penalties anytime the lender pays a yield spread. Then comes the so-called Alt A, which are typically loans for fairly unusual circumstances. The credit scores here go down to about 580, although there is less standardization. The worst, most dangerous, absolutely awful loan in the world comes from the "Alt A" world. There are all kinds of friendly sounding names for it, like "Option ARM", "pick a pay", and such things, but they are all negative amortization loans at their heart - you end up owing more than you borrow. They sound benign: "pick your monthly payment!" But in fact most people choose the minimum monthly payment which capitalizes and then amortizes more money into your loan every month. Every single one I've ever heard about carries a prepayment penalty. I see adds for these abominations every day all over the internet. If anybody quotes you a mortgage rate below 3%, I will bet you millions to milliamps they are trying to sell you one of these (despite the fact that there are other loans out there below 3% right now). There seriously are providers that do nothing but these - they're easy to sell to unsuspecting victims because the minimum payment is so small. There really isn't space here to go over everything that's wrong with them (or where they may be appropriate), but except in certain special circumstances, RUN AWAY! And do not do business with that person! They have just proven themselves unworthy of your business.



(Every so often, a representative from a new lender walks into my office. I'm always glad to talk to them so long as they answer my questions in a straightforward way, but I have one inflexible rule. If the first thing they talk about is a Negative Am loan - no matter the happy sounding name they call it by, I throw them out and do not allow them to return. I think it indicative of the state of things in the Negative Am world that the one time I had a client who would actually benefit from this thing, and I took the time to tell him exactly where all of the traps I knew about were, give him strategies to turn it to maximum benefit, and he agreed that he wanted to do it - not one of the five companies I tried would actually approve the loan.)



The final niche that comes from regular lenders is called sub prime. And in the world of sub prime lending you can do a lot of things that higher rungs on the ladder will not allow you to do. As in A minus, anytime the lender pays a yield spread there will be a pre-payment penalty, and I think I've run across exactly one sub prime loan that didn't have a prepayment penalty in my whole time as a loan officer. However, the people who subsidize sub prime lenders just don't have a whole lot of choice. This is typically the only way they're actually getting a home loan, be it because of low credit, low equity, or what have you. The rates are high, but it's that or nothing. Sub prime loans are very lucrative - the average lender or broker specializing in them usually makes about 5 points - 5 percent of the loan amount - on each and every loan. I've had people thank me so profusely I was almost embarrassed when I got them a loan on something more closely resembling a typical margin from higher niches. The lines between A minus, Alt A, and sub prime are blurring more and more as time goes on. It is to the point now where if someone says they do sub prime, that usually means Alt A and A minus as well - it's just a matter of where on the spectrum a given client sits.



The final niche is Hard Money. These are not typical lenders as all. They are agents for individual investors, sometimes even carrying the loan themselves in their own person. The rates for this start an absolute rock bottom of about 13 percent, and go up from there. Typically there will be a front-end charge of about 5 percent of the loan amount, and a prepayment penalty of about 7%. These are loans for people with sub 500 credit scores, people with homes that have been damaged in some way and must make repairs before a regular lender will touch the property, and so on and so forth. The equity requirements are large - 75 percent of the value of the home based upon a conservative appraisal is about the highest a hard money lender will go, and most are less. Everybody until this point is in the business of making loans, and is likely to cut you as much slack as practical if you have some difficulty making payments, as they are not in the business of foreclosures. A hard money lender has no such constraint. They will foreclose on your home without a second thought. One way or another, they will get their money back and then some. WARNING! It is common practice on the part of hard money lenders to have you sign the Note and Deed of Trust "conditional" upon them finding an investor. The person signing the documents thinks the loan is done, and that their situation (usually a time critical one) is resolved, and everything is all roses now, but it isn't. They may still want you to pay for multiple appraisals, jump through multitudinous hoops, and still not give you the loan in the end. This is just their way of binding you to them so that you don't or can't go elsewhere. Not that this is completely unknown in the higher niches, but it's not common, as it is here.



There are three main types of places to go to get a loan. The first is a regular lender. The second is what I call a "packaging house", although in practical terms it is very similar to a regular lender. The third is a broker. Each has their advantages and disadvantages.



A regular lender is what you think of when you think of a bank. Most of the big names are regular lenders. They typically have their own offices, often mingled with other banking functions. They have their own funds, wherever they've gotten them from, and they have executives and such that put together their own loan programs, complete with criteria for approving or not approving a given loan. These people do loans with at least the possibility of keeping them in mind, and some do keep every loan they do, while others sell almost every loan. The good news is that they'll typically be slightly more willing to make exceptions around the edges (whether or not the loan is a good one for you!). The bad news, from the consumer point of view, is that they consider you a captive from the moment you walk in the door. Even if they know of another lender with better pricing or a program that suits your needs better, they're still going to keep you "in-house". And their loan pricing is such that it's going to pay for all of the salaries and benefits for all of the people in the office, and the beautiful office itself and all of its contents.



A "packaging house" is like a regular lender except that they do their loans with the explicit intention of selling off every single one, either immediately or a few months down the line. Practical difference to consumer: there's a 100% chance you're going to end up making payments to someone else. In other words, no big deal. The original lender recently sold my own home loan. The only difference is that now I write the check to company B instead of company A, and mail it to place X instead of place Y. California has stronger consumer mortgage protection laws than the federal government, but there are laws in place nationwide for the consumer's protection that avoid payments being unjustly marked late because your mortgage was sold.



A broker is not lending their own money, but is being paid instead to put the loan together and get it to the point where it is funded, at which point they are out of the picture. A packaging house could, in theory, decide to keep a particular loan. A broker doesn't have this option - it's not their money being loaned, but instead that of a regular lender or a packaging house. On the down side, a broker has somewhat less leverage to get underwriters to make exceptions to the rules (although the difference is academic for those outside this narrow range). There is also a lot of variation on quality. You'll find the very best loan officers in the country working as loan brokers - and the very worst, as well. On the up side, a broker always has at least the ability to get you a lower price than the other alternatives, although they may not have the willingness. First, a good broker shops many different lenders to find the program that's priced best for you. This is less important but still very noticeable at the A paper level (A paper had pretty standardized rules) then it is for borrowers whose situations (either through credit, or through needing to do something A paper doesn't support) need to go to markets lower down on the totem pole. On the other hand, I (as a broker) get better pricing from the lenders, either regular or packaging house, than their own loan officers. Why? Partially because they're not paying my support expenses - office rent, furnishings, support staff salaries, etcetera. Mostly because it's my customer, and I can and will take my customer elsewhere if they don't give me the best possible deal. Every week when I do the family shopping, I see the banks in the local supermarkets offering their mortgage deals, and I always smile because I'm always getting somebody a better price on the same loan from that same lender.



Caveat Emptor.

UPDATE: This article has been updated here

Everybody knows that you want the lowest rate, and everybody knows that you don't want to pay any money you don't have to, in order to get it. However, not everybody makes the connection that it is always a tradeoff between the two. At any given point in time, each home lender has it's own set of tradeoffs in place.



There are two components to the costs of a loan: Closing costs and points. Points have to do with the cost of the money. Closing costs relate to the work that has to be performed in order to get the loan done. These are not junk fees, although junk fees do happen.



Let us consider for a moment the home loan. You want to buy a home for your family, but don't have enough cash. Without somebody willing to loan you the difference, you cannot buy. You check with your family, your friends, your neighbors and they're all tapped out (or say they are). But there's a bank over there willing to loan it if you meet their terms.



The banks are not being altruists, of course. They're making a good chunk of change for doing so. But you would not believe the amount of complaints I hear out sympathetically about how this evil horrible bank is charging all this money and making people jump through all these hoops to get this money ("They want a pay stub! Actually they want two pay stubs! What is the problem with these nazis?"). Fact is that this bank is doing you a favor, risking hundreds of thousands of dollars on you so that you can own a home for your family. They are doing something for you that all of your friends and family were unwilling or unable to do: loan you the money to buy a home. I'd say that puts them pretty high on my "nifty list", not "Nazis", but it's your life. When you think about it, they're doing you a favor by making certain you can afford the payments on the loan (It's more than many agents and many loan officers will do), as well as insuring that if something goes wrong and you can't afford the loan, they'll get most of their money back. Real Estate is not sold on a whim. Right now, another agent in my office has a listing of an $800,000 home. The family makes about $60,000 a year. Their interest alone is 76% of their gross pay, never mind property taxes and insurance. An unscrupulous agent sold them the house based upon the ability to flip it whenever they wanted, and found them a similar loan agent to get them a negative amortization loan so they've got about fifteen hundred dollars a month being added to their mortgage and they still can't make the payment. But real estate is not like stock; you can't sell it at will. The market cooled just a little bit. They've already lost their entire investment, and they've come to our office to get it sold before worse things happen, and we're doing everything that can be done, and still nobody wants to buy it.



