Help is yet to reach the millions of homeowners in danger of losing their homes to foreclosure. Difficulties and obstacles still plague the government’s mortgage refinancing program. A small percentage of distressed homeowners have been able to qualify for temporary mortgage adjustments but an even smaller number has able to transform their application into permanent modifications.
· Home Refinancing
· Modifying Home Mortgages
It is estimated that only a small percent of those undergoing temporary modification or half of these applications are qualified for permanent mortgage modifications. The government in response to the homeowner’s clamor for faster handling of their applications has placed January 31 as the deadline for all temporary applications.
Homeowners have often complained about the pace at which their applications are being processed. Changing requirements and confusing government policies are one of the major factors affecting the rate at which applications are currently being handled.
Months into the program, the latest government offering has yet to make a serious dent into the number of foreclosures. Home industry analysts and counselors believe that the program has failed to reach projected goals.
The large delay has also been blamed at the speed at which banks have been processing the huge numbers of applications, in what some homeowners could only describe as being snail pace. Banks have been swamped by the sheer number of homeowners applying for refinancing. Bank personnel had to be pulled from different departments just to cope with the number of paperwork to be processed.
Introduced March of last year, the HAMP was the third government initiative aimed at curbing the rising rates of foreclosure. To attract interest in the program, mortgage services and lenders were given $4,000 for each loan modified. All homeowners are required to undergo a trial program where they are assessed for eligibility by making a total of 6 on time monthly payments.
Changes have been made on the program allowing homeowners with less than 20 percent in equity on their homes to qualify for mortgage refinancing. The original program placed a ceiling on how much a homeowner must have in terms of total home equity. For example homeowners whose home’s current market value is pegged at $200,000 should not have a loan exceeding $210,000. Since the changes, a homeowner with a $250,000 loaned amount could still avail of the refinancing program.
Final Four Steps to Buying a Home
Buying a home can be exhilarating, but it is also a serious process. If you’ve taken the first steps to become preapproved and you’ve found the perfect house that you can afford, then it is time to take the final four steps to buying a home.Reverse Mortgages
With the current economic difficulties, a lot of homeowners are finding themselves defaulting on their monthly mortgages or worse in danger of foreclosure. Retirees and senior Americans particularly are one of the hardest hit sectors of the population. With rising healthcare cost and the value of their pensions dropping making the next mortgage payment is becoming more and more difficult.Advantages and Disadvantages of Reverse Mortgages
As the term implies, Reverse Mortgages are funds which are released to a home owner based on the equity they have made based on their mortgage payments. In typical mortgages, payments are made on a predetermined amortized payment to the lending entity. Reverse mortgages release these equity built thru years of monthly payments to their homeowners. In this type of loan, homeowners are not obliged to make payments only that when the owner dies all rights are transferred to the lending institution.