February 24th, 2010
Title insurance is insurance against defects in title to real property. It is meant to protect an owner’s or lender’s financial interest in property against loss due to title defects, liens or other matter of public record. It will defend against a lawsuit attacking the title, or reimburse the insured for the actual monetary loss incurred, up to the dollar amount of insurance provided by the policy.
Just as lenders require fire insurance and other types of insurance coverage to protect their investment, nearly all Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: title insurance
Posted in Underwriting Rules | No Comments »
February 17th, 2010
Buying distressed properties, whether they are in foreclosure or are a short sale, can be difficult. I am going to cut and paste an email from a prior client in relation to this topic, and my reply, as an example of how difficult it can be to buy distressed properties: Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: buying distressed properties
Posted in housing values | No Comments »
February 12th, 2010
I almost feel like there is no more PMI (Private Mortgage Insurance) on condos! But that is not true, there is PMI availability for condos, but it is getting harder to get. Most people know by now that PMI is needed on a Conventional loan if you have less than 20% down payment. I recently had a client who Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: PMI
Posted in Underwriting Rules | No Comments »
February 8th, 2010
It seems any banks that are still doing home equity lines of credit (also known as a HELOC) have limited them to an 80% combined loan-to-value (LTV). This means that the existing 1st trust mortgage and any equity line cannot exceed 80% of the current appraised value. For example: Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: home equity line
Posted in Uncategorized, Underwriting Rules | 5 Comments »
February 2nd, 2010
It used to be simple to get an FHA condo loan. Lenders could do an FHA “Spot Condo Approval”, which meant that the condo did not need to be on the FHA Approved Condo List, and all we lenders needed to do was verify that the condo met certain FHA requirements (51% owner occupancy, no litigation against the condo, no more than 10% of the unit owners behind in their condo fees, etc). Now the condo approval process is more centralized, and more complicated. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: FHA condo rules
Posted in Underwriting Rules | No Comments »
