RATES

I do not publish interest rates on this website because if I did, that would be all I do. Current rates for your area can be found at bankrate.com

Read the fine print, if you want a 97% loan and your credit isn't terrific, you aren't gong to get the rates published for a person with 800 credit scores and 20% down.

And, rates in Sunday's paper were submitted last Thursday; bankrate.com's rates are updated every 48 hours . . . . and none of them are going to be the exact figure you're going to get on your loan.

I prefer not to take phone calls asking what today's rates are.

I could take the time to price every loan on every phone call I get, and give you an accurate rate, if you were ready to close your loan today.

Understand, it could take hours to price YOUR loan to four different lenders, and anyone who does it faster has a crystal ball or only has one lender.

Or, I could just tell you what you want to hear and do some song and dance later about how the rate changed.

What you need to understand is that it is not important what rates are today, it is important at what rate your loan closes. And, rates are going to change 30 times before your loan closes if it is a purchase . . . once a day, sometimes twice a day . . . you probably aren't going to know rates every day til your loan closes.

I have found that prospective clients who spend hours on the telephone rate shopping everyone who has a phone number will eventually commit to someone who will tell them what they want to hear.

Sometimes they come back to me, like the people in these emails . . . the rest, being pressed to close a loan for whatever reasons, accept the difference in what they were quoted at the onset and what they actually get. They chalk it up to the market, or realize maybe they went to the wrong place.

I do what I say I'm going to do, and I get my clients the best rate I can get them for whatever deal they are doing . . . owner occupied properties and investor properties.

I keep my borrowers informed as the process matures, and you'll probably find that you're more educated in the process after you close.

I don't charge outrageous fees, (they're posted on that page) and I don't inflate rate to make high back end fees.

And I don't quote today's rates.

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NOTES FROM AFAR:

As a mortgage professional, I spend a lot of time telling people what kind of deal I can make for them. I shoot straight from the hip, tell them what I can do, what I can't do, what I don't know and will have to check. . . I have hundreds of programs from almost a hundred lenders. I know the things I sell the most and the best. Other times, I have to go to the source: my investors.

I lose business to other lenders who talk faster, or harder, or promise things I know I can't deliver. I know that some of those people are going to be disappointed at the table, or take something they weren't expecting, because they want to close, and don't know how to say I won't accept these terms, or don't want to start the process all over again, because it already took two or three weeks to get that far.

Sometimes, though, they come back to me before they get to the table.

From my mailbag, help for those whose deal has gone south . . .

Traci,

I talked to you about a week ago regarding the 6 month interest only mortgage tied to the LIBOR. Could you help me now?

Hi Traci,

A couple months ago I started to go through another mortgage lender (and he'd shopped me, too).

He did not exactly move with the best of speed and follow the details - or know what he could offer.

I was just rejected for an investment property loan (details removed due to privacy constraints)

Do you have anything for this situation, what would the rates and closing costs be, and how fast can you get a commitment?

Thanks, C. M.