Harp Refi?

[Anonymous]

A little late on the bandwagon for this, but we just found out we may be eligible for a Harp refi (loan backed by Fannie Mae, 105% LTV according to Zillow estimate, meet all the other basic criteria listed on Fannie's webpage). Current rate is over 6% (don't remember the details but it was something like take a slightly higher rate for no separate PMI), we are current and don't have trouble paying it but would like to reduce the length of the loan and lower payments a bit. Joint HHI around $170K; we have a fair amount in easily accessible savings but as we consider it our loss-of-income/emergency fund, don't want to burn it all, and even if we did, it wouldn't quite get the loan down below 80%.

Haven't called our lender yet, just thought I'd see if it is even worth it. Think it's doable?

[Anonymous]

I don't think you have to use savings to get your equity up - my brother did one and didn't have to pay down mortgage at all. I would do it.

[Anonymous]

Definitely look into it! We didn't think we were eligible, but our lender contacted us and we are going from 6.5% to 3.875% with almost no out-of-pocket.

[Anonymous]

We went from 5.875% 30-year to a 3.75% 15-year with no out-of-pocket (they credited us 5K for closing costs). This was with Quicken Loans in August with ~100% LTV according to their estimate -- no actual appraisal was done. Our monthly payment is approximately the same, but we'll be paid off 10 years earlier (we were five years into our old loan). Totally worth it.

[Anonymous]

OP here again. Finally contacted our lender and they said when they looked it up in Fannie Mae's system, it said we were not eligible. He couldn't tell me exactly why but speculated it was because we had lender-paid MI instead of PMI. He offered some pretty good rates for a conventional refi (3% even for a 15yr) with trad. PMI but they require 10% equity which is more than we can do right now.

HOWEVER, I then called Quicken Loans, because I was a little skeptical about the "did not qualify", and lo and behold, Quicken Loans says we DO qualify. They are able to convert our lender-paid MI to traditional PMI easy, and their system values our home a fair bit higher than Zillow so we'd actually have an LTV of 95%. The loans he quoted me require <$1K down but the rates were much worse than I was hoping for--3.675% for a 20yr (with next to no reduction in our monthly pmt) and 3.99% for a 25yr (smaller than desired reduction in pmt). Are those rates actually fair for now, or should I try elsewhere?

And if elsewhere, any recommendations? No idea where to start looking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here again. Finally contacted our lender and they said when they looked it up in Fannie Mae's system, it said we were not eligible. He couldn't tell me exactly why but speculated it was because we had lender-paid MI instead of PMI. He offered some pretty good rates for a conventional refi (3% even for a 15yr) with trad. PMI but they require 10% equity which is more than we can do right now.

HOWEVER, I then called Quicken Loans, because I was a little skeptical about the "did not qualify", and lo and behold, Quicken Loans says we DO qualify. They are able to convert our lender-paid MI to traditional PMI easy, and their system values our home a fair bit higher than Zillow so we'd actually have an LTV of 95%. The loans he quoted me require <$1K down but the rates were much worse than I was hoping for--3.675% for a 20yr (with next to no reduction in our monthly pmt) and 3.99% for a 25yr (smaller than desired reduction in pmt). Are those rates actually fair for now, or should I try elsewhere?

And if elsewhere, any recommendations? No idea where to start looking.

PP here with the brother - he also had the lender paid PMI which was supposedly the problem, but qualified for Harp 2. Call Ajay Datta at Fidelity Direct. He is the best and stuck with my brother who had a +6 interest rate and no end in sight- Ajay took great care of him.

[Anonymous]

We ended up refinancing through Aimloan.com. I'm not sure if the lender-paid MI will be an issue with them. We were able to get 3.625% for a 30 year. Their online rate calculator was accurate, and you don't have to give them any personal information to use it. The big variable in the rate you'll get from them is the value of your house, but that's true with any lender. Aimloan was good to deal with, but their contractor who came to notarize our closing was awful (really late and seemed clueless)--but the loan went through. Good luck!