The Difficulties for the Self-Employed Borrower

As all of us are aware by now, after the largest housing bust since the great depression, getting a mortgage is far from the pre-bubble days where just filling out an application gave you an over 70% chance of getting a loan if you had good credit. Everything you can think of involving your financial picture now needs to be disclosed and reviewed by a lender. For those of you that are self-employed or own your own business, getting a loan can be even more toilsome.

Pre-housing bubble days allowed the “self-employed” to just state their income and put a decent amount down in cash. We, the lenders, just focused on the borrowers’ credit scores, the value of the property, and in most cases savings in the bank. As the housing market nationally started to crash, so did more of these stated income loans, referred to these days as “liar loans.” Not all self-employed borrowers that used stated income loans were lying about their income, but since the program was abused it went “pop” with the bubble.

Here is what you need to know about getting approved as a self-employed borrower:
1) You must have a 2-year history of being self-employed with reported 1040s to qualify for a mortgage. There are some exceptions, so e-mail me if you have any questions.
2) Lenders are looking for several months of “cash reserves,” which are total mortgage payments in liquid assets. Many mortgage programs, especially if the loans are over the Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac loan limits, are looking for as little as 6 months or up to 12 months of cash reserves, depending on the loan size and down payment.
3) Lenders are now using income reported to the IRS as taxable income to qualify for a loan. If you are writing-off a lot of deductions then you are going to have a harder time qualifying for a loan. You have to be more conservative in your business deductions, which is hard in this economic climate. Bottom line: pay more in taxes to qualify for a larger loan.
4) Declining income is a red flag for an underwriter. If your business is still reeling from the economic tsunami of 2009, getting a loan can be even more difficult. Lenders will only use the lower of the two years of income to qualify you if, for example, 2010’s income is lower than 2009’s. We can make exceptions for declining income for a health issue or call to active duty, for example.
5) The higher your credit scores are, the better chance you have of getting a higher loan and qualifying for more. Reducing credit card debt is one of the easiest ways to improve your credit score, since credit card debt has an immediate impact on your score. Work with a credit repair company to get rid of any inaccurate information and make sure you check your credit scores regularly.
Gregg Busch is Vice President of First Savings Mortgage Corporation. For more information or a free pre-approval contact him at GBusch@FSavings.com or 202-256-7777.