3 ms·

I'll bite: how did they work around the issue?

by ghughes 11y ago

nostromo 11y ago
I don't know all of the details, but my broker knew the right person to call at the bank. They asked for some details on the company, which I provided, and then viola, it was approved with a great rate. This is the kind of thing that's impossible to do getting quotes from a website, or talking to someone that works at your local branch. It's a matter of knowing how to package your application and then being able to speak with someone that actually has some ability to make the decision.
- shostack 11y ago
  That always made me a little nervous. We have all these new safeguards in place around mortgages since the last crisis, and I wonder how things like this are ok to leave up to back-channel conversations. Not knocking you or your situation specifically, but in general if someone is not a great risk, but that goes away if they get someone to make the right phone calls, is that a good thing in the big picture? Not judging, just posing the question.
  - hueving 11y ago
    It sounds like the risk wasn't quantified correctly in the first place. Being a highly-skilled tech worker, working for a well-funded startup should have nearly no impact on the probability of you being able to pay your mortgage. Even if the thing collapses, you can have another job within a week. If the whole industry collapses in a dotcom bust style, established companies will be heavily impacted as well.
    - sokoloff 11y ago
      I had a similar situation when buying my house. Tech employee, fairly high percentage of compensation was stock options (we'd gone public ~18 months prior) and the standard route wasn't working (as there was no place to put the variable/incentive comp). Mortgage broker got it done very easily (albeit with Countrywide, not exactly known for the strictest of standards :) ). Never missed or late on a payment on that loan.
  - rconti 11y ago
    Different companies offer different products. Some lenders were doing 90% LTV up to 800k, some were doing it up to $1m. Some lenders might give 30 year fixed rate loans on certain high LTV loans, others might only do ARMs. Every business makes a calculation about what kind of business it wants to do. I did not use a mortgage broker when buying a house. My reasoning was that they compete on price enough that the interest rates aren't worth shopping around for. The PRODUCTS may be. If I was doing a bridge loan to buy a 2nd house, I might shop around. If I'm doing a straight-up financed purchase on 2 stable well-documented incomes, I'm probably going to get about the same product and rate no matter what bank I use.

I'll bite: how did they work around the issue?

by ghughes 11y ago

I'll bite: how did they work around the issue?

I don't know all of the details, but my broker knew the right person to call at the bank. They asked for some details on the company, which I provided, and then viola, it was approved with a great rate. This is the kind of thing that's impossible to do getting quotes from a website, or talking to someone that works at your local branch. It's a matter of knowing how to package your application and then being able to speak with someone that actually has some ability to make the decision.

shostack 11y ago
That always made me a little nervous. We have all these new safeguards in place around mortgages since the last crisis, and I wonder how things like this are ok to leave up to back-channel conversations. Not knocking you or your situation specifically, but in general if someone is not a great risk, but that goes away if they get someone to make the right phone calls, is that a good thing in the big picture? Not judging, just posing the question.
- hueving 11y ago
  It sounds like the risk wasn't quantified correctly in the first place. Being a highly-skilled tech worker, working for a well-funded startup should have nearly no impact on the probability of you being able to pay your mortgage. Even if the thing collapses, you can have another job within a week. If the whole industry collapses in a dotcom bust style, established companies will be heavily impacted as well.
  - sokoloff 11y ago
    I had a similar situation when buying my house. Tech employee, fairly high percentage of compensation was stock options (we'd gone public ~18 months prior) and the standard route wasn't working (as there was no place to put the variable/incentive comp). Mortgage broker got it done very easily (albeit with Countrywide, not exactly known for the strictest of standards :) ). Never missed or late on a payment on that loan.
- rconti 11y ago
  Different companies offer different products. Some lenders were doing 90% LTV up to 800k, some were doing it up to $1m. Some lenders might give 30 year fixed rate loans on certain high LTV loans, others might only do ARMs. Every business makes a calculation about what kind of business it wants to do. I did not use a mortgage broker when buying a house. My reasoning was that they compete on price enough that the interest rates aren't worth shopping around for. The PRODUCTS may be. If I was doing a bridge loan to buy a 2nd house, I might shop around. If I'm doing a straight-up financed purchase on 2 stable well-documented incomes, I'm probably going to get about the same product and rate no matter what bank I use.