Builder's Lender Questions (Plano, Spring: insurance, mortgage, loan)

[Trailing Spouse]

My husband looked at a Standard Pacific home in Spring Creek (Plano) and the builder's rep said we would get a discount if we went with their lender (don't have the name). I know this is a common practice - my question is - did anyone use Standard Pacific's lender? If so, pros and cons would be appreciated.

If anyone has comments on Drees/Hovanian/Highland/Landstar lenders I would appreciate those comments as well.

Thanks in advance for your help.

[nsumner]

Your best bet is for your husband to knock on doors of the houses already occupied by owners in that community and they'll tell him about their experience with the lender or the builder himself. They have nothing to gain at this point and nothing to lose by telling you the truth.

[Trailing Spouse]

Originally Posted by nsumner

Your best bet is for