There's a lot of this out there. You would likely be amazed at the loans a competent loan officer can qualify you for (and that if you understood what you were getting into, you'd drag them into the sunlight and run a wooden stake through their hearts before running away, instead of believing them to be your friend). I'd get an extra client a week, at least, if I didn't sit down with the people to find out what they can really afford before I showed them the $800,000 house that's going to get me paid a Huge Pile Of Money, when I really should be telling them about 2 or 3 bedroom condominiums, or even telling them to continue renting. It's hard to get a client enthusiastic about a 2 bedroom condo, particularly when someone else is showing them a 5 bedroom 2800 square foot House With It's Own Yard and No Shared Walls and telling them they know Someone Who Can Get The Loan. But the world will catch up to these agents and loan officers, and I put a certain value on staying in business.



Getting back to the issue of closing costs, there is work that has to be done before you get your loan. The people who do that work are entitled to be paid. You don't work for free. They're not going to work for free. As I have covered elsewhere, realistic closing costs without junk fees are about $3400, and can easily be higher. The bank is not just going to absorb the cost because they're going to make money off the loan.



Each home loan, whether the lender intends to sell it or not, has a value on the secondary market. They also cost the lender a certain amount (they have to pay for all money they lend, whether by borrowing or by opportunity cost). Based upon these two facts, the lender sets a level of discount points or rebate for each rate for each type of loan. When you pay discount points, you are actually paying the lender money in order to buy a rate that you would not otherwise be able to get. When there is a rebate, it means that the lender will pay out money for a loan done on those terms. A rebate can be thought of as a negative discount, and vice versa. Whatever the level it is set at by the lender, there's going to be an additional margin so that the broker or loan officer can get paid, even if the loan officer is an employee of that lender. This margin is not necessarily smaller by going direct to a lender - actually a broker usually has a better margin than that lender's own loan officers. As I say elsewhere, the supermarket banks often have their best rates posted, and I'm usually getting someone a better loan (lower cost/rate tradeoff) with the same lender.



But within a given type of loan, the lender always sets the loan discount higher for the lowest rate. The lower the rate, the higher the discount and the higher the rate the lower the discount. Choose the lowest rate, and pay not only closing costs but the highest discount as well. Whether it's coming out of your checkbook or being added to your mortgage, you are still paying it. Choose a somewhat higher rate, and there will be no discount points, just closing costs. There's a name for this rate where there's no points but no rebate; it's called par. Rates below par involve discount points, rates above par will get you some or all of your closing costs paid by the bank or broker.



Many people will want the lowest rate; after all that has the lowest payment. It is (or should be) your choice. It's actually easier to qualify for lower rates, because the payment is lower. However these lower rates can be costly, because the fact is that the median mortgage in this country is about two years, and fewer than 5% of all loans are less than 5 years old. This means there's a 50% chance you've refinanced (or sold and bought a new home) within two years, and over 95% within 5 years. I see no reason for these consumer habits to change. Furthermore, I'm a consumer, and so are you. There are people who bought a place and paid off their 30 year loan and now own the property free and clear, but they are rare these days. Much more common is the person who bought their house in the 1970s, has refinanced ten or twelve or fourteen times, and now owes ten times the original purchase price. More common yet is the person who's on the third, fourth, or fifth house since then. You might be one of the first group, or you might not be, pretend you are, and be hurting only yourself. It's likely to be a costly illusion.



Let's look at three different 30-year fixed rate loans. All of them start from needing $270,000 in loan money. Loan 1 gets a 5.5% rate, but has to pay two points to get it, so his loan balance starts at $270,000 plus $3400 plus two points, or $278,980. He paid $8980 to get his loan. Loan 2 gets a 6% rate at par, and his loan balance starts at $273,400, because he only had to pay $3400 to get the loan. Finally, Loan 3 chooses a 6.5% loan where all closing costs are paid for him by the bank or broker. His loan balance starts at $270,000.



Your first month interest with Loan 1 is $1278.66, and principal paid is 305.36, on a payment of $1584.02. Loan 2 pays $1367.00 interest and $272.17 principal with a loan payment of $1639.17. Loan 3 is going to pay interest of $1462.50, principal of $244.08, and have a total payment of $1706.58. So far, it's looking like Loan 1 is the best of all possible loans, right? But look two years down the line when 50 percent of these people have refinanced or sold:

Loan Loan 1 Loan 2 Loan 3



Interest pd. $30,288.21 $32,418.26 $34,720.18



Principal pd. $7,728.21 $6,921.84 $6,237.83



Balance $271,251.79 $266,478.16 $263,762.17



interest diff: $-2130.05 $0 $2301.92



balance dif: $+4773.36 $0 $-2715.99



Net $ $-2643.31 $0 $+414.07



Remember, the original balance was $270,000. Loan 1 has paid $2130 less in interest the Loan 2, while Loan 3 has paid $2301.92 more. Furthermore, Loan 1 has paid down $7728 in principal, while Loan 2 has only paid down $6921 and Loan 3 still less at $6237. It's really looking like Loan 1 was the best choice.



But remember, 50% of all loans have refinanced or sold within two years. When you refinance or sell, the benefits you paid money to get stop. But the costs to get those benefits are sunk on the front end, and you're not getting them back. Look at the balance of Loan 1. The person who chose this still owes $271,251 - $1251 than they did before they chose the loan in the first place. Furthermore, his balance is $4773 higher than loan 2, and even though he paid $2130 less in interest, he's still $2643 worse off. Furthermore, whether he refinances or sells and rolls the proceeds over into a new property, the new loan is going to be for $4773 more money than Loan 2's new loan. Assume everybody got a really fantastic new loan at 5%. Loan 1 is going to have to pay $238 more per year to start with in interest expense for his new loan, simply because his remaining balance on the old loan was higher. Loan 3 is in even better shape than Loan 2. He's paid $2301.92 more in interest, but his balance is $2715.99 lower, for a net benefit over loan 2 of $414, not to mention that his interest costs on his new loan will be almost $136 lower simply because his starting balance is lower.



Now let's look 5 years out, when over 95% of the people will have sold or refinanced.



Loan Loan 1 Loan 2 Loan 3



Interest pd. $74,007.65 $79,360.88 $85,144.66



Principal pd. $21,033.41 $18,989.39 $17,250.36



Balance $257,946.59 $254,410.61 $252,749.63



interest diff: $-5353.23 $0 $+5783.78



balance diff: $+3535.98 $0 $-1660.98



Net $ $+1817.25 $0 $-4122.80



At this point, Loan 1 has saved $5353 in interest relative to Loan 2, while Loan 3 has spent $5783 more. Loan 1 has cut his balance difference to $3535 more than Loan 2, so he looks like he's ahead! Furthermore, Loan 3 is really lagging, having paid $5783 more in interest although the difference in balance is only $1660 to his good.



Well, loan 2 is ahead of loan 3 pretty much permanently at this point. Assuming all three refinance or sell and buy a new property with a 5% loan right now, Loan 3 is only going to get back $83 per year of the $4122.80 he's down relative to Loan 2. Especially considered on a time value of money, that's permanent. But despite Loan 1 being ahead of Loan 2 right now, Loan 2 will get back almost $177 per year. Ten years on, assuming a ver low 5% rate, loan 2 is back to even, and most of us are going to be property holders the rest of our lives. Consider also that 95% of the people who chose loan 1 NEVER got this far - they never broke even in the first place.



The point I'm trying to get across is that money you roll into your balance hangs around a very long time. And you're sinking potentially many thousands of dollars into a bet that most people lose. Yes, if you keep the loan long enough, the lower rates (at least for thirty year fixed rate loans) will pretty much always pay for themselves, several times over in many cases. The other point I'm trying to make is that most people don't keep their loan long enough for the benefits to pay for their costs to get those benefits.



