Jason Montoya - Res. & Coml. Mortgage Banker

Remodel Your San Diego Home Using a FHA 203k Loan!

Want to remodel your home, but don't have enough equity to pull out cash or qualify for an equity line of credit? An FHA 203k loan can be the key to a remodel that could transform your San Diego home into your dream home!

There are two types of FHA 203k loans. There is a FHA streamline (k)version which allows you to finance up to $35,000 in remodel costs without needing to hire a consultant which could be used for smaller remodel jobs. The second type is the full FHA 203K loan which would be for anything over 35,000 with no maximum. This type does require a consultant and has a minimum repair cost of at least $5,000.

What kinds of improvements can you make to your San Diego home? You can literally remodel the entire house. Remodel your kitchen, baths, install new energy efficient windows, tile or wood floors, add a new roof. You can even use the FHA 203k loan to add new rooms or baths!

Once the loan is done, the funds for the remodel are held in escrow and paid out to the contractor as the work is done. Because the maximum FHA 203k loan amount is based on 103% of the improvement value of the home, even if you currently owe as much on your house as it's currently worth you could still qualify for this type of loan and be able to finance the costs of the remodel.

For any questions you can reach me to find out more by visting: www.JasonMontoya.com or send an email to jmontoya@gateway-funding.com

Condos for sale in San Diego, CA - Downtown

If your looking for condos for sale in downtown San Diego, CA there are a lot to choose from. In the last few years San Diego's Downtown has been in a building frenzy with more and more towers going up each year.

When searching for a condo for sale, downtown offers many different styles from soaring penthouses with views for days to quaint condos for sale near the urban streets. Prices vary greatly depending on location, views, and building. You can also expect HOA dues to be anywhere from $250 dollars to $700 dollars a month, although some buildings dues are upwards of $1,000 dollars a month!

The best thing to do when searching for a condo for sale in downtown is to first figure out how much you can afford each month and how much your willing to spend. You may find 2 condos for sale in separate buildings, each for the same price, but if the HOA dues are very different you might find that one of them becomes unaffordable.

The best way to find out how much condo you can afford is to get pre-qualified with a mortgage professional. From there you can figure out what your maximum total monthly payment you can qualify for and then look to see which condos for sale are within that range.

A few tips about buying condos: If using conventional financing condos require a higher down payment than a house with a minimum of 15% down compared to 10% on a single family residence and unless you put 20% down you will have to pay MI (mortgage insurance) each month.

You could get an FHA loan which on a condo only requires 3.5% down, however the condo complex must be FHA approved. If it currently isn't, but the complex where the condo for sale is meets the requirements, your lender can submit the condo project for approval to HUD (Dept. if housing and urban development) to get the building FHA approved. I have been able to get condo project approved using this method in less than two weeks.

Other options to buying condos for sale include VA loans if your a Veteran, you could put 0% down and not have any mortgage insurance each month, but again the building must be VA approved.

If your looking for a condo for sale in downtown San Diego and are interested in FHA financing, but aren't sure if the building you are looking at is FHA approved, you can look it up on the HUD Website. If it isn't, as I mentioned it doesn't mean it can't be, but you will need to check with your agent or a qualified mortgage professional experienced in getting condo projects approved to see if it can be.

You can check out more information about San Diego and mortgage financing on my Facebook page.

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Calculating property taxes that need to be impounded is an important thing to know for everyone involved weather your purchasing a home or refinancing. The formula to calculate them can be a bit tricky for some. If your not in front of your originating system and need to figure it out here is a little cheat sheet to help you calculate the # of months that will need to be impounded (CA).

1st half of taxes are due November 1st and become delinquent by Dec 10th

2nd half of taxes are due Feb 1st and become delinquent by April 10th

Taxes impounded are not fees, and the amount collected remains the borrower's money, used by the lender to pay the property taxes. Whenever a property is refinances or sold, any amount left over in the existing impound account is refunded to the borrower.

San Diego, CA where the average median home price in San Diego County is about $345,000 as of June 2010, is a great place to live. It is also a great time to look at your mortgage and consider if you can save money. With interest rates at historic lows and several programs available for homeowners in various situations there's no reason to not get a quick mortgage check up.

I recently did a refinance for a borrower in San Diego with a loan of $324,017. I took him from 5.5% down to 4.375% and saves him $331.00 per month. Most people would stop there and go no further. What I did though was show my client how if he continued making his payments at the old amount he would actually shave off about 4.25 years from his mortgage saving him almost $100,000!

This strategy eliminates the "starting over" with another 30 years and the savings is truly amazing. What would you do with an extra $100,000?

Whenever I do a free mortgage analysis for a client I find out what their specific financial goals are and give them options so that they can make the best choice that fits their needs. Weather its putting more money into retirement, or just saving money on a monthly basis.

Again, with so many different programs available to help homeowners, even if your upside down in some cases, there's no excuse to not see how much you could be saving by refinancing. If your mortgage is owned by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac you could qualify for a program where you can refinance with today's low rates even if you owe more than what your home is worth. To check if you mortgage is owned by either of these you can quickly and easily see at:

Fannie Mae Loan Look-up: http://www.fanniemae.com/loanlookup/

Freddie Mac Loan Look-up: https://ww3.freddiemac.com/corporate/

FHA/VA loans can qualify for a streamline refinance, which require limited documentation, no income/asset verification, and no appraisal on FHA streamlines.

Refinancing in San Diego, CA can save you thousands! For a free no cost or obligation mortgage evaluation feel free to contact me today!

Recently I was working with an agent who was helping a client try to short sale his home. He had a legitimate hardship and had tried to get a loan modification, but was denied. Currently is someone is trying to get a loan modification and they are denied the banks are "supposed" to allow them to short sale the property. We had a great well qualified buyer for the property offering fair market value for the home. The bank went ahead and foreclosed anyway.

Why would they do this you wonder, when it will cost them more money to foreclose and sell the home at auction than by taking this offer? Well I found out that with some banks the FDIC will cover 80% of a banks loss on the sale if the loan went into foreclosure. So in this case the bank would actually make a profit, not a loss from foreclosing on this borrower.

The really sad part of this is that it's the taxpayers who are really paying.