When do schools go back? (Troy, Plymouth: mortgage, credit, loans)

[firecracker123]

Again, we are relocating to Michigan (likely Oakland County) this summer.....my husband is being transferred....he has had one of many conference calls and they have told him that they will move him based on our time line provided he can travel to meeting as required. This is great news for us as we were hoping the kids can finish the school year here and it will buy us some time to get our house ready to sell.

Now the questions I have is when do schools go back? I know in the South it is late Aug but here it is after the labour day weekend....that will determine the move for us more than anything....also, are homes pretty much closed with immediate posession? From the looks of things they are, but here most wil like a 60-90 day close....a little juggling though his company will pay for lodging should our home here sell before we buy one there, but I would rather not move twice....

[Bydand]

Schools start after Labor Day - by state law.

[firecracker123]

Whew! THANKS at least THAT will be one constant....Maybe we can aim to move August long weekend - though July long weekend will buy us more time there....which I would rather have...we'll see

[Coldjensens]

Lots of homes are sitting empty. If you have a confirmed binding deal, you can move into many homes when you want, even before close in many cases. Sellers are desperate and will work with you to accommodate the sale. However watch the values. You do not want to make a deal and move in only to find out that the house will not appraise for enough to support your loan and then have to move out. Make sure that you have a current appraisal. Values have fallen so fast that old appraisals are not valid.

[firecracker123]

ok - please help me out here....

Naturally we are going to have to open an American bank account and then transfer our money.....first thing's first -- we have been told to be careful on the bank we choose -- can you recommend a few? Preferably with Oakland/Troy branches?

Secondly....I am trying to get my head around this point (and again, I may be iggnorant since hubby did most of the administrative work on this house) -- once this house sells we can pretty much get our home and move in fairly quickly but before we do we should get a new appraisal done? Isn't the loan, beg my pardon, given on the value it was bought at minus the down payment? Ok, I sound naive, I know, but again, I am a little new to this

[Coldjensens]

A mortgage appraisal is based on the current market value of the property. The appraiser looks are similar houses that have recently sold in your area and converts that to a comparable price per square foot for your house. They then simply multiply the price per foot by your square footage to get the current market value. It is supposed to be objective, but it is not. The appraiser uses subjective criteria in selecting which houses to use as comparable. Thus, if the appraiser dislikes your house, he will compare it to other houses that he considers crummy. If he likes your house, he will compare it to the nicest houses in our area.

Before a lender will approve a loan, they have to make certain that the house is worth more than the loan amount.

Typically lenders like to see a loan to value (LTV) of 70/30 or better. In other words, if you are trying to borrow $70,000, they want the house to be worth $100,000.

You can find loans at higher LTV but you need excellent credit and will pay higher interest rates.

Prior to August 2007, lenders were pretty lax about LTV figures. They offered loans for 100% or even 150% of the LTV. Anyone could get a loan at 80% LTV. Appraisers were encouraged to make the appraisal fit the amount of the loan requested. Many loans were issued on inflated appraisals. This was based on the assumption that real estate values would continue to rise forever. This year, they got a surprise in the form of massive numbers of defaults on houses that could not be sold for enough money to cover the balance of the loan.
Now lenders are scared. A lot of them are in big trouble. They are less likely to offer loans at high LTV. They are less likely to offer loans to people with less than perfect credit.

Thus, let's imagine that you find a nice house that is offered at $380,000. You think it is easily worth $350,000 so you make an offer in that amount and it is accepted. You have a down payment of $50,000.
When you get your appraisal, you find out that the house is only valued at $300,000 in this market. No lender will loan you $300,000 on a $300,000 house. Now you are in trouble. Hopefully your purchase agreement is conditioned on loan approval and you will not lose your deposit.

An appraisal costs about $350. You can find cheaper appraisers with a little effort, but you need to make sure that your lender will accept their appraisal. If you are certain enough about a house to make an offer, it makes sense to get an appraisal first, especially if you plan to move in before closing.

No one really knows what houses are worth anymore. In many places, the only recent sales are foreclosures or other distressed sales. All houses in that area get appraised at the distressed sale values since that its the only thing to compare to. In other places, nothing has sold in two years or more. There is nothing to compare to. Appraisers now tend to be more conservative in order to protect themselves from potential liability for over appraising.

You, your Realtor and the seller may all honestly believe that the house in our example is worth $380,000. They may even be able to point to a neighboring house that sold for $400,000 two years ago. However the appraisal may well come in substantially lower than anyone ever imagined that it could.

[Coldjensens]

When we moved here, we had a lot of money. We spread it between several different banks. Here is what we found:

LaSalle: Excellent local service at our branch. LaSalle will notify you if an ATM charge will overdraw you account (no one else does this, they just overdraw it and charge you $35-$70). The one time that we had to deal with corporate people, they were rude and condescending, but the branch people were always very pleasant and competent. As our money dwindled away, this is the bank that we chose to keep our primary Michigan account.


Charter 1.: Excellent customer service, decent rates. Outrageous fees.

B of A: Terrible Customer service. Everything about them was terrible.

Fifth/Third. Insane fees. We started to open an account here, but then chose not to when we saw their various fees and charges.


Main Street Bank (Northville and Plymouth) Small local bank. Friendly, good service and programs. Sometimes you had to work at it to find someone who could get things done correctly.

[tcb]

I have Chase as my bank, they are all over the US I've seen them in most states I go too, at my local branch everyone has been nice, I have never had any problems where I had to deal with corporate, I also haven't overdrawn my account so no idea if there are fee's.