As a final consideration, consider what happens if one year later interest rates are one-half percent lower. I can get Loan 3 the same loan that Loan 2 has for zero cost. He's got the same interest rate as Loan 2, whom I can't help right now, but a lower balance - neither one of his loans cost him anything. And it has happened that the rates dropped down to where I could get someone 5.5% on a thirty year fixed rate loan for zero - lender pays me enough to pay all the closing costs. Net to them, zip. Suppose rates do this again. I call Loan 2 and Loan 3, and now they've both got 5.5 %, but this doesn't help Loan 1. Now Loan 2 has the same as Loan 1, while only adding $3400 to his balance to get it, as opposed to Loan 1 adding nearly $9000, and Loan 3 has the same loan without adding a dime to his balance. Who's in the best position?



Caveat Emptor



This article has been updated here

For all the fact that I rant on about problems in out national mortgage market here in the United States, the problems are mostly on a retail level. Almost in their entirety, they have to deal with what happens when one consumer meets one provider, and I believe that they will vanish when the consumers are informed of the facts, and take the time to make rational, informed choices.



The fact is that for mortgage providers, there are strong incentives to lie to consumers. "Everybody else does it, too - how else am I going to compete?" Also, real closing costs seem high. Real closing costs are high enough that many states with so-called "predatory lending laws," limiting the amount in total charges as a percentage of the mortgage, either have already repealed them or are considering repealing them so that their residents can get loans. I can talk to people about closing costs that have been significantly reduced by contracts I have with service providers, and they'll say, "Costs seem high." Well, yes they are expensive, but they're real, and what I tell you about up front actually covers what my clients will be asked to pay. Just because we allow you to roll them into your mortgage, where you pay interest on them for the rest of your life, instead of the money coming out of your checking account doesn't mean you somehow didn't pay this money.



So We can take it as proven that there's an incentive for loan officers to minimize costs of their loan in conversation with you. Many will tell you anything it takes to get you to sign up with them, do anything they can to force you to stay with them (signing fees or lock fees up front are common, and THE BIGGEST RED FLAG I KNOW, and requiring you to give them original documents is almost as common and almost as large). They will penalize you out of spite if you decide you don't want their loan.



From almost the first moment a consumer talks to some mortgage providers, they are lied to. The fact is that as long as the rate that they quote you is available, the providers won't be held responsible if you don't get it. If you ask them what there rate is on a 30 year fixed rate mortgage without points and they reply with a the rate that's available on a 30 year loan that's fixed for one month at a time with five points, that's actually legal. They can sign you up for the former, deliver the latter 30 days later, and with rare exceptions that they are adept at avoiding, not get in legal trouble. They can tell you all about a loan that's based upon completely different qualifications than the ones you possess, in order to get you to sign up. And many loan officers, from the largest, "most reputable" banks on down to the smallest brokers working out of their home, make a habit of it. The examples I give above may be more extreme than usually happens, but it's a matter of degree, not kind. Blatantly unethical is still blatantly unethical, whether they're stealing multiple tens of thousands of dollars from you, or "just a few thousand between friends." If you found out you were victimized by a Nigerian 419 scam, I'm sure you'd feel much better to find out that you were only taken for $3000, where it could have been $30,000, right? This is no different. No, let me take that back - it's worse. If the loan provider were honest, your patronage would still have put a lot of money in their wallets, and they backstab you to get more?



The first thing to keep in mind is that all of the incentives are aligned for them to tell you ANYTHING in order to get you to sign up with them. The fact is, many people, once they sign the initial papers, consider themselves committed to that provider, and won't switch no matter what. At the end of the process, many loan providers are adept at hiding the crucial things you should study carefully in amongst the sometimes dozens of pieces of trivial paper that you have to sign. A large portion of people victimized in this way never notice that the loan delivered had three points more than the loan they signed you up for. A few more only realize it weeks later when they get a statement loan balance is much higher than they thought, and it's too late to do anything about it. And of those people who do notice that something is amiss when they're actually signing the final documents, eight to nine out of ten will cave in and sign. They're tired of the whole process, all they have to do to have it be over is sign right there on the dotted line. And if it's a purchase, the consumers are under a deadline. It's the thirty-ninth day of a thirty day escrow, and if they don't sign the loan documents right now, they not only don't get the house, they also lose their deposit and the extra money they've been paying to keep the escrow open while the loan officer got his (or her) stuff together and decided exactly how much in extra charges to stick them for. The leverage available to the consumer in such a situation is Zero. Zilch. Zip. Nada.



I'm going to make what seems like a heretical suggestion here. This is truly radical. The resistance in some quarters (particularly loan officers) to this suggestion is enormous. I can already hear howls of outrage already from loan officers and their bosses. Furthermore, I can hear millions of consumers griping about the paperwork involved already, and I haven't even said it yet - except to fewer than a dozen clients who took this advice and are forever grateful to me.



Apply for a back-up loan.



It isn't precisely a walk in the park to do the extra paperwork, I'll admit. But it isn't thirty years in purgatory either. There are issues to be aware of (most notable being the appraisal, about which more in another column), and extra charges to put up with from the appraiser, escrow and title companies. $100 to $200 if you handle it right, $500 or a little more if you don't. But this is likely the most cost effective insurance policy a consumer can buy today, and I'm going to harp on it until something changes this fact



You see:



Every so often I encounter a client who I'm certain has been lied to, and believes every word of it. I know what rates really are available, and at what cost. And this person has been quoted something where, if it were true, that loan officer not only isn't going to make money but is actually going to pay hundreds or thousands of dollars of their own money in order to get it for the client. Unless John or Jenny Consumer is a close relative or the loan officer literally owes them their life, it doesn't take a genius to know that's not going to happen. (Some of the worst taking advantage of someone that I've observed on the part of loan officers has been from Uncle Bob, the first cousin they grew up with, or even Sister Sue, but I digress). So every once in a while, I volunteer to act as a back up loan. They cooperate with me for the paperwork, and I will do the work, knowing full well that if their primary loan goes through as advertised, it's all a waste of my time, effort, and money.



Every single time it's been my loan that they ended up getting.



Furthermore, there have been other situations where I wasn't 100 percent sure - the rate existed, and it was possible the loan officer might deliver something similar if they were willing to settle for a lot less compensation than most loan officers, and so I didn't make the offer, and they came back to me weeks later with "Can you still do that loan you talked about?" (The answer to this is ALWAYS no. Rates at every bank vary daily, and often within a day - even the sub prime lenders that publish rate books good for months have adjustments that change daily. This is part of the importance of a lock. But usually I can do something similar, and sometimes better if the rates have gone down).



Most consumers do not realize that there is not necessarily any correlation at all between the loan you sign an application for and the loan that gets delivered with the approved documents ready for a notarized signature. It's completely dependent upon the good will and good faith of that particular loan officer and the company they represent. Some are completely honest. Some are looking for extra bits and pieces of cash to pick up around the edges. And some will take the odd arm and leg from you if they figure they have the opportunity. Even those few companies that do guarantee their rates and closing costs up front are difficult to collect from if they should be stretching the truth. If I had a dollar for every time I told somebody that I didn't believe a rate was real and they responded, "I've got the paperwork on it," as if that settled the question (or made any difference at all), it'd make a real difference in my mortgage balance. Oh, most of the time from most companies, if they sign you up for a thirty year fixed rate mortgage, they will actually deliver a thirty year fixed rate mortgage, and the rate will generally be about comparable, albeit with two points and $2000 in extra closing costs they somehow forgot to mention (Quoth the loan officer: "Clumsy me!"). But until then, they'll be throwing around all kinds of rates on all kinds of loans just to get you to call, to come in, or sit down and talk. Once that happens, they are confident that their A salesmen (see my essay on A salesmen and B salesmen) will get you signed up.



If you have a back up loan, you've got something else waiting to go. Another arrow in your quiver. Plan B. Your fallback position is defended. You're not going to lose the house and the deposit and the extra money to prolong escrow if you don't sign these papers right now. You're not going to have to choose between completely missing the lowest rates available since your grandparents were children and are now unavailable and paying $6000 more than you were told for your refinance. You're not hanging out there all alone at the end of the process after discovering that your trust was completely misplaced Here you have a solid, bona fide alternative. Imagine yourself with the ability to say, "No, I'll just sign the other papers instead." You'd be amazed at the leverage this gives you, with both companies if need be.



