Anonymous wrote:OP---sorry our current place is a townhouse condo. We hope that the new property will be a SFH.

Huh? Why condo ? Why fees I don't get it.

OP---sorry our current place is a townhouse condo. We hope that the new property will be a SFH.

Why are you buying a condo

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a friend who mortgage just fell through (after initial pre-approval) because she was using funds received from a relative. Lending companies like the downpayment to have been in your accounts for a couple of years.

That's simply not true. And you can also get a gift letter documenting where the funds came from, and showing that they do not need to be re-paid.

It is true, because it happened. They wanted the downpayment to be a product of her own income and assets (so maybe I misspoke that you need to have it for a couple of years, I think it's probably enough to document that you generated it over time). A letter didn't help and she lost out on the house.

I'm not saying it's a given for all lenders but it was for this one, and she wasn't able to line another one up in time to salvage the sale.

Anonymous wrote:I have a friend who mortgage just fell through (after initial pre-approval) because she was using funds received from a relative. Lending companies like the downpayment to have been in your accounts for a couple of years.

That's simply not true. And you can also get a gift letter documenting where the funds came from, and showing that they do not need to be re-paid.

OP here---thanks all. I think it probably does make sense to wait until we list......good to see experiences of listing quickly. In this case my DH is helping his dad prepare for a move to an assisted living facility (a long, complicated porcess due to FIL's personality) and we have a lot of his stuff stored at our house so DH can work on selling things on ebay, organizing etc. In the long run all of that could just go to storage along with the stuff we would need to declutter but I think the family transition is causing a lot of stress, and trying to list our house at the same time may be too much (we have a toddler and both work full time). Bad for us in terms of options, but good for us in terms of sanity. Also there are two houses on our immediate block for sale (we live in townhouses) right now. Generally places in our neighborhood sell fast, but I think these are lingering due to time of year. So probably not a good time to list for many reasons.
Thanks for the insights all!

Anonymous wrote:What needs to be done to your place, OP? Might be easier just to fast-forward whatever improvements need to be made, or put it on the market as-is. Good luck!

We just put our place on the market and it was much easier than we thought. We got a realtor in here one evening after work to tell us what they thought we should update/upgrade/declutter. This was v helpful as they recommended that we do less than we thought we had to. They gave us recommendations for a handyman who was able to get all work done the following week. We rented a uhaul and a storage unit and took a weekend to declutter and move stuff out. Then got cleaning people in here to do a deep cleaning. Within 2 weeks we were on the market!

I have owned (unhappily) two homes at the same time in the past, and it is very stressful. I would recommend not going that route if you dont have to.

What needs to be done to your place, OP? Might be easier just to fast-forward whatever improvements need to be made, or put it on the market as-is. Good luck!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a friend who mortgage just fell through (after initial pre-approval) because she was using funds received from a relative. Lending companies like the downpayment to have been in your accounts for a couple of years.

How would they know if it's been there for years? Ours just recently asked for the last 6 months of statements. So they know I've had the money, and added to it, over the last 6 months...

in this scenario, the OP is out of luck, as it seems she is looking to move relatively soon

Anonymous wrote:I have a friend who mortgage just fell through (after initial pre-approval) because she was using funds received from a relative. Lending companies like the downpayment to have been in your accounts for a couple of years.

How would they know if it's been there for years? Ours just recently asked for the last 6 months of statements. So they know I've had the money, and added to it, over the last 6 months...

I have a friend who mortgage just fell through (after initial pre-approval) because she was using funds received from a relative. Lending companies like the downpayment to have been in your accounts for a couple of years.

Contact a lender and ask them. We are in the same situation and to make a long story short we could get approved for a second mortgage but our current house would have to be under contract in order to close on the new home.

you might have problems getting approved ultimately (not with the preapproval), if you are using a loan from a relative.

i recently bought a home, and the lender wanted to know where each and every dollar i was using for the down payment came from. i had to trace all of it from various accounts into the checking account i ultimately used for the down payment. the loan officer is one of my best friends. i asked him why, and he said one of the reasons is they want to be sure you aren't taking on another loan on top of your mortgage that you have to pay back. you might have to get your relative to lie and say it was a gift.

You can get preapproved if the total of both mortgage payments falls within the lender's limits (which is generally 33% of your income). If not, you can look into whether bridge loans are still available.

DH and I currently live in a home and can easily make mortgage payments and condo fees. A number of homes that very much interest us are currently on the market but our place realistically won't be ready to be listed for a few months., A relaitve has offered to lend us a substantial amount of money that could be used for a down payment on a new home. Would we be able to get pre-approved for a second mortgage at this point? How does this work? I am assuming I need to wait until we sell our house, but wish we could move on another properties. Prices are dropping because of the time of year and I would like to take advantage of that.