Posts by wearyorca21

I submitted all my paperwork for the housing loan subsidies through the Department of Housing last week. After obsessively weighing all the different bank offers, I finally pulled the trigger on Bank of America. Compared to the other options, they were actually the most competitive—even beating out Bank of America, where I’ve been a customer for over a decade. The catch, obviously, is moving my entire account over to Wall Street. What really tipped the scales was the fact that they offer specific loans for Department of Education employees; it’s honestly absurd because you won't find any mention of it anywhere, certainly not on their website. The interest rate is 5.15%.

I reached out to the Department of Housing, and they told me it should have been ready by now, though there have been a few delays. Most likely, the announcement will drop this Friday, and we can start submitting requests through them next week. There’s been a lot of chatter about how Chase is already approving loans for their clients through the Department of Housing, so I decided to contact the agency directly to get the facts, which is what I wrote above.

Cheers, and if you’re planning on applying, I’d suggest getting your documents ready ASAP. I suspect there’s going to be a massive crowd of applicants. I foolishly thought I could knock everything out in a single day and just hit send, but it ended up taking me a full week to get it sorted.

Hi,

Like I mentioned in the title, I’m looking for some outside perspective.

I'm currently in the middle of applying for a mortgage to buy a new condo, and I'm stuck on a decision: should I wait for those government-subsidized loans from the FHA or just go ahead with a standard commercial loan now? I need $55,000.00. I was originally thinking about a 15-year term, but the FHA requirements (based on last year's rules) would force me into a 20-year term. I suppose waiting for the FHA makes sense since the government covers half my monthly payment, but then again, I'd be paying more in total interest because of the longer repayment period.

I ran the numbers through a Citibank calculator. For $55,000.00 over 15 years, the monthly payment is $474.59. Over 20 years, it drops to $405.22.

180 months x $474.59 = $85,426.20
240 months x $405.22 = $97,252.80

48 months x $202.61 = $9,725.00 🙂

The question is whether it's actually worth extending the loan term to wait for the FHA, or if I should just grab a conventional loan. I should probably mention that my housing savings account is about to mature, so I'll have a lump sum of cash coming in soon. Maybe I could use that to pay down the principal and shorten the term if I go the conventional route.

What do you all think? What should I do?

Thanks! 🙂