If you want to watch someone experience a truly amazing level of discomfort, tell a loan officer you're signing up for a back up loan with someone else. Most of them will say literally anything and do their absolute best to talk you out of it. I'll admit, even I would be momentarily nonplussed. I would hope that I would respond with "Okay. How do you want to handle the appraisal?" (assuming that it hadn't already been done) secure in the knowledge that I actually intend to deliver the loan I said on precisely those terms. You see, given the circumstances, I don't think you're doing anything wrong. If you asked me, I'd have to agree you were simply being prudent. Because until I actually put the final documents in front of you for your signature, there literally is no way for me to prove that I intend to deliver that loan on those terms. (There are a lot of red flags that if a consumer runs across them mean the loan officer isn't going to deliver the loan promised, but a competent loan officer can conceal them. There's also one thing that happens on every loan that looks like a big red flag, but isn't one at all). There's a lot of paper I can put in front of you that makes it look like I intend to deliver the loan I promised. None of it actually means anything in the way of a guarantee. At the present time, the only form or piece of paperwork that a loan officer cannot play games with is a form called the HUD-1 - and that doesn't come until the very end of the process. So until then, what you're really relying upon is the loan officer's good will to deliver the loan they signed you up for, on the terms you signed up for. Some fully intend to deliver the exact terms of every loan, and some will tell you anything to get you to sign up. Guess which the short-term dynamics of the marketplace favor. Here's a hint: If the loan officer can't get you to sign up for a loan, there's an absolute gold-plated guarantee they won't make anything.



If you shop multiple alternatives like you should for a mortgage, it's quite likely somebody is going to tell you that the best rate you've been quoted doesn't really exist, at least not at the level of closing costs indicated. That's your perfect opening. Ask them "So will you volunteer to be my back up loan?" They're going to try to talk you into going with them, of course, and forgetting that other guy, not to mention all this heretical, unheard-of, ridiculous nonsense about back up loans. Disregarding the fact that a back-up loan gives you leverage over them, they want you to put money in their pocket and not the other loan officer's.



Not too long ago, I had one of my clients tell me somebody had told her I wouldn't be making anything if I delivered the loan I promised. "Okay," I thought, "She has a fair enough concern. There's no way for her to know I actually intend to deliver this loan, and certainly no way real way to prove it until the HUD 1 is ready at signing. Just because it's me doesn't mean anything to her until I've actually got the track record of delivering what I quote." Keeping this in mind, I told her something consistent with what I'm telling you right now. Offer to do the loan documents to make the other guy her backup if he was that certain - if he was wrong, the only cost would be that his work would be uncompensated, something loan officers get used to, and if he was right, he'd be right there ready to close his loan and get paid. (The other loan officer declined. She ended up with my loan - on exactly the terms quoted at time of lock).



Indeed, in my experience, it is more likely that the person who tells you something isn't real is likely to be a closer approximation to ethical than average. This doesn't mean that the person who gave you the best quote necessarily doesn't intend to deliver. They could just be comfortable making less per loan than the competition. And this doesn't mean you shouldn't get back to the guy who gave you the low quote with some pretty pointed questions, including the information that you're signing up for a back-up loan. Make the calls and stick to your guns. Maybe you'll end up signing up with the second guy as a primary and find a different provider for your back up. It'll depend upon factors I can't see from here. But find the back up, if you can. If you can't, it likely means that the guy who quotes you the lowest rate is quoting you something that at least exists, and he could potentially deliver if he actually wants to. But there is no way to prove he wants to. Which is precisely the reason you need the backup.



Word to the wise: Do follow up on both loans. Sign the application documents for both loan officers; provide your copies to both of them. And make certain, to the extent you can, that both loan officers are actually doing their work. The backup loan is useless as leverage if it's not actually ready to go at about the same time as the primary. (This is one indicator as to which of the two loan officers knows what they're doing. It has happened that on the last day to sign and still fund within deadline, I had my back-up loan ready to go, and the primary loan officer didn't have theirs ready despite a head start. So I suppose I can't prove the other loan wasn't real - but it sure wasn't ready on time, and that's unreal enough to be another reason why you want to apply for a back up loan!



Caveat Emptor

This article has been updated here

(Continued from part I)



Below the "Estimated Closing Costs" line, there are three more sections. The first is "Items required by lender to be paid in advance." These are not negotiable - they are what they are, and except for mortgage insurance or PMI, correct accounting should be the same no matter who the loan provider is. Of course that doesn't stop many providers from playing games to make it look like their loan is cheaper. Sometimes the items in this segment or the one below it may not be exactly knowable in advance.



"901 Interest for (blank) days at $(blank) per day." This is a good example of a fee that isn't exactly knowable in advance. On a refinance, until the current lender comes back with a payoff demand (which are usually in the form of $X, plus $ABC.DE interest per day after Date 1, invalid after Date 2), all I can do is estimate. It should be a pretty accurate estimate if I have last month's statement. On either a purchase or refinance, when the lender's loan funder sends to the funds for the new loan, they will tell how much prepaid interest the escrow company needs to collect, which is also in a comparable form. The same thing applies to that figure as well. Until the actual quote is in our hands, all we can do is estimate closely.



The reason for line item 901 is simple. Unlike rent, mortgage interest and payments are made in arrears. They can't charge you interest until they earn it. You could win the lottery, get an inheritance, or receive some other large windfall, and decide to pay your loan off (or down). You could also sell your house or refinance it. This would affect the amount of interest the current lender is owed. So you borrow the money at the beginning of the month, it accrues interest all month long, and you make a payment at the end of the month. So when you buy a house on March 15th, the lender is going to require you to pay interest on the loan from March 15th through the 31st in advance. This gives them a chance for their servicing department to set everything up. On April first, the loan will start accruing interest normally, and your first regular payment will be due after the end of April - May first to be precise.



When you refinance on March 15, you must pay the old lender for interest due between March 1st and March 15th, which has accrued since the last time you paid them on March 1st. You must also pay the new lender for the interest due from March 16th through March 31st. Between the old lender and the new lender, this figure can never be anything but the whole entire month worth of interest, and there will always be one or two days of overlap between the time they get the funds from the new lender and the time they are disbursed to the old lender. Around the beginning of the month, it can be two months interest if the old lender hasn't received your payment yet or hasn't credited it yet. You borrowed the money from them for the time in question. They are entitled to be paid. They're not going to let you keep it out of the goodness of their hearts, especially not when you're leaving them.



As you can see from the above, you never actually skip a month (or two) in your payments when you buy or refinance your home. It is not going to happen. What is happening is that your new lender is paying for this interest out of their pocket and adding it to the loan balance where you will be paying interest on it for a very long time. Pretty sneaky, huh? Well, you do have the option of making a payment to cover this line, or any other line on this whole form. Many providers will not tell you this because they can't run up the loan amount (and their compensation) if you make these payments. If you decide to make the payment to cover this line, it will be the interest portion of your normal monthly payment, prorated between the two loans in the case of a refinance, or prorated on that portion of the month you have a loan in the case of a purchase. In most cases, I tell people to think of it as their normal monthly payment paid early, because that is a reasonable approximation.



The most common game played with this line is to decrease the number of days of interest you'll actually be paying. Let's say you're planning this on June 1st, and your loan provider tells you "don't worry about it. We're going to close on July 1st". First off, the chances of this actually happening as planned on any particular day are slim. Second, it's pointless to try. If you do close on July 1st, the lender is going to ask for all the interest for the month of July up front, and your loan starts working normally August first with your first payment being due September first. Third, I've learned the easy way (from watching other people make this mistake, not wanting to lose clients of my own) never delay closing - it always gives something else a chance to pop up, and it's amazing how often something does. It's amazing how often something new pops up at the last minute without this gratuitous opportunity. If you can close it NOW, do so. Once those loan documents are recorded, the bank can't call the money back unless you violate the contract.



