VA loans?

[MarineGrunt]

My wife and I are beginning plans to purchase our first home and we were considering a VA loan. Can anyone offer me some info as far as the positives and negatives of this loan? Any advice you can offer about purchasing a home would be great too, since this is all new to us...

 

[jetpilot243]

Hey MarineGrunt,

My wife, Dana, runs her own mortgage company and is constantly doing VA or conventional loans for fellow military folk or pilot buddies of mine. Check out her website at www.carteretlender.com Dana would be more than happy to help and save you some money. Make sure to ask her for the "Pilot Discount."

 

[pony251]

MarineGrunt, there are some other products on the market that are very close to a VA loan. Check out USAA. They offer a "Veterans choice"? loan. They basically decided to give you a zero down loan and guarantee it themselves instead of having the VA do it. That way they get to keep the origination fee the VA would have charged you. Not a bad way to go. Just shop around. The costs and monthly payments vary wildly.

 

[T1bubba]

I think you might be confusing Navy Federal Credit Union's Veteran's Choice loan with USAA. I used the NFCU Veteran's Choice loan for one reason- I needed to finance 100% but the VA limits (about $240K) were too low for what I wanted.

The VC loan is a 30 yr fixed rate and has a 1.5 point origination fee which pays for a mortgage insurance policy. So instead of paying for mortgage insurance monthly you're paying it up front.

If you're active duty and will be moving every three years I'd recommend looking at variable rate loans. Run the numbers yourself to see how much rates would have to go up for you to break even vs a fixed rate loan over the three years.

Most of all, do lots of research BEFORE you go out and find your dream house. To help sort through all the financing options know how much you can afford to put down, how much you can afford per month, and how long you plan to stay in the house. Once you have those numbers there are plenty of mortgage calculators on the web that can help you find the best loan for your situation.

 

[skiddriver]

The only real advantage to the VA loan is that you can get it with zero down payment. The rates aren't generally any better than any commercial loan. One thing to note, if you have a veteran's disability rating, they waive part of the fees.

 

[USMCFDX]

Highly recommend going with Navy Federal for the home loan, and really do not see the advantage of the VA loan in todays interest rate enviornment and the zero down programs that are out there. NFCU beats most rates out there and their closing costs are the lowest. They beat USAA on my last three home loans. Was not even close.

 

[qmaster3]

VA Loan

VA loan had advantages, and disadvantages. The wife and I used ours 2/yrs ago through cendent mortgage. Cannot go wrong with Navy Fed. Like any thing else shop around, and don't be afraid to fire the Real Estate Agents. They are like used car salesmen this day in age. Any questions feel free to email at [email protected]

 

[Slim]

A couple of things to consider...

1. Are you going to be in this home for less than five years? If so, get a conventional ARM. A realtor friend of mine told me most couples in a first home sell within five years. With an ARM, you get a low initial rate which can last from 1-7 years. You also get the tax advantages of home ownership.

2. How much of a down payment can you make? If the answer is zero, be careful. My wife and I had to sell our first home following 22 months of ownership. This was due to a job relocation and we had a VA loan. We had almost no equity. We had to take money to closing.

Good luck!

 

[Caveman]

Ditto on the NFCU VC loan. It's a great product. The point and a half is used to make a one time lump sum PMI payment in lieu of tacking it on to your monthly payments. An added bonus is that your VA certificate of eligibilty is still free and clear to use for a little vacation hideaway somewhere.

 

[katbird]

I work for USAA and they have a lot of help for first time military homebuyers. Go to usaa.com and check out all the details

Good luck !

 

[Kikuchiyo]

My wife is a Realtor who specializes in military relocations. She says don't go w/ a VA loan. Their rates are actually higher than a conventional loan and the VA funding fee is a waste of your money. There are a number of 0-down conventional loans out there. Do compare the lenders' fees and closing costs along with the interest rate. We've also used adjustable rate mortgages when we knew we weren't going to be in a house beyond the first adjustment period. We got a lower rate and didn't have to worry about the adjustment.

qmaster3, I'm sorry you got a bad agent, but would you do surgery on yourself or represent yourself in court? I'm not smart enuf to know all the laws in the state I'm moving into and make sure that every i is dotted, etc. Yes, don't be afraid to fire a bad agent, but also don't paint all agents with the same brush based on your one experience. We've had good and bad agents, one's we've referred to others and ones we wouldn't give the time of day to. Like any business, there's good and bad ones.

BTW, speaking of USAA, here's a little known fact. The agent gives 35% of her pay to USAA relocations if you register with the USAA MoversAdvantage(tm). You might get a few hundred of that. Just something to be aware of.

 

[Dr Pokenhiemer]

I bought my first home under a VA loan in 1994. Sold the home in 1997. I never got a VA loan again, but every month or so I get a phone call from a telemarketer wanting to talk about my VA loan. For some reason, they think I have one now and want to talk about refinancing. I've gotten to where I let them go on and on about how they can help me get a lower interest rate than I am currently paying, then ask them where they got their info. I tell them I haven't had a VA loan since '97 and they say they will take me off their list. This has been going on for 4 years now.