Q. We have to relocate because of my husband’s job. Our home value has fallen nearly $100,000. We would like to get rid of it, but we don’t want to go into foreclosure. Someone mentioned a short sale. What impact would that have on our credit rating?
A. A short sale, in which you negotiate with the bank to sell your home for less than you owe on your mortgage, will have a dramatically negative affect on your credit.
A consumer who has been through a short sale could see a drop in her credit score of up to 200 points, essentially the same decrease as if the homeowner had gone into foreclosure. And like a foreclosure, the negative mark will pull down the score for seven years.
That said, if you’re underwater on your mortgage and you need to move, a short sale is a better option than foreclosure. Going through foreclosure will make it very difficult for you to get a loan for at least three to five years; if you’ve done a short sale, you may be able to qualify for a new mortgage within two years.
We have a mortgage for 10 years. It’s really hurting us. What can we do about it? We live on a very quiet neighborhood. We took out a home loan with a very optimistic term. Since we have very short terms, our the interest rates on our mortgage is quite low while our repayments are really high. We are considering to go for a refinancing scheme to avail of some lower interest rates but what can we do to make sure that this won’t hurt us in the long run?
Continue reading Should we go and Refinance our Home Loan?
April 30 (Bloomberg) — Fixed mortgage rates fell for a third consecutive week, matching the record low reached earlier this month, driven by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke’s plan to buy home-loan securities to bolster the housing market.
The average rate of a 30-year mortgage dropped to 4.78 percent, the lowest in records dating to 1970, McLean, Virginia- based Freddie Mac said today in a statement. The rate hit that level the week of April 2. This week’s 15-year fixed rate was unchanged at 4.48 percent.
Continue reading Fixed mortgage rates down
SunTrust Mortgage is the mortgage lending division of SunTrust Banks Inc., an American bank holding company with 1700 branches and offices throughout the southern United States. In its current form, SunTrust Banks Inc. is the result of the 1985 merger of the Trust Company of Georgia and Sun Banks Inc of Florida.
One of achievements of SunTrust Mortgage is that they helped underwrite the IPO of Coca Cola back in 1919 resulting to SunTrust Banks to hold 48 million shares of Coca Cola worth approximately $2 billion. SunTrust offers ten to forty year fixed rate mortgages with financing on up to 1035 of the property value.
They also offer a variety of ARM loans with cap on interest rate varying from year to year. SunTrust Mortgage also offers Jumbo loans, FHA, and VA mortgages, and special terms for loans on student condominiums. Florida foreclosures are up 70% over last year. Currently the state is behind only CA and Nevada in number of foreclosures. While many lenders have given lip service to the current loan crisis and the need for individual assistance, SunTrust is one of the few to actually make a commitment to refinance and write off some loan amount in order to keep Florida residents in their homes.
An in-depth review of SunTrust Mortgage and their holdings will be posted in the next couple of weeks.
I’m hoping that the $275 bilion package to help protect people from home foreclosures will work. At least that’s what I took out of President Obama’s announcement last week.
Continue reading Low Mortgage Lenders : Hope In the Foreclosure Plan?
