January 2009

Why a Pre-Approval is more important than ever.

Tuesday, January 27th, 2009 at 1:47pm. 688 Views, 0 Comments.

Purchasing real estate is a complex transaction which involves many parties and factors, and therefore is done in a step by step fashion. The very first step in the buying process is to get pre-approved for financing (unless you are paying cash). I speak with a lot of people who are interested in viewing property before they have been through the pre-approval process, and it's important to for perspective buyers to know that it is critical that you sit down with a mortgage professional and have them run your numbers. Until you do so, you are not sure of how much you can borrow, what interest rate you can borrow at, what the monthly payment will be etc.. Of course these are critical factors in your buying process, so it's important that these questions get…

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Cal HFA a thing of the past....for now

Friday, January 9th, 2009 at 1:54pm. 680 Views, 0 Comments.

If you are a first time home buyer who's been looking at financing options, you probably are familiar with Cal HFA financing. Cal HFA is a State subsidized program that allows first time home buyers to borrow up to 103% of the purchase price of a home, which means the buyer could finance the closing costs and down payment and basically buy a home for almost no money out of pocket. Basically it was one of the last options for 100% financing that was left after the mortgage meltdown.

Unfortunately, on December 19th the Cal HFA program was suspended. From what I have been told by Mortgage professionals, the administrators of the program aren't sure if they will have the funds to keep lending into the new year. With the ecomonic problems on top of the…

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