As I have said, on a refinance the number of days prepaid interest can never be anything less than the entire month. Period. Somebody writes anything less than 30 days on this line, they're trying to pull the wool over your eyes. On a purchase, look thirty days out or to the last day for close of escrow according to the contract, and estimate the number of days left in that calendar month. There's the number that should be written. If a loan officer can't do it in thirty days, chances are they can't do it at all on the quoted terms or anything similar, and chances are they were playing games with you from the first. The only general exceptions to this are when refinance is booming. For instance, during the summer of 2003 the delay between complete loan package being submitted to the bank and the underwriter actually looking at it for the first time got to be more than thirty days right there, never mind the time it took for everything else. And even then I could usually run purchases through another department in close to a normal time frame. If you're not writing a check to cover prepaid interest, and you have a $270,000 loan at six percent, that's $1350 getting added to your loan when you may not want it to be.



"902 Mortgage Insurance Premium" This is another one of those lines that needs discussion. First off, the odds of it really needing to happen, or being in your best interest if it does, are vanishingly small. In the hundreds of loans I've pushed through I've never actually had a loan that included mortgage insurance. It was never the best thing to do for the client.



Let's take a step back and ask, "What is mortgage insurance?" It's an insurance policy that the lender makes you, their client, buy for their benefit so that if you default they get the full amount of their loan. The usual threshold for this is 80 percent of the appraised value of the house. Mortgage insurance is never tax deductible when it's a separate charge, and is always charged based upon the full amount of the loan, and the amount of the loan expressed as a percentage of the value of the home. The larger the loan, the more you pay, the higher your loan value as a percentage of your home's value, the more you pay. It is commonly assessed as a separate charge, but can be expressed as a rate surcharge on the loan interest you'd pay anyway (in other words, say a 6.625% rate on your loan instead of 6%).



"What good does mortgage insurance do me, the consumer?" you may ask. The short answer is it gets you the loan. It gets you the loan when you would be turned down without it. After that, it's just money out of your pocket every month. Mortgage Insurance, also called Private Mortgage Insurance or PMI, is primarily a thing that happens in the A paper world (sub prime loans are usually incrementally priced to cover the higher risk, as the lenders there are in the business of taking those risks for appropriate compensation), and more importantly, it's usually avoidable.



PMI is only charged if the first mortgage exceeds 80% of the value of the home. But if I split even a 100% loan into two pieces with the first mortgage 80 percent or below, it goes away. Yes, the second mortgage will be at a higher interest rate, and yes, the closer to 100 percent of the home value it gets the higher that rate gets. But this tends to be on significantly smaller amounts of money, and this is an interest expense - deductible in most cases. The difference in total interest expense and total monthly payment tends to be in favor of doing this even without mortgage insurance or tax treatment factored in. So when I'm shopping a given loan around, sometimes I don't always even ask about doing the loan as one loan.



"With all this against mortgage insurance, why does it still happen?" you ask. At last the critical question. Lenders usually pay yield spread (to brokers or their own loan officers) based upon the amount of the first loan. Pay for a second is typically (not always) a flat amount or zero. Your loan provider makes more money by doing it all as one loan. The loan provider wants to make more money and sticks you with the bill.



"903 Hazard Insurance Premium" This is mostly for purchases, the yearly hazard insurance or homeowner's insurance premium. Any sane lender is going to require you to pay your insurance premium through escrow or before closing. They do not want there to be even a fractional second when their investment in the property is not insured. Of course, you don't want this either. I can't imagine paying the current cost of housing around here and not insuring the investment. So they're not asking for anything outrageous on this line. Unless you are one of those people who won't insure their properties, the net cost to you is zero.



"905 VA Funding Fee" I haven't done a VA loan in three years. All I remember is that it's charged by the VA on VA loans, not by the lender. If it's applicable, it's going to be the same no matter what lender is doing it.



The final section is reserves of money held by the lender to be used to pay your expenses. This is your money; they're just holding it for you in order to make sure these items get paid on time. If you sell the property or refinance you should get this money back.



These are once again, not truly costs of the loan, unless you roll them into your mortgage where you're going to pay interest on them basically forever. The lender may (and most do) require that you hold up to two months reserves in this account. Ironically, this section of comparatively small amounts is one of the most tightly regulated aspects of the Good Faith Estimate, and the whole escrow or reserves account thing is optional - although most lenders require a small fee for no reserve account. In my experience, Escrow or Reserve accounts are usually more trouble than they are worth. I'm just going to explain quickly, and not with any dollar figures because 1) they vary too much, and for good reason 2) they are not, properly speaking, costs of the loan. As I said, when you sell the home, refinance it, or pay off the loan, you get the remaining contents of these accounts back.



"1001 Hazard Insurance Premium" in most cases, count the number of payments from the time the refinance is effective to the time that the yearly premium is due (usually on the anniversary of the date you bought the property), subtract it from 14. Multiply this number by your monthly premium. Even for purchases, the lenders will generally want a month or two of reserves.



"1002 Mortgage Insurance Premium Reserves" See my comments for line 902. If an early premium on this is due, compute it the same way as your prorated hazard insurance.



"1003 School Tax" California doesn't have it as a separate line item, or at least I can't recall seeing it broken out. Matter of fact, neither of the other states I've done loans in does either.



"1004 Taxes and Assessment reserves" This is the part to make certain your property taxes are paid on time. Same method of computation as line 1001. The lenders really don't want the city, county, or state repossessing the property out from under them.



"1005 Flood Insurance Reserves" Some homes require flood insurance in order to get a loan. Same method for computing as line 1001. If you live in or near an old riverbed, especially with dams and such on the river, research "riparian rights" sometime when you want another real world horror story.



Then there is a line about Compensation to Broker, which may be disclosed here or above. Some will try not to disclose it at all. Once again, you're looking for honest disclosure here, not the lowest number. This line makes no difference to you unless you're the one paying it. This didn't used to be required, but lenders and packaging houses got it put through in order to make the deal a broker offers you look worse in your eyes, thus handicapping brokers in their ability to compete. The thing that's important to you is what happens to you - the loan you are getting. When comparing offers, scrutinize the terms of your loan carefully, not what the broker is making on the deal. It's not like the packaging houses and many lenders aren't turning around and making even more money off the secondary market, just that that particular amount isn't disclosed anywhere.



The final section runs through three columns really fast. These are just bookkeeping, really, except sometimes you can spot your loan provider playing games if you pay attention. Remember, if this is a purchase I really hope for your sake you know your purchase price. If it is a refinance, I hope you know what your statement says. From this you can get to an approximate payoff by prorating your monthly interest. Once you have this figure, look up above on this form for the total of closing costs and prepaid items. Sometimes in a purchase your seller will give you a certain amount of credit for closing costs, so if this is applicable you can subtract those. This is the Amount You Have to Come Up With. Now subtract off new first mortgage amount, and second mortgage amount (if any), but add any closing costs for the second mortgage. The figure that is left is the Check You Need To Have. This is cold hard cash you have to come up with in order to make this all happen as described.



One of the most common tricks I've seen is for loan officers to tell clients and prospective clients they can roll the costs into the loan so they don't have to come up with cash. Despite being told this is what the client intends to do, they then give you, the client a payment quote in the third column here based upon you paying all of these costs out of your pocket - with the Check You Need To Have. In short, they're acting like all those closing costs have mysteriously vanished somewhere, like they're lurking in the Bermuda Triangle waiting to ambush some poor unsuspecting sap who will never be seen again. This poor sap is you. You're going to pay them somehow. They generally can be rolled into the loan, but make sure the loan provider gives you a payment based upon real numbers.



Loan officers know that most clients shop for loans based upon payment quoted. This is the not the best or smartest thing for you to be doing, but it is nonetheless what most people shop based upon. So many of them will play a lot of games to be able to quote you a low payment. And this is one of the games they play, quoting you a payment based upon the loan without the closing costs of the loan added in. If you have a financial calculator, use it. If you can do the math yourself, better. Otherwise, go out and do a web search for financial calculators or mortgage calculators. Automobile loan sites will probably be programmed incorrectly (different assumptions), but pick a couple of others and punch the numbers in. Make certain that the real loan amount you're going to need jibes with the payment they quote at the rate they quoted. Of course, this all assumes that they're being upfront and otherwise honest and are not going to hit you with three points out of the blue, but you do the best you can with what you have. Oh, and now that you're done applying for your loan I strongly suggest you find someone willing to act as a back-up loan provider so that you can offer the person who just gave you this form a concrete reason not to hit you with those three extra points.



