Arizona Home Mortgage Guidelines:

We offer several different types of Arizona home mortgage loan products to suit your needs.  You see we aren’t a bank.  To us it doesn’t matter whether you have good credit or bad credit.  We work with borrowers who have plenty of funds for their down payment as well borrowers who do not have down payment money and can qualify for a VA home loan.

FHA Loan Program:

The FHa loan program requires a middle fico score of 580 or higher to qualify.  You need at least two open tradelines reporting for the last 12 months.  What are tradelines?  They are open accounts that show up on your credit report such as a car loan, truck loan, credit card, or a student loan payment.  On an FHA loan, you can not have any late payments within the last year on both student loan payments and credit card payments.  FHA allows for a higher debt to income.  What does that mean?  It means that FHA allows you to be able to afford a more expensive home versus if you obain a Conventional loan.  The only drawback to an FHA loan is you will be paying a monthly mortgage insurance premium and this does not go away even if your loan to value ratio is less than 80%.  FHA loans help borrowers get into a home.  Once you have equity in your home and if rates have dropped, then you might want to consider a Conventional loan where the monthly mortgage insurance premiums are much lower.

VA Home Mortgage Loans:

VA home mortgage loans do not require any down payment.  To qualify one must be a vet and have a fico score of at least 580.  VA home mortgage loans do not require any monthly mortgage insurance.  This is a huge savings for borrowers.  Since this is a government sponsored loan, interest rates tend to remain lower than a Conventional loan.

Conventional Mortgage Loans:

Conventional mortgage loans require a middle fico score of 620 or higher.  Furthermore, they require at least 1% down to as much money down as you would like to put.  To qualify for the 1% down program, borrowers need a middle fico score of 720.  Otherwise, you will need at least 3% down.  However, the monthly mortgage insurance premiums are high on the 3% down program.  If you can afford to put 5% down, then you might want to think about it because your monthly mortgage insurance is dramatically cheaper.

Article 1:  Arizona Home Mortgage