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Mortgage Loan and Closing Cost

L

longhornlump

Member
I'm looking into buying a my first home in a couple of months and have been trying to research as much as possible, but wanted to get ATOT opinions...

What sites do you guys look to for reference material?
Some of the sites I have been looking at are ActiveRain, the CreditBoards Mortgage Forum, FatWallet Finance Forum, Bankrate

How did you all go about selecting your lender? Online Search? Referred to lender by friends or family? Credit Union? PenFed?
I contacted my bank (Wells Fargo) but was very unsatisfied with the GFE they provided... Closing cost approx. $4200, 1% origination fee, 0% discount

What are some closing fees that I should try to eliminate or reduce?
Origination Fee, Processing Fee, Title Insurance, Attorney Fees...

Finally, has anyone tried to use zillows.com new mortgage tool?
It allows you to plug in financial information without submitting personal info(ie ssn, address, etc) and receive quotes from various lenders. If you like their "quote" you contact them directly. So far it sounds like a good idea but I'm not sure I can trust the lenders providing the quotes. Some of the quotes have been reasonable but a few have "bait and switch" written on them.

BTW... I am looking to buy in Houston, TX.

Cliffs
-------------------
1. Want more reading material for learning purposes.
2. Need help choosing a lender.
3. Need help determining which junk fees to contest.

Thanks for reading 🙂
 
1% origination is a very fair deal. Anyone who promises "no-closing costs" are raising your rate to get rebate (the investor giving the agent a spiff for raising your rate higher then it really has to be) and they are helping to pay some of the costs with that.

I have been both a broker and on the lender side, and a 1 point origination is about as fair as it gets.

Appraisal/Title/Escrow/Prepaid Interest, and impounding your taxes/insurance are all costs that you have to pay (if you choose to impound).

I rarely see under 6000 in total closing out here in CA, and im still closing 30-40 files a month as a processor.
 
Dont try to skip the title insurance, it is well worth the cost.

Besides I dont think most lenders will let you go by without it.
 
Originally posted by: Sluggo
Dont try to skip the title insurance, it is well worth the cost.

Besides I dont think most lenders will let you go by without it.
Click to expand...

Yes I definitely want title insurance. The fee for the title insurance actually seemed pretty reasonable compared to the state and national average. Some other fees however were inflated so I was wondering if anyone has had success negotiating fees down.

BTW I am looking to buy in Texas. Here is the best breakdown I have seen for closing cost in Texas. They also have data available for the other 49 states.

http://www.bankrate.com/yho/ne...8/closing_costs_TX.asp
 
Right now most places aren't charging a lot of fees for mortgages...you should be able to get by with many for just your downpayment and up front escrows.

I know K. Hovnanian is doing this out in Houston. Don't know your price range so that determines a lot as well as type of home.


Condos and jumbo's (expensive houses) are hard for banks to do right now and can change your downpayment and what the loan costs you.

Also a quote without your personal info is pretty worthless, they are going to quote you the best case scenario that less than 3-5% of buyers actually qualify for. Credit score alone is not the only determining factor. Many young people have 700+ scores, but no major/long tradelines.
 
Quick question to those involved in the mortgage industry: How legitimate are some of the closing cost fees? To the average home buyer, it's impossible to determine which of the myriad fees are necessary, and/or if there's suspect "padding" involved. Also, in this respect, is the mortgage industry tightly regulated to prevent closing costs abuses? Thanks to anyone who can help me understand this.
 
Originally posted by: txrandom
What part of Houston are you buying in? Just curious.
Click to expand...

Rice Military, Montrose, Midtown... A place inside of 610, South of I-10, North of 59 would be ideal as I work downtown and around Greenway plaza.
 
Originally posted by: thetxstang
Quick question to those involved in the mortgage industry: How legitimate are some of the closing cost fees? To the average home buyer, it's impossible to determine which of the myriad fees are necessary, and/or if there's suspect "padding" involved. Also, in this respect, is the mortgage industry tightly regulated to prevent closing costs abuses? Thanks to anyone who can help me understand this.
Click to expand...

the mortgage industry is regulated, the fees cannot be more than a certain threshhold or the loan is flagged as a 'high cost' loan.

That said...outside of this none of the 'fees' are really bogus. It's not free to process a loan, underwrite it, etc...however; you do have companies that will eat these costs.

It really comes down to what do you end up paying per month and how much you had to shell out in the beginning.

It's really a great time to buy esp. if you can afford new construction. Home builders need to unload their properties and are doing so at fractions of the cost.

I bought last year here for around $265k...not new...however; if I could have stretched to $300-350k I could have picked up a home that was priced $750k-1M only 6months to a year before. Beautiful homes with granite, expensive fixtures..nothing downscaled.

The older homes all end up in price brackets around here. I compare it to the laptop market. For $300 you usually will see all the older generations of CPU offered. It makes no sense to pick the 386 when a Pentium M is the same cost, but people do for various reasons (usually school or a special interest in the area).

A lot of the benefits of buying a home now are going away soon. Downpayment asssistance will be done by next month (you have to close by the end of Sept. I believe), the tax credit is short lived. Rates are heading up. Builder fiscal years usually end in Oct so they are hoping to hit sales by that deadline otherwise they can roll to the next year and be more selective and wishful, etc.

The mortgage market has always be cyclic with the internet thought it's becoming more volatile. What happened this time around was a major cut into home ownership in the US. Too many able to become brokers, appraisers, investors....you had people buying homes just to sell to others looking to sell to someone and builders more than willing to cater to that.

When the music stopped we were left with a classical case of musical chairs.
 
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