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Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Locked & Loaded

Today we moved another step further in the home-buying process. We met with our lender this afternoon and signed a boatload of paperwork and officially locked in our interest rate. We're locked in at 5% which is an incredibly far cry from the 14% + our parents had. Incredibly, that was the norm for the late 1970s and '80s. These days anything above an 8% is considered high. When Dylan said the times were a-changin' I wonder if he was including home-buying in that equation.

So ultimately, we're a step closer to holding the title and keys to a home. Crazy but true! Now we need to wait for the attourney review of the contract ant all the papers, and then we do a hell of a lot of praying that everything goes smoothly until the closing.

Our lender is a really nice guy and went through all the paperwork with us and did a good job of explaining everything. Since we're first-time buyers, we've got a lot to learn in a few short weeks, and he's been great in explaining all we need to know. Last night I woke up and had a small bout of "OH MY GOD WHAT IF THE BANK TAKES IT ALL AWAY AND WE'RE SCREWED AND HAVE NO HOME?????????????????" I asked him to be honest with me and explain everything that could possibly go wrong and all the "what ifs" that are left. Basically, he said that as far as the "3 C's" are concerned, we're pretty golden. The first C: Credit. He's reviewed all our paperwork and feels confident that we're in a good position and that there won't be any red flags during the filing and working with the underwriter. That's a good thing to know.

The second C: I can't remember what it's called, but it basically boils down to the loan, and we're pretty set as far as that's concerned.

The final C: Collateral. That's pretty much out of our hands. That C belongs to the house, and the only red flag that might be if something comes back in an appraisal that doesn't look kosher. At that point, the bank, lender, realtors, and seller would have to work something out so it all gets fixed. I had a friend go through something similar lately--the bank was fussing over the appraisal because of some things that needed to be fixed or finished. My friend had worked it out with the seller that she and her husband would fix those things and the seller would knock down the price of the house, but because banks are banks, they were being nitpicky. In the end, all they had to do was adjust the wording in a contract or on a form or something, and they were able to close on their target date. If we can be that lucky, we'll consider ourselves lucky!

Man...this is nervewracking stuff! How do people DO this all the time? Or more than once? I probably won't rest easy until I'm holding the keys...and even then! It's going to be a hell of a long month, that's for sure....

Just keep praying for us that all goes well and continues to go well! We've been really blessed so far, far more than we deserve. Hopefully those blessings will continue over the next few weeks and into the holiday season--nothing like moving on Thanksgiving weekend!

We'll continue to update as things progress...but if I remember correctly according to our agent, this is the point where it all slows down and is completely out of our hands, so there may not be daily house updates like there have been (which you're all secretly thankful for!) but we'll deal.

1 comment:

Tell me what you think. For serious.