Caveat Emptor



UPDATE: This article has been updated here

I had a great rant about the limitations of the Good Faith Estimate all planned out in my head when I when I was in the very first stages of planning this blog in my head. It was the first idea I had for an essay, as it is the most commonly abused item in the whole mortgage system of ours, and abuse of the GFE (as the industry calls it) sets the stage for a significant amount of everything else that goes on.



Then California pulled the rug out from under the rant. There's a new form called the California Mortgage Loan Disclosure Statement, which we are all required to use in lieu of the Federal GFE



I don't know if it's a character limitation or what, but when some new regulation or disclosure requirement it's just not in my nature to immediately go out and see how much I'm permitted to game the new system. The abuses of the Federal Good Faith Estimate and the fact that pretty much all of them were actually legal had been something that took time to soak in back when I first got into the business, although a short stint with a Company Which Shall Remain Nameless was a real education. On the other hand, interim regulations are notorious for mirroring previous standards. Furthermore, I'm certain that somewhere in Sacramento lobbyists are paying bribes campaign donations so that just this or that little detail can be changed "just a little in a way that doesn't really make a difference," and eventually the cockroaches will have all of their safe harbors back. But for right now, things are a little unsettled. The downside of which is that I don't know about abuses of the new form yet, because I haven't seen any myself.



On the other hand, the federal Good Faith Estimate is still the form in use in the other forty-nine states. On that note:



On the line above where all of this starts, there should be written a total loan amount, an interest rate, and a term (360 months for all 30 year loans, whether it is fixed for the full term or not - numbers less than 360 mean that the loan is due in full in less than 360 months. This can be one clue that they're trying to hit you with a balloon payment loan). As I have said elsewhere on this site and will continue to stress, just because a mortgage provider puts these numbers on a Good Faith Estimate does not mean that they have any intention of actually delivering them. I think bait and switch is the official company game of many providers. The Good Faith Estimate is THE most abused loan document, bar none. It's supposed to be a real estimate of what the loan is going to be like, based upon the loan officers best estimate. In practice, it's become nothing more serious than the loan provider wants it to be. In many cases, it's almost like a joke: "(giggle) and this is what we had to tell him in order to get him to sign up! (loud guffaws)" and this carries through the rest of the document as well. The relationship of the loan described on the Good Faith Estimate to the loan that is actually available and that said provider will actually deliver is completely arbitrary and up to the provider within very broad limits. Because at the end of the process, the client has very little leverage to get the provider to deliver the loan they talked about to get you to sign up. Unless, of course, you signed up for a backup loan like I keep telling you to do.



Now, it is also important to note that with two exceptions, all of the fees below are commonly held in abeyance until the end of the loan process, and you don't owe them if you don't end up refinancing with that company. They can be added to your loan balance instead of being paid out of pocket. It is the biggest red flag I know of for a loan provider to ask you for money up front beyond the credit report.



The first actual line item on the Good Faith Estimate is "801 Loan Origination fee." This is an explicit fee charged by the loan provider who signs you up. It can be expressed in dollars, but it is more commonly expressed in terms of "points". One point is one percent of the final loan amount. Put another way, if you have a loan for $198,000 plus one point, the way to do the computation is $198,000 times 100, divide by 99 (100 minus the total number of points), which equals $200,000. It's probably not intentionally unethical if the loan officer uses $199,980 ($198,000 plus 1%, or $1980) on a quick calculation, just a desire to get an approximate answer quickly. It's still not mathematically correct. Now, if as is common, the loan provider only writes down 1% here rather than converting it to dollars as well, it can appear as if that loan is much cheaper at first glance or to the uninitiated than it actually is. If you've got a loan that's $200,000, leaving the estimate as one point without an explicit dollar figure is a way of making it look like the loan actually costs you about $2000 less than it will. Two points without an explicit dollar figure is twice as much ("The other guy wanted $5000 to do my $300,000 loan, but this guy only wants $3000 and two of these point thingies. What a great deal!" You would be amazed and dismayed how often I have to explain even to people who know what points are that $3000 plus two points on a $300,000 loan is about $9000). Nor is this figure, whether expressed as points, dollars, or both, carved into anything more than silly putty. I worked for a short time at a Company Which Shall Remain Nameless, and one of the things that got me yelled at several times, and one of the many reasons I left, was that I violated company quoting policy by actually adding in all of the little miscellaneous adds for half a point here and a quarter point there that the customer was going to get hit with at the end of the process anyway, and telling the customer about them up front. Finally, there is no reason why this line has to be nonzero in all cases, and indeed I've done more loans without than with.



The next line is "802 Loan Discount". In theory, this is supposed to be used only for actual discount points charged by the lender. In practice, it is used almost interchangeably with "Loan Origination Fee" on the line above (not without some justification in fact, which is beside the point of this essay). Once again, watch out for whether the figure in points is converted into an actual dollar value. Again, there is no reason why this line has to be nonzero, and I've done more loans without than with.



"803 Appraisal Fee" in California is $350 to $450 for the average home, depending upon what that particular appraiser charges for that particular job. It is legitimate and correct to mark this as PFC (prepaid finance charge) so long as the loan officer gives you an approximate figure. Unless they have a contract with a particular appraiser, it's not under the loan officer's control. This is another place where many providers play "hide the closing costs." Quoting from one less than ethical example "Hey, I'm not the one charging it and if it makes my loan look better than the guy stupid enough to tell the client, that's not my problem." I tell people with average homes that it's likely to be about $400. The abuse that happens here is that this is one of those things that's called a "third party charge" - paid to a third party service provider. As such it is not included in total fees when calculating APR on the "Truth In Lending Statement", and will almost certainly not be included in any computation of total fees by your loan provider (Other than me, I know exactly one company that includes it). The vast majority of those billboards advertising "Total fees $X" really mean "Total fees $X plus third party fees," not to mention the fact that they're going to give you a rate which gives them an Earth-Shatteringly Large Rebate (see my essay on rates and points when it's posted for more). It is not unethical for the loan provider to ask you to pay the appraiser at the time the appraisal is performed, provided the person being paid is an external appraiser (see my essay on the appraisal for in depth reasons).



"804 Credit Report" is usually somewhere around $20. Single Individuals buying a house on their own are cheaper than two married people, but unmarried individuals must each be run separately, and so it may be a little more than $20 if you're buying a house with your brother, parents, or whatever. It is neither unusual nor unethical for the loan provider to ask you to pay for this up front. So long as the check is written to the credit reporting service, there's nothing wrong. And there is a rule going into effect that we must have explicit written consent to run credit from every person, so don't get angry with your provider for following it.



"805 Lender's Inspection Fee" is charged by the lender to have one of their inspectors go out and take a look and make certain the house isn't falling down. It is common for the lender's fees to be ignored by a broker, and then you'll get another Good Faith Estimate from the lender that discloses this. On the other hand, this is not necessarily charged on every loan. Many lenders will rely upon the appraiser's work in this, and not do one of their own, particularly on refinances. Since (assuming you're sane) you're going to want a building inspection yourself in the case of a purchase, the lender may make it a condition that they get a copy. And, I will admit as a broker that although I do disclose a total of all lender's fees I know about, I don't always break them out into categories and may amalgamate them all under one category. (I can ask a lender what their fees are, and one will tell me A, B, and C adding to $750. The next one will tell me A, D, and E adding to $780. The third might tell me B, E, and F adding to $995. And so on. The brokerage I work for is approved with well over fifty lenders. I maintain that as long as I disclose the total amount, most clients don't care whether it's going to underwriting or document preparation or spa visits for the CEO. It's just not important to them where it goes. It's a fee they've got to pay to do business with that lender and get that loan. Whereas I will help them consider the total cost in comparison to the cost of other options, this total is not subject to negotiation).



"808 Mortgage Broker Fee" (there is no line 806 or 807 on the form). This is another fee potentially charged by a brokerage. Just because it's not, or listed as zero, here doesn't necessarily mean you're not going to end up paying it. One trick I've seen is leaving it blank at the beginning, then at the end it's "We charged that based on how difficult your loan was. You don't expect us to work for free, do you?" Trust me, they're not working for free. Although I don't think the level of trust you need to have in me in order to believe this should be astronomical.



"809 Tax Related Service Fee" I've never had to include it as a separate line item even if present. It's usually amalgamated and lumped in with something else, if it's applicable.



