The Money Mustache Community
Learning, Sharing, and Teaching => Real Estate and Landlording => Topic started by: Belial on November 01, 2013, 11:52:15 AM
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Any tips for getting the best deal on a mortgage?
I just went under contract for my first house. I will be putting 20% down, have excellent (760+) credit, plan to live in the house for at least five years, and am debating if it's better to shorten the term of the loan to reduce the interest rate or take a 30 year and invest the difference in the monthly payments.
I'm pre-qualified with a credit union and plan to check bankrate.com for other lenders. Anything else I should do to find the best lender?
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I used Pentagon Federal Credit Union, the rates are pretty competitive. Not sure if you eligible to be a member but you can check thier site on how to becomea member.
Good luck
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Rate shop.
So many people don't shop around.
If you're under contract already though you need to gogogo ASAP.
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+1 on rate shopping. BUT do NOT let a bunch of different banks all run your credit. You know your numbers, so ask them what rate they can give you based on those numbers.
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It is my understanding that if several lenders do a hard credit inquiry (what they'll do for a mortgage) within a 30 day period, that counts as only one inquiry as far as your credit score goes, so it won't affect your credit score if they do a credit report. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.
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That is what my Lender told me and as far as I can tell from my credit report is accurate.
FYI - When your lender pulls your credit report it will have additional information and potentially a different credit score then you can see.
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It is my understanding that if several lenders do a hard credit inquiry (what they'll do for a mortgage) within a 30 day period, that counts as only one inquiry as far as your credit score goes, so it won't affect your credit score if they do a credit report. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.
I thought it was a two-week period. If the OP is already under contract for a house, she presumably was already preapproved (most realtors won't accept offers without preapproval letters), so the period, however long it is, already started ticking... it started whenever she got preapproved and may well be over by now.