Get Your Papers in Order: The Essential Things for a Mortgage
These days, a lot of people are looking to take advantage of low interest rates and affordable housing options. To make this happen, there are a few essential steps to get the ball rolling.
Firstly, you’ll need references for your previous landlord and your attorney.
For dealing with closing the mortgage and signing the papers, you’ll need a good real estate lawyer who can make sure you’re not being gipped. Make sure to pass this contact information along when working on your mortgage too, as the lender and attorney will coordinate the closing.
The name, phone number, address and email address of your landlord, or multiple landlords will also be useful. You need to prove that you are someone who pays rent on time and your landlord can do that. You’re basically doing the same thing with a mortgage, just for your own house.
Have all the proper identification. Make sure you have a driver’s license with front and back images. This complies with the patriot act, and also verifies your identity. You will also need secondary identification to support your driver’s license. This could include a social security card, passport, or military ID.
You’ll need some paperwork regarding your employment and salary to ensure you can make payments. A month’s worth of pay stubs will be required, whether or not you are paid hourly or via a W-2 salary. W-2 forms from employers for the past one to two years, depending on the lender, are also essential to prove employment and salary history. Tax returns signed and with all pages and schedules, for the past two years, are required and especially useful for those who are self-employed, or collect bonuses or commission income. Sometimes you’ll have to fill out a Form 4506-T, which allows the lender to get a copy of your tax returns, and helps prevent fraud. It used to be that self-employed borrowers could simply state their income on tax returns and use that as proof of income on their mortgage, but it may be that you need to fill out a profit-and-loss statement. Finally, you will have to present your last two month’s worth of bank and asset statements, with all of the pages intact.
To prove you’re taking the mortgage out on an actual property, you will need a copy of the fully executed purchase contract for your home or property. This also creates a baseline for the collateral appraisal and loan parameters so there can be an estimate for the loan. The same goes for if you are refinancing. Bring a copy of your deed, so the lender knows what property is being refinanced.
Your realtor can often help you with all the requirements in getting a mortgage and buying your home. Some of the best in Columbia SC real estate are ERA Wilder Realty. With over 23,000 homes already sold, seven offices and hundreds of agents to help you begin your search, ERA Wilder Realty can make choosing from the many Columbia SC homes for sale an easy process for anyone.
