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How do I get pre-qualified?

The first step is to speak to your loan officer.  You’ll want to know the following: 1. Your gross income 2. Your available cash for a down payment 3. Your monthly debts 4. Potential locations and types of properties you are interested in   By providing us with your income/assets/debts, we are able to determine…

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How do we determine how much you qualify for?

You may already have a payment range you’ve determined that would work for you.  But when people think about getting pre-approved for a maximum loan amount, we have our own system for determining what we think would work for you.   When asking about a maximum amount you can borrow, what we really look at…

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What credit score do I need to get a mortgage?

An FHA or VA loan will typically require a credit score in the 600s.  A conventional loan will become possible at higher scores – the minimum will depend on other factors like down payment and debt-to-income ratio.  The lowest possible score however is 620. We check credit scores with Experian, Equifax and Experian and use…

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How much down payment do I need in Washington DC?

A common misconception is that you’ll need a 20% down payment to receive mortgage financing for a home purchase.  You can actually get a loan with as low as 3.5% down, or 0% down if you are a VA eligible veteran.   Specifically for first time buyers, there are actually programs based on the city…

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Conservator’s report – state on Fannie & Freddie

Full report here: http://www.fhfa.gov/webfiles/16591/ConservatorsRpt82610.pdf   FHFA, linked above, wrote a report on the state of Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac.  Here are some interesting pieces of it.  All data is from Fannie Mae’s stats:   1. This year’s average credit score is 758 versus 716 in 2007. 2. 8% of loans are less than 10% down.…

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