"100% of people who do not save money do not have any!"--Dave Ramsey

[JSH]

Originally Posted by Xist

Navy Federal Mortgage Review: Rates Appear Low and They Keep Your Loan
Oh no! They are bad!

I didn't say they are bad, just that the rate was high.

BankRate is showing 3.250%, 5% down, 0 points, and $1085 in origination fees.

That is a FHA loan from LincolnWay Community Bank so it would only require 3.5% down.

[Xist]

Ah. There you go. I believe that my credit score is 735 - 740.

If only I remembered which financial institution gave out credit scores, but that would require getting between my brother and Super Mario Brothers.

I have too much of a sense of self-preservation.

Someone e-mailed me from Navy Federal: "I want to bring to your attention our Realty Plus program, which is a coven of proven realtors that give cash back to your family for allowing them to give you there service."

A coven of proven realtors.

I am unsure that I copied that correctly. I hope that he appreciates me correcting his use of "there."

Why wouldn't this be a form letter that he sends to dozens of people a day?

By the way, my phone automatically changes "realtors" to "traitors."


I do not know what the deal is. First of all, I definitely gave it my ZIP code, but when you want to adjust your search you need to say "change location," except my location was correct.

I increased my credit score and it still did not show anything. I admitted to being a Veteran and suddenly it showed Veterans United, but they don't advertise their rates.

It is stupid that I need to pretend to not be a Veteran. I absolutely qualify for a VA loan, but I doubt the houses would.

[redpoint5]

Start by getting your free annual credit report from all 3 credit bureaus and raise a complaint about anything that is inaccurate, or is a top contributor to a lower credit score. Often the things you bring up will just be removed from your credit history. I had missed mortgage payments (that were the bank's fault) removed from my credit history. They didn't corroborate my story though, they simply removed it.

Next step is to online shop rates. I'd assume some of the military credit unions to have among the best rates, such as USAA or PenFed. Still, don't shop just the places you've heard of, that's what Google is for.

Don't fail to secure a mortgage for a particular property before you actually fail. In other words, let the lender say they won't loan for the property rather than assuming they won't. Their motivation is to make money originating and possibly servicing your loan, so those things sometimes don't matter so much.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by Xist

Ah. There you go. I believe that my credit score is 735 - 740.

If only I remembered which financial institution gave out credit scores, but that would require getting between my brother and Super Mario Brothers.

Mint is not only a very useful financial tracking app / website but they also give you a monthly credit score. Just a warning there is not one formula to get a credit score, different companies use different formulas. Mine has about a 20 point range depending on the source.

Like redpoint said, checking your credit report is the first thing I would do.

This is the official free site: www.annualcreditreport.com

An easy way to increase your credit score is by paying down your credit card. You want your credit utilization rate to be below 30% in total and on each one of your credit cards. Using more than 30% of your available credit damages your credit score and credit utilization rate makes up 30% of your total FICO score. It will take up to 60 days to see the change reflected in your score.

[redpoint5]

You can ask for credit limits to be raised too, which will lower your credit utilization ratio. Never hurts to ask. I've had 100% success rate.

[Xist]

Navy Federal:

I gave my brother pizza and he allowed me to pass.

Right, so my credit information was months out-of-date. I believe that is around when I paid off my student loans. I start accruing interest on my credit card June First, so I plan on paying it off at the end of the month. Right now I owe exactly $7,000 and my limit is $24,100. Mom freaked out when I told her my limit.

Huh. I guess that I have had it for almost a year. It seems like longer, but they gave me a 0% APR for twelve months with zero transfer fees.

I am at 29% utilization with this card, but I owe $0 on my Bank of America card. The limit is $3,300. I also owe $0 on my USAA credit card. The limit is $9,500.

I am sure that I could buy lots of things with the combined $36,900 limit.

Oh well. I enjoy buying as little as possible just fine.

My score will be higher when I pay off my card. It is supposed to grow further still as my accounts get older, except I want to earn more interest than 0.25%.

I am trying to get 4% until I find a better use for my money.

My score would be higher if I had loans?!

Edit! I didn't tell BankRate that I wanted FHA loans, so it didn't show me any.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by Xist

Navy Federal:

Well there you go. You are in the top credit bracket so there is no way you should settle for a mortgage with 4.25% interest.

Originally Posted by Xist

My score would be higher if I had loans?!

It would be but higher once you are in the top bracket it doesn't really matter. You are also proof that someone can have excellent credit without loans or being in debt. I hear people say credit scores are rigged against people that don't take out loans but all you really have to do is pay your bills on time and have a credit card

[Xist]

"It's not you, it's me"--banks.

