VA loan? For those who have used it?

Question

My husband and i are thinking about buying a house and using the VA loan, he is an E-5 and a flying crew chief, i do administrative work for an office, what was your rank when you got it if you don't mind me asking? how much did you get approved for? we are hoping to be able to qualify for at least 200,000, any advice would be very helpful

Answer 1

Va doesn't provide your loan, they simply guarantee it. We were guaranteed the full amount (which I believe was $230,000 at the time, although I'm not sure what it is now). But just because VA guarantees a certain amount doesn't mean a bank will finance you for that amount. The amount you qualify for will depend on your income, debt to income ratio and other factors. However, with VA guaranteeing your loan, you are of no risk to the bank, so often you get a low interest rate.

At the time we bought our house, my husband was an E-6 and I wasn't working. We were approved for $160,000 by the bank (although we bought a house for less). Our interest rate is 5.4% as compared to the 6% we were offered on a conventional loan. Research all of your options. VA was the way to go for us, but for some of our friends, they got a better deal elsewhere.

Keep in mind with the price too that you have to add taxes and insurance to your payments. Ours adds about $250/mo to our mortgage payment, so you don't want to overextend yourself.

Find a mortgage lender and go from there. Good luck!

Answer 2

Depending on what area you are in 200,000 might not cover it. The VA Loan Guarantee only guarantees an amount that you qualify for. I was an E-5 when I got my loan. The VA sets the amount that they will guarantee based on income. It is still up to a bank to decide if you qualify for a loan. Before a bank will consider your application you should have the VA certificatee of eligibility. This document tells the bank how much according to the VA you will be guaranteed for. The VA guarantee will cover the loan if you go into default, and then the VA takes over the house. There is a work sheet that will tell you how much you can get your VA certificat for at the VA website.

Answer 3

I've never used the VA to buy a house because my credit was good enough, I didn't need to....The VA only guarantees your loan to the bank/mortgage lender....its a holdover from the days when the banks actually knew their customers and wouldn't give loans to people they didn't have a relationship with. If you PCSd every two years or so, you wouldn't have been able to establish a relationship with a bank in your new town.

The main benefit to use the VA if your credit is good, is that you won't have to put any money down.

In both cases, the credit union on base gave me a better interest than a bank...and they wouldn't do VA loans! Definitely shop around for your mortgage. Good luck....there's nothing having your own home.

Answer 4

The first time I was a Lieutenant Junior Grade (0-2) in the Navy. I had received a commission from the ranks about three years earlier. Until then we had lived in base housing here and overseas. With the grand sum of a dollar down I now had a place where I could put a nail in the wall without having to get advanced permission from the housing office.
The upper limit in those days was $50,000 as I recall. I paid
$27,500 for the house and sold it a few years later when I got orders back to Japan for $35,000.
There's one caveat with buying a house when you are in the military. If you sell it before moving on to another locale, you will have to invest the money you made into a new house somewhere, within three years, or face capital gains tax from the Feds. The good news is that you can get your VA loan entitlement re-instated if you sell the home you bought and buy another one later. That's what I did 12 years later.

Answer 5

VA workplace work does not take virtually as lengthy to technique because it used to yet you're speaking some month's time. Watch the expenditures of interest to make certain in the event that they're secure, increasing or falling: as an occasion if we would be in a time of increasing expenditures, you will choose to fasten in a cost as quickly as available. VA loans often even conceal the final expenditures. I won't advise on what to do with the 10k yet while that's a sparkling living house, there are a number of products to purchase. in the experience that your credit is sturdy, a fifteen 365 days loan is far greater suited than 20 or 30 years by way of super quantity of interest saved over the existence of the loan. no longer a sturdy thought to get a variable value. relies upon on how lengthy you intend on possessing the living house/quantity of value you have got the money for for a manner lengthy of a time the loan value is . in the experience that your husband is energetic duty, the regularly used turn around time is 5 years or much less, barely sufficient time to get some escrow and resell once you circulate directly to a distinctive base.

Answer 6

I believe you get a loan thru a actual civilian bank. The va loan program is just to help back up the loan making more likely to be approved. It will be up to the bank along with your income and credit rating on how much you will be approved for. Best of luck!

One more thing. Make sure you ask the bank that you plan on getting a loan thru if they use va loans. There are some banks out there that do not.

check out this link........

http://www.homeloans.va.gov/

Answer 7

We just bought a home a month ago, we used Va. Find out how much you all qualify for.
Whats good with VA is if you all find a home and put a bid on it VA sends a inspector how to make sure thehome is worth what they are asking.

Answer 8

we are in the process of buying and conventional is an easier way to go for us in the way of fiancing and everything. most lenders really don't want to use va and have steered our to local banks. va only guarantees the loan, that's all.

Answer 9

wife and i used our's to buy house in huntington beach in 1985,i think we got 100,000, as i'm a former combat marine and vietnam veteran