"810 Processing Fee" This is what they pay to the nice person who processes your loan and coordinates your transaction while the loan officer is off doing loan officer things. This varies, but I'd be very suspicious of anything less than $300. I know brokers that say to charge $600 when they pay the processor $300. My attitude towards that is that at least they're telling you, the consumer, about it up front. Better that than being told $300 and hit for $600 at the end. The processor knows what they make. The broker knows what he pays the processor. Don't worry if the processor gets the whole thing. It's not your concern, and it's not really negotiable, and whereas you have the option of going elsewhere, the elsewhere you go has the option of lying to get you to sign up.



"811 Underwriting fee" is charged by the bank to pay their underwriters. It's also a good category for brokers who hate pointless detail to lump all of a lender's fees together in. Be suspicious of anything less than three to four hundred dollars - typical actual underwriter's fees. But just because he's showing $995 here where everyone else is showing $400 doesn't mean he's overpriced. Just to mention it, if you are doing a first and second simultaneously with the same lender, the lender's fees will go up by about $500 to cover the second. If the second is being done with a different company, they're probably going to charge a whole other set of lenders fees.



"812 Wire transfer fee" is charged by the escrow/title company to wire the money into your account for immediate availability. Otherwise, it's going to be a few days before the check clears. If it isn't something advantageous to you, don't get it. Most of the time it probably isn't necessary, but considering daily interest on typical amounts of real estate transactions, it may be a good investment. Last time I had this done for a client it was a little under $25. The lenders fees I've talked about elsewhere usually include a charge for wire transfer between them and escrow or title, but this doesn't cover you.



Below this are several blank lines. An ethical loan provider will use them to disclose that he's getting a rebate from the bank (assuming he's getting such a rebate) or tell you that the price quoted includes a rebate to you from them reducing the price, if such is the case. (Most of the loans I have done tend to have this feature. You'll find out why in a different essay). Just because provider A is getting a bigger rebate does not mean provider B has a better loan. It happens quite often that one broker shops a better lender or works a little harder. A 5.5 % loan with $3500 in total closing costs is a better loan than the same loan type with the same terms at 6% with $5000 in total closing costs, even if the broker in the first case is getting paid $10,000 (to pick an extreme figure) more by the lender. Now it's unlikely that there's that much of a difference in broker compensation when the one is delivering a better loan, and if there is that much of a difference I'd bet millions to milliamps that the loan terms are different. But the point is for you, the consumer, to look hard at the actual terms of the loan involved - that's what's important to you. There was just a study released a couple months ago about how most people would just choose the loan where the broker made less money, or where a loan provider's compensation wasn't disclosed, rather than the loan that's actually better for them (If anybody finds a link to it, send it to me. I tried and couldn't find it among my search engine results). If we weren't all adults here, I might need to make the point that if the loans are otherwise the same, the broker in the first case earned every penny of his extra pay by finding you a better loan on the same terms and qualifying you for it. But we are all adults here, so you know that.



There also may be other fees listed here. I've only done significant business in three states, but there really is no need for anything else that I've seen. Additional fees in this area usually amount to a "Loan Officer's Latte Fee", or a "This is going to make me miss my surfing!" fee. If they actually list them, at least they're telling you up front instead of keeping it a deep dark secret that the consumer has no way of knowing about. Every once in a while, I'll see somebody write something like "Amalgamation of lenders fees" rather than using line 805, 811, or 1105 to cover it.



Finally, some states require a survey if none has been done for a certain period of time, usually ten years. This will cost $300 to $400 if required. These requirements are the same in each given state no matter who the lender is. It's rarely the case that one lender will require it where the state will not. As a disclaimer, I haven't worked in any of these states.



So when we look at this section, we are left with midpoint fees of $400 for the appraisal, $20 for the credit report, about $800 between line 805 and 811 and miscellaneous other lender imposed fees, and $500 for processing. Believable total, thus far, $1720, plus the amount for any points you pay, less any rebate to you. $2220 or so if you're doing a simultaneous first and second, $2500 or more if you are getting a first and second from different lenders.



The next section is title fees. These are the fees you are charged by the title company for doing the work necessary and writing appropriate policies of title insurance upon the transaction. Title insurance is a part of every real estate transaction in California, although I am given to understand there are still states where it isn't necessarily so. And even in California, if you're silly enough to buy the property for cash and insist that you don't want any kind of coverage in case it turns out later that the seller didn't really own it, or that what you think you see is not necessarily what you got, it is possible to do a transaction without title insurance. Otherwise, when you buy the property, the seller should, as a condition of the sale, buy you an owner's policy of title insurance. When you get a loan on the property or refinance that loan, the lender will require you to buy them a lender's policy of title insurance. In California, average transactions may be a little larger than many other states, so I'm going to use a property with a purchase price of $300,000 and a loan of $270,000 for examples. It's large for many other states, but smallish for California, and here in San Diego right now it's a decent to middling two bedroom condo of about 900 square feet where the prospective buyer actually has a 10% down payment, which is unusual. Good agents and loan officers do these in their sleep. (And I'm well aware that in the vast majority of cases, I can save my clients a lot of money by splitting these into a first and a second. Work with me here for the sake of simplification. And I'm also aware that the same thing can be over $1,000,000 in certain areas of Manhattan).



"1101 Closing or Escrow Fee" depends upon the company and type of escrow. Many loan officers will write PFC, but ethical ones should tell you what it costs. Middle of the road is $450 for a refinance, the same plus $1 per thousand dollars of purchase price, divided by two for a purchase, because it is split two ways between buyer and seller. Like the appraiser's fee, attorneys fees, and title insurance, this is a third party fee that is excluded from the calculation of APR, and it's not under the lender's control unless there's a contract. Still they should let you know how much it's going to be, as it's not like there's any possibility of you not having to pay either an attorney or an escrow company, and many will pretend it doesn't exist or try not to give you a dollar value, as $X plus unknown escrow charges sounds cheaper than $X plus 450 for refinances or $X plus $375 for a purchase



"1105 Document Preparation Fee" somewhere between $100 and $200 in most cases, this covers the cost of generating the mortgage documents. Will be covered in total lender's fees if that's accounted for elsewhere. Grant Deeds, etcetera usually prepared by the title company for the process will be extra, usually about $50 per document.



"1106 Notary Fees" $100 to $150 is reasonable, and about the range of what the various mobile notary services charge. Even if your loan officer agrees to act as notary, this is likely to be charged. You may or may not be able to save yourself money by taking it somewhere yourself as state laws are different, but if you do, you're going to have to cover it out of pocket, and you're going to have to deal with the issue of the notary's business hours, taking time off work, everybody who's party to the loan being there to sign, etcetera.



"1107 Attorney Fees" Some states require the use of actual attorneys to do the escrow function. Lenders should not charge you both this and escrow. On the other hand, attorneys are more expensive. I haven't done any actual work in these states but from what I can tell $800 is about average. Disclaimer: the company I was working for at the time may have had a contract for reduced rates to which I wasn't privy. Like appraiser fees, escrow fees and title fees, this is a third party fee excluded from APR calculation, and can be marked PFC, but the loan officer should give an known dollar value, as the company should have a contract with the attorney's office. Once again, unethical providers will try to keep a dollar value from finding its way onto the paper because it looks cheaper that way.



"1108 Title Insurance: Like Appraisal, Escrow, and Attorney's Fees, this is a third party charge, and as such is excludable from the calculation of APR. A dishonest loan officer will mark it PFC without telling you how much, as once again, $X plus unknown title fees sounds cheaper than actually adding the title charges from the rate book to the paper. In the case of a purchase, the seller should purchase an owner's policy for the buyer, and the buyer's lender will require the buyer to purchase a lender's policy of title insurance, which should be heavily discounted because it's the same title search under slightly different rules of relevance. In the case of a refinance, the lender will require the borrower to purchase this. I took an average of the costs to the nearest dollar between several rate books, but they companies are really pretty comparable in most cases. If the property had a policy of title insurance issued on it within five years (the vast majority of properties qualify, as only about three percent of all mortgages are older than that), the owner's policy will cost the seller about $1004 base rate, and the concurrent lender's policy will cost the purchaser $453 (remember, this is a $270,000 loan on a $300,000 property). In the case of a refinance, the lender's policy would cost $823.



