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Article Archives for Vancouver, Washington VA Home Loan Team - Since 1992 (Page 3)
Clark County Veterans Assistance Center
April 1st, 2011
A new non profit organization for veterans opened today in downtown Vancouver, WA. The vision for the Clark County Veterans Assistance Center is to allow veterans a place to drop in for advice, counseling, job searching, finding housing, or to point them in the right direction on their available benefits. The center will be run by volunteers, primarily other veterans, who can help vets find what they need, even if it is simply someone to chat with them over coffee and doughnuts.
Trying to find something to do to help out, I, purchased a refrigerator for the center so the volunteers had a place for their lunch. In the larger scheme of what the center is trying to achieve a fridge is the least I could do. The volunteers at the center are amazing and the help they look forward to providing will have a huge impact on the veterans in our community. If there is more that I can do, I will, as I think this center is going to change lives.
Michael Frakes
NMLS#71539
Creekside Mortgage
360-571-5626
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Wasington & Idaho VA Home Loans Gives $1,000 Towards SOWF
March 25th, 2011
Creekside Mortgage is donating $1,000 to Special Operations Warrior Foundation. We have been working with them over the last year, and give $100 for every VA purchase in the state of Washington & Idaho. This money provides full scholarships for children of fallen Veterans. Thank you to everyone for helping make this happen.
Kerry N. Greenwald
NMLS # 70269
Sr. VA Loan Specialist
Creekside Mortgage Inc.
360.571.LOAN (5626)
www.VALoanWA.com
Dominance of Short Sales in Vancouver WA
March 22nd, 2011
The dominance of short sales in Vancouver is becoming overwhelming. In conversations I have had with Robin Conrad ,our local VA realtor in Vancouver, he says that more than 60-70% of all transactions are short sales, which means that many buyers are waiting anywhere from 3 to 6 months to get bank clearance for their transaction to go through. A lot of people in Vancouver ask why it takes so long for a bank to decide if they can accept the offered price. The only information we have been able to find on why it takes so long for banks to consider offers is that they don’t want to take the loss on the house to show on their books that as a company, the bank is taking tremendous losses. Most larger banks want to cycle losses in slowly, so their books don’t show overwhelming losses per quarter. If they trickle the short sales into their equation, it shows mediocre losses per quarter, rather than one huge flood of losses. This is why the short sale process takes so long. The reality of short sales is that less than 10% of them ever actually close, meaning that you as the consumer can’t or won’t wait six months, and typically walk away from the transaction, or the bank holds out and waits for someone to come along and give a higher offer than what you are willing to pay for the house. A lot of times if there is a second lienholder involved in the transaction, one bank will agree to sign off on it, and the second will verbally sign off on it, but it gets to the closing table and the bank changes their mind and wants more money. The buyer in that predicament has to either come up with more funds to close on it, or walk away from the deal. This happens an overwhelming number of times. It is always crucial to ask your agent if there are two banks involved that have to sign off, and never under any circumstances, ever accept a verbal agreement from a second bank. Make sure you always get their acceptance in writing. Numerous times when we have had the verbal acceptance, we get to closing, especially in Vancouver, and the bank comes back and says they want $5,000 or $10,000 more to accept this, and the first always says no, and an entire transaction has crashed, so always be aware of that.
Kerry N. Greenwald
NMLS # 70269
Sr. VA Loan Specialist
Creekside Mortgage Inc.
360.571.LOAN (5626)
www.VALoanWA.com
www.OregonVALoan.com
April 1st 2011 Industry Changes
March 13th, 2011
The Changes in the mortgage industry on April 1, 2011 are going to be overwhelming. It is going to be the good, the bad, and the ugly. But overall, I do see the positive aspects in the changes that will happen on that day. The biggest thing is that everyone is going to have to do it. Where rules and laws in the past have subjected only limited amounts of the industry, at least what can be seen so far of these changes should affect everyone in the industry.
There are aspects of the April 1 Frank Dodd Act that I feel will be good in the long run. A lot of people argue with the Safe Harbor Act portion, which states that it is our duty and our job to put the individual in the loan or the best option for them. There are a lot of people who say that hindsight is 20/20 when you look after the fact, for example, If certain individuals who took out a 7-year ARM and then decided to stay in the house longer than seven years, which they had not originally intended when they first moved, their situation appears worse than if they had sold as originally planned…or if they did a 30-year FHA loan when possibly they should have done a different type of loan to fit their needs.
In my industry, what I see in the bill is positive. Everyday I come across people who are Veterans, that in some cases have service-connected disability benefits, and they are pushed in or roped into a loan that does not fit their needs. From my perspective, that should never happen again. If you do have your VA eligibility, and in some cases have disability through the VA, there is no reason and hopefully no time in the future that anyone will ever do a non-VA loan for you. So some parts of the bill I can see as benefits.
Most of the changes, however, will be in accounting and pay structures. The intent of this bill was to have the consumer have less in cost, but I don’t think that will be successful. For example, right now, a year plus into the effects of the changes in RESPA that were instituted back in January 1, 2010, you can see that the individual borrower is actually paying more in cost than what they were prior to that event due to bank logistics and the individual companies involved that have to offset their expense to facilitate the law. I feel the same thing is going to happen on April 1. While the intent of the law is to lower the cost to the consumer and enable them to make more free choices, actually, in the end, it’s going to make it more expensive for them because businesses pass that expense on to the consumer. That is the one negative that will come out of this bill. Overcharging is still going to exist. It is not going to go away. It is going to be a shell game on how banks or how brokerages or how mortgage bankers will pay the individual loan officers. That’s just my opinion on what the law is going to effect, and I look forward to that date to find out exactly what is going to happen.
