Avoid 6 Things While You Are Waiting For A Mortgage Approval

A home buyer should know that there are 2 stages to mortgage loan approval. We have heard of preapproval. When the buyer submits the loan application to his loan officer for preapproval, Stage 1 begins.

When pre-approval is requested, it will be a preliminary home mortgage approval indicating that the mortgage will likely be approved for a certain down payment and purchase price.

This preliminary approval becomes obsolete once the buyer signs a purchase agreement. Stage 1 is now over because the buyer must now secure the actual loan from an “underwriter” and not the loan officer.

During the second phase of the approval process, a mortgage underwriter is reviewing income, assets, credit, job history, and other items, too; the underwriters job is to make sure that the buyer meets the bank’s criteria for lending.

This procedure should be a formality if the Stage 1 loan officer did an appropriate job. Usually this stage moves along as anticipated. However, sometimes the buyer changes his loan “risk” without intending to do this, but affecting the mortgage approval. The buyer doesn’t mean to decrease his loan probability, it “happens.”

It is important for the buyer to maintain a consistent “risk profile”. The following is the “DO NOT DO” list of 6 activities for a buyer to avoid during the period between Stage 1 and Stage 2 of the mortgage loan process:

1. Don’t buy a new car (or take on a larger lease payment) 2. Don’t quit your job or change industries (and certainly don’t switch to a heavily commissioned role) 3. Don’t transfer large sums of money into or out from your bank accounts (and remember that “large” is relative) 4. Don’t miss a payment to a creditor (even if you don’t think you owe it) 5. Don’t open a new credit card (even if you’re getting 10% off your new bedding) 6. Don’t accept a cash gift without talking to your loan officer first (because there’s rules on how to accept them)

There may be some other “don’ts” but this is a good starter list. It may not be possible to avoid some errors. Talk to your loan officer if you have to break a “rule.” You need to have professional guidance during this process because There are a lot of “snafus” possible during the process.