Mortgage Refi

[OZZY.40]

I've been looking for a mortgage company to do a refi on my current mortgage and was wondering which companies INGO members like and what companies that I should stay away from?

 

[spasmo]

We just refinanced through Supreme Lending out of Texas. I chose them because they are an accredited business with the BBB. Did everything online. Title company came to the house to close. Went smoothly. Closed within a month. They did absolutely everything. Two things: You have to go through their home appraiser which is $425. If you get a cash out, you'll need to ask upfront how much it will cost to wire the funds to your bank. We got a check because the $ amount was not on the paperwork prepare for/by the Title agent. The check was here within a week of closing. Not knowing how much it would cost, we didn't want to do the wire thing.

The loan will be sold though. Not sure yet to whom.

If you want to contact him directly:
Paul Philleaux (pronounced Phil-o)
Sr Loan Officer
972-447-5752 Direct
214-288-5548 Cell
469-461-1326 Fax
14801 Quorum Dr. Suite 300 Dallas, TX 75254
paul.philleaux@supremelending.com

To complete an on-line application, please visit the website at:
Home Mortgage Loans - Conventional - FHA - USDA - Refinance

 

[Scutter01]

I was not super impressed with their security and privacy procedures (sending personal financial data through unencrypted e-mail, for example), but other than that I was reasonably satisfied with them and we got a good rate.

 

[hoosierdoc]

We used salin bank. Great rates on a 15-yr fixed. They did the closing at my house.

 

[gregkl]

I have always had good service and good rates with Well's Fargo.

 

[chuddly]

Im going through it right now....i went with Citizens Bank (local indiana bank). Got a rate of 3.75 and their appraisal is only $350. It ends up saving me about $200 a month so no complaints.

 

[tsm]

What I did when I had about 50% equity in my house was to open a line of credit against it at my bank. Cost only a few bucks to do that and the credit line just sits there unless you pull money out of it. Once my outstanding mortgage balance dropped to within what the credit line allowed, used the credit line to pay it off and started making payments against that line, which at that time was lower than the mortgage companies were offering. Almost no out of pocket costs plus a low rate which could be paid off slowly (by just paying the minimum) or faster (by paying extra toward the principal) with no restrictions. I chose the latter approach for the several years it took to do so.

Just another way to consider.

 

[IndyBeerman]

Im going through it right now....i went with Citizens Bank (local indiana bank). Got a rate of 3.75 and their appraisal is only $350. It ends up saving me about $200 a month so no complaints.

We refinanced back in November and got a 3.375 rate, and our appraisal was also $350.00, we ended up saving $275.00 a month on our original loan. Have to love it when you drop a payment from $1250.00 to $975.00.

Unfortunately Citizens Bank (Citba Financial Corp, parent corp name) is merging with Merchants Bank, and while they are retaining the parent corp name, Citizens is going to be renamed Merchants with the two brothers that own Merchants ending up owning 80% of the combined banks.

There goes our home owned bank.

 

[spasmo]

We got 3.5% from Supreme Lending. We are saving about $400 a month after refinancing.

 

[PistolBob]

Pay off the house if you can. Forget about a refi.

 

[Scutter01]

Pay off the house if you can. Forget about a refi.

A refi can significantly reduce the amount of interest you're paying over the life of the loan. Not everyone can just "pay off" a 20 or 30 year loan.

 

[CountryBoy19]

Check local as well. I Refinanced last fall with a local credit union for 3.25%.

I'm certain somebody could beat my rate by a couple tenths of a percent, but my money stays local and when I have issues with my mortgage I can talk to a person face-to-face.

 

[24Carat]

Stay straight the hell away from CitiMortgage if you are planning a USDA or VA Govt backed loan. Their processors are all incompetent trainees who don't stay on task, lose the information you send them and have no real world comprehension of the proper steps needed to avoid excessive time and expense. Bluntly put, the right hand has no idea what the left hand is doing. A pox on their house !

 

[88GT]

I would avoid Wells Fargo and Chase. Took 4 months to close a Wells Fargo refi at the end of last year.

And one of our MetLife loans was sold to Chase. They offered a stream-lined refi so we started the process. The loans docs we received were full of errors. Not clerical errors. Mortgage fraud type errors. When Mr88GT sent an email (all communication is via the "secure" email system) to inquire about the issues, they dropped all communication with us. That was last week and we still haven't heard a single word in response. We are currently looking to refi those loans just to get rid of Chase. (Chase also screwed up insurance when they bought the loans from MetLife. Chase is bad juju.)

I wish I could tell you who to use, but I must have ridiculously high standards because nobody seems to be able to close a loan like they did in the good old days. Your best best is to stick with local. Credit unions usually give better service.

I would have recommended First Horizon, but my local guy seems to have joined up with Caliber Funding (or something like that). I'll admit to knowing next to nothing about Caliber, but I've had a working relationship with Steve since 2005 or 2006. If it's good enough for him to move his mortgage business to Caliber, it's good enough for me...until I learn something differently.

 

[hoosierdoc]

I think PistolBob was saying don't refi and cash out or bring more debt onto the house, though I could be wrong. Certainly don't add consumer debt to your house and then lose your house over unsecured debt issues.

I am surprised rates are up to 3.75% already. I refi'd a few months ago for 2.85% or so and our break-even point was I think 10 months. We had been 3.5% prior to the refi but the numbers worked.

 

[OZZY.40]

You guys and gals seem to favor the credit unions, but does anyone dealt with Lending Tree or Quicken Loans; they seem to be at the top of a couple of lists.

 

[Scutter01]

We looked at Quicken but they couldn't match the rates we got elsewhere.

 

[Hoosier8]

Check local as well. I Refinanced last fall with a local credit union for 3.25%.

I'm certain somebody could beat my rate by a couple tenths of a percent, but my money stays local and when I have issues with my mortgage I can talk to a person face-to-face.

I did mine through a Credit Union also because I wanted a 15 year fixed and not have an escrow account. My rate is not as low as that but at 4% I am not complaining.

 

[IndyBeerman]

A refi can significantly reduce the amount of interest you're paying over the life of the loan. Not everyone can just "pay off" a 20 or 30 year loan.

We are applying the money we saved on the refi to the principle to pay it down faster.

We looked at Quicken but they couldn't match the rates we got elsewhere.

Quicken was not only wanting 1% more, they badgered us relentlessly (even after telling them we was refinancing elsewhere), to the point that I told them if I received another call from them I was going to call the Indiana Attorney General's office.

 

[Scutter01]

We are applying the money we saved on the refi to the principle to pay it down faster.

That's what we did. We actually refi'ed at 30 years to lower our payments and interest rate, but we're still paying at the old schedule. Every 2-3 months, we'll have paid enough that we'll have made an extra payment. It's a hedge against one of us losing our job, to give us some breathing room.