Kerry N. Greenwald
NMLS # 70269
Sr. VA Loan Specialist
360.571.LOAN (5626)
I-5 New Bridge
March 12th, 2011
In Vancouver right now there is a debate going on about the building of an I-5 bridge, and not only building it, but having access for light rail to come across it. The third aspect is having it be a toll bridge. In my opinion, here in Vancouver, yes, it is nice to have a new bridge, but I think it would be overwhelming negative to Vancouver to have something with a cost attached to it. I know an overwhelming number of clients that I’ve dealt with that work in Oregon and elect to move to Vancouver for tax purposes. Why would you do that if you had to pay even as low as $2 or $5 per trip across the bridge? You’re talking $4 or $10 per day, which is something that adds up over time, and when you start figuring your utility bills, gas, etc., that little toll portion would not benefit Vancouver at all, even if Vancouver got a portion of the money. Most of these benefits would be to Portland, and Vancouver would come out on the short end of the stick. It would take away the advantage of living here, and it would draw our housing market down.
Kerry N. Greenwald
NMLS # 70269
Sr. VA Loan Specialist
Creekside Mortgage Inc.
360.571.LOAN (5626)
www.VALoanWA.com
Tidewater is doing some Rehiring in 2011
March 8th, 2011
Tidewater is rehiring some employees back after the locks will reopen on the Columbia and Snake Rivers. The locks were shut down for approximately three months. There are over 8 million tons of cargo at over 2 billion dollars of value that moves up and down the Columbia and Snake Rivers per year. This is ranging to about 40% of all the exports in the NW travel on the Columbia River. The main product has been wheat. This will help obviously with the economies of the river when the locks are reopened. In the past, it typically shut down for just three weeks a year for maintenance. This time, it was for a major overhaul replacement of a couple of doors. The good news is that over 100 employees will have their jobs back full time and part time will go back to full time.
Kerry N. Greenwald
NMLS # 70269
Sr. VA Loan Specialist
Creekside Mortgage Inc.
360.571.LOAN (5626)
www.VALoanWA.com
Washington Tax Exemption for 100% Veterans
March 2nd, 2011
The property tax exemption for 100% VA disabled veterans in Washington State was originally written as RCW84.36.379-84.36.389. Thislaw was written in the State of Washington to allow 100% VA disabled Veterans to be exempt from property taxes. The problem with this bill today is that a Veteran who receives 100% VA disability also exceeds the income cap of $35,000 per year.
As I see this bill, the way it was written, it eliminates any Veteran from being compensated, or exempt from paying taxes on their property.
I think this is something that needs to be revisited by the legislation in the State of Washington to correct that gap. They should either not cunt disability in income, or revise the income limits to fit the current numbers. Obviously in the next few years, Veterans’ disability incomes will not be increased due to federal budgetary issues. What they are making right now with inflationary factors, the last thing we want to do is tax a 100% service-connected disabled Veteran out of their house.
Kerry N. Greenwald
Sr. VA Loan Specialist
Creekside Mortgage Inc.
360.571.LOAN (5626)
www.VALoanWA.com
Homebuyers Tax Credit Extended Oregonian Article
March 1st, 2011
An article yesterday in the Oregonian had some great quotes by Steve Granmo saying that VA is one of the last loans out there offering 100% financing. The Oregonian did a great job in putting everything together and discussing this tax credit for Portland homebuyers and any Oregon state Veterans.
Kerry N. Greenwald
Creekside Mortgage Inc.
360-571-LOAN (5626) / 530-445-1038
www.VALoanWA.com
www.OregonVALoan.com
Interest Rates Improving
February 23rd, 2011
What an overall crazy week it has been in the markets, but the good news is that rates have actually been improving; sticking with the theory that bad news is good news for interest rates. The issues going on in the Middle East, oil prices drastically increasing, and the stock market on decline have contributed to improvements in rates over the last week. This will most likely continue over the coming months. No one sees any light at the end of the tunnel and oil prices will probably continue to increase through the busy fuel months into the summer.
Kerry N. Greenwald
Sr. VA Loan Specialist
Creekside Mortgage Inc.
360.571.LOAN (5626)/503.445.1038
www.VALoanWA.com
www.OregonVALoan.com
Tax Credit Extension Coming to a Close
February 14th, 2011
Were you a Guard or other U.S. military member serving on qualified official extended business outside the United States for at least 90 days during the period between December 31, 2008 and May 1, 2010? If so, you may be eligible to receive the $8,000 tax credit offered for first-time homebuyers as long as you purchase, or enter a contract to purchase, a home before April 30, 2011, and close on the home before June 30, 2011.
The definition used for “first-time homebuyer” in this case is someone who has not owned property in the last three years. So, even if you’ve had a home in the past, you could be eligible as a first-time homebuyer if you fit within these guidelines. Additionally, you must be purchasing a primary residence. There is a $6,500 credit available to long-time homeowners buying a replacement principal residence as well. Please see the IRS website for additional qualifying guidelines.
This gives service members who may not have been in the country at the time the full opportunity that their fellow citizens had to take advantage of this government incentive.
Often, people find that they can purchase a home for not much of a difference than what they pay in rent every month. With VA, you can get into a home with $0 out-of-pocket cost, since it is one of the few loans that will finance 100% of the appraised value of the home.
Here at Creekside Mortgage, we have helped a number of Veterans purchase homes and receive this tax credit. Combined with historically low property values and great interest rates on VA loans, you can hardly turn this down! Give us a call with your questions.
Kerry N. Greenwald
Creekside Mortgage Inc.
360-571-LOAN (5626) / 530-445-1038
www.VALoanWA.com
www.OregonVALoan.com
Newer Articles - Article Archive Page 4
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