As BankRate said in that screenshot that I shared:

Recent market volatility caused by the coronavirus pandemic has caused many of our lending partners to temporarily remove their advertised rates from Bankrate.

Even when I put 20% down it only shows four lenders and First Citizens' Bank advertises 4%.

Get that junk out of here! Who wants that when they can get 3.25 - 3.5% with the other guys?!

I just want to see what other sites show me for those 20-percenters, but NerdWallet just advertises lenders without showing their rates.

Well, it appears that attempting to be specific so that I did not need to tell each website "Single white male first-time homebuyer looking for a young single female conventional 30-year mortgage."

Let's try "lowest mortgage rates."

The Simple Dollar made its results disappear when I put in a $180,000 property. It defaults to the nice round number of $437,500, which is an actual $350,000 loan with 20% down.

It shows one bank.

Even with 20% down on a $435,000 house it does not show anything, just $437,500, also known as $200,000 over the median home value in my ZIP.

The fun thing is that townhouses are worth significantly more than actual houses. No thanks.

Better.com will do a 3.14% loan on a $437,500 house with just 5% down, but not a $437,499 house with 20% down.

Rate data provided by Bankrate.

That really limits my options. I would never qualify for a $437,500 house on $36,000 a year and right now my only opportunity to earn more would be to become a teacher!

They do not make much more, not out here.

This little thing sold for $437,500 on 09/20/2019:

They do not do areal shots of houses in my price range.

Of course, 20% down on that thing was $87,500, which might pay for your servant's quarters.

Wait wait wait. Lending Tree shows:
3.48% for 30 years and 2.95% for 15 with a 700-739, but
3.54% for 30 years and 3.20% for 15 with a 740+

I forget whether Graham or Kevin said it, but one of them said that banks actually dislike high credit scores because those people are less likely to spend their money, but they are going penalize them for trying?

Lending Tree shows 2.875% with $9,000 down, which it calls $0, even though the loan is $171,000. However there are $5,314 in lender fees! It works out to $836 a month, which is $5 less than Navy Federal, $1,800 over 30 years.

I finally found something showing Bank of America's rates. It shows 3.375% on $180,000, but with 20% down. It does not show anything for less than $27,000 down, but that is 3.25!

I double-checked! Why does it give a higher rate with a higher down payment?!

Nerd Wallet doesn't show anything for less than $36,000 down on $180,000, but two lenders for $12,500 down on $250,000, and one is 3.628% APR.

Smart Asset shows two lenders for $9,000 down on $180,000. AimLoan has the best offer, 3.5% with $71 in fees.

Smart Asset doesn't give additional information, I needed to go through AimLoan's website, which said "No personal information" on each screen.

It shows many options:
30-year fixed rate: 3.375% with $4,482 to close.
97 payments of $808.71
262 payments of $755.98
1 payment of $757.72
Total: $281,751.35

30-year fixed rate-upfront PMI: 3.375% with $6,568 to close.
359 payments of $755.98
1 payment of $757.72
Total: $272,154.54

30-year fixed rate-homeready: 3.25% with $4,793 to close.
96 payments of $791.23
263 payments of $744.20
1 payment of $745.23
Total: $277,220.91

30-year fixed rate-homeready-upfront PMI: 3.25% with $6,845 closing costs.
359 payments of $744.20
1 payment of $745.23
Total: $274,758.03

Buying points again?
Of those four options, the one with the lowest total cost has the second-highest up-front costs, and isn't far behind #1. The second-cheapest overall has the highest up-front costs. The most expensive overall has the lowest closing costs.

I went to mortgagecalculator.org to look more closely at the costs, but after I gave it a bunch of numbers it gave me a blank screen.

Thanks!

Well, it is 0245, and I have spent the day hunting elusive mortgage rates while houses are even more elusive. All that I will say at this point is that the most expensive of those is $21,086.65 cheaper than Navy Federal over 30 years and that I really should have written progress reports today.

I hope you guys had a great night.

[Piotrsko]

So you're playing whack-a-mole with google looking for cheaper unobtainable rates. Good luck with that.

Figure out what you can afford within your known parameters, then go shopping in person which indicates sincerity.

The internet has made comparing things too easy so people just show stuff they don't have to defend.

[redpoint5]

In person? It's well established that if you walk into an insurance agency you'll pay more than if you had shopped it online. They know that the fact you walked into their doors they have your attention AND a good chunk of your time and energy, and people succumb to the "sunk cost fallacy" all the time thinking they can't waste the 30 minutes they have driven and the $1 in gas to get there, so they had better sign on the line.

Heck, I don't even recommend pursuing relationships that way. It's a poor use of time and likely to result in a worse "deal".

That's about the worst advice I've seen in a while.