So adding this section up at the mid points, in the case of a refinance you have $450 or $800 (depending upon your state), plus $150 plus $125 plus $823, totaling $1548 or $1898, depending upon your state. In the case of a purchase, you're talking about $375 or $800 (again depending upon your state) plus $200 (somebody is going to have to do a Grant Deed) plus $125 plus $453 (remember, the seller usually pays for owner's policy of title insurance, and we're talking about a Good Faith Estimate for a loan, which the seller doesn't need unless he's buying another property) totaling $1153 or $1578, depending upon your state.



I'm going to lump two sections into one here.



"1200 Recording Fees" charged by the county recorder. Should be the same for every lender. In San Diego County it's currently $63.



"1202 City /County Tax Stamps" Some city and county governments have an intangibles tax on mortgages.



"1203 State Tax/Stamps" Some states have an intangibles tax on mortgages, computed based upon the dollar amount of the loan. Usually it's the states without state income tax. If your state charges this (California doesn't), it will be the same no matter your lender. If one company gives you an estimate that's different from everybody else, that's a matter for investigation.



"1302 Pest Inspection" If something raises a red flag with the lender, they will require a pest inspection. There may also be areas of the country where it is required of every loan, but I've never heard of one. On a purchase, you're going to want a pest inspection anyway. There is potential for abuse (somebody charges you $200 and orders a $100 inspection), but it's relatively small potatoes, and most just won't bother when it's so much easier to hide big ticket scams elsewhere. Order it yourself from an approved vendor if you're concerned.



So the section total is $63.



Below these sections is a line "Estimated Closing Costs". This really is the total of all the closing costs associated with the loan. I keep telling you that the numbers which go onto this sheet may be fictional or incomplete, but if they are actually complete and correct then the number here on this line is the most important one on the whole sheet. This is the total of the costs you're really paying to get your loan. Some call it the "total of non-recurring closing costs." If you pay attention to nothing else on this sheet, (begin Groucho Marx accent) chances are that you're being taken for a ride (end Groucho accent). But this is the most important single number. Adding the midpoint estimates from the sections we come up with $1720 if you're getting one loan on a refinance so $1548 or $1898 (depending upon your state) plus $63 plus any charges for points. Using consistent assumptions, this makes for a total for a refinance $3331 if you live in an escrow state, $3681 if you live in a state where they require lawyers to get involved. The totals for a purchase under these assumptions is $2936 or $3361. None of these numbers account for points you're paying or rebate you're getting, of course.



Just to make an important point again, this sounds like a lot more than $1658 plus third party fees, doesn't it? If offered the choice between buying one item for $3331 and buying the same item for $1658 plus third party fees, most people think the second choice sounds cheaper. However, as I've just demonstrated these are exactly the same given comparable assumptions. And there's a lot of leeway in those third party fees for junk fees if your loan provider wants to make use of them to pad their own pocket, not to mention they could trivially be much higher if your loan provider doesn't choose third party providers wisely. Insist upon actual numbers.



(continued in Part II)

UPDATE: This article has been updated here

A mortgage is basically pledging an asset that you own as collateral for a debt. If you default on the debt, the lender takes your property. When you're talking about real estate in the state of California (and many others), this is generally accomplished by use of a Deed of Trust. There are three parties to a Deed of Trust: the trustor, trustee, and beneficiary.



The Trustor is the entity getting the loan.



The Beneficiary is the entity making the loan.



The Trustee is the entity which has the legal responsibility of standing in the middle and making sure the rules are followed. When the loan is paid off, they should make certain a Reconveyance is completed and sent to the trustor so they can prove it was paid off. If the beneficiary is not being paid, they are the ones who actually perform the work of the foreclosure.



One thing to keep in mind during all discussions of real estate and real estate loans is that the amounts of money involved are usually large - the equivalent of somebody's salary for several years on every transaction. The temptation to fudge the numbers or even outright lie to get a better deal, or to get a deal at all, is strong. Many people don't think they're really doing anything wrong by fudging things a bit, but this is FRAUD. Serious felony level FRAUD. Fraud, and attempted fraud are widespread. There are low-lifes out there who make a very high-class living at it (for a while). Every lender has to devote a large amount of resources to determining that each individual transaction is not being conducted fraudulently. To fail to do so would be to fail in their jobs to protect their stockholders and investors. I can, and probably will, tell stories about the most common sorts. But the reason everything in every real estate transaction is gone over with such a fine-toothed comb that adds thousands of dollars to the cost of the transaction is that people lie. Every hoop that anybody is asked to jump through has a reason why it exists, and often that is because somebody, usually MANY somebodies, have committed FRAUD based upon that particular point.



One of the conditions I must attach, implicitly or explicitly, to every quote for services, is that this is based upon the condition that you are telling me the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth, and are being honest and forthright in your presentation of the facts without trying to hide anything and are specifically calling my attention to anything that you suspect may be a problem. And because the list of what is relevant information is long, complex, and conditional upon factors that are often opaque to non-professionals, sometimes, people quite honestly don't realize that something is a fly in the ointment so they don't mention it. I, or any other professional practitioner, have no way of knowing that said fly exists unless you, the client, tell me about it. Therefore what I tell you initially does not account for said fly. This is not unethical, it is just a due to the fact that I don't have all of the relevant information..



When you're talking about residential real estate loans there are basically two absolute requirements as to the nature of the collateral. The first is land - land as in real estate. A partial, fractional, or partial ownership of a common interest in land (as in a condominium) are each sufficient unto the task. A rented space to park your mobile home is not.



To that real estate, there must be permanently attached in a way so as to prohibit removal, or at least make it an extended project, a residence in which people can live. We're all familiar with you basic site-built house. Personally, I'm a big believer in the virtues of manufactured housing. To paraphrase Robert A. Heinlein in precisely this context, imagine a car for which all the parts are brought individually to your home and assembled on site with ordinary portable tools in an environment which was not specifically designed to facilitate said assembly. How much would you expect to pay, and how would you expect it to perform? The correct answers are "A LOT more than for your house", and "not very well, in terms of either reliability, speed, or economy."



Nonetheless, when a lender looks at a house that's been moved TO the site, they see one that can be moved AWAY from the site as well, and they are skeptical because so many people have done precisely this. Furthermore, the way that residential real estate is valued is arcane. The lot itself may be worth $400,000 here in California because it has $150,000 of improvements on it in the form of a three-bedroom house on it, but take away that three-bedroom home, and the lot may be only worth a fraction of the amount. So they loan you money based upon a $550,000 value of the combination as it sits. Some time later, you back your truck up to the house and cart it off, and then default on the loan, leaving the bank a lot may only have a value at sale of $80,000. Now imagine yourself as the bank employee who made the loan. How do you explain this to your boss? Over the years, many bank employees have had to explain this to their bosses, all the way up the chain of command to CEOs explaining to investors and stockholders. Lenders know that most people are honest - but they've got a duty to make sure you are among the honest ones. And if you subsequently lose your job and can't pay your mortgage, might you not be tempted to back the truck up and haul the house off somewhere if you could so the bank can't take it? There are good substantial reasons why many lenders won't approach manufactured housing as residential real estate, and the ones who do treat it as such charge higher than standard rates, and place further limitations on lending.



I've been personally eyeing a beautiful manufactured home that more than meets my family's needs, is in the middle of the area I want to live in, and is priced more than $100,000 lower than comparable sized and lower quality site built homes on smaller lots. Yet there is a reason for that lower price. It's not like that owner just decided to list it for $150,000 less than he could get. The home carries many higher costs. If I buy that home, I am going to be paying for it in the form of higher loan costs every month, and higher loan fees every time I refinance until I sell it, and fewer people able to buy the home when and if I do sell it as a result of loan constraints, and a I can expect lower eventual sales price as a consequence - which is the situation that owner is in right now. I have reluctantly decided that those costs outweigh the benefits. My decision is regretful, but until somebody comes up with a procedure that banks agree makes manufactured housing equal in every way to site built in their eyes, it is also firm.



Caveat Emptor.



(And I must say that if somebody comes up with such a procedure, you will be a gazillionaire, and deserve every last penny and then some. I hereby publicly forswear all claims of compensation for the idea of such a procedure. If you can make it work and it makes you rich, I won't ask for a penny, although any contribution you care to make voluntarily will be happily accepted. I just want to be able to say you got the idea from me, as part of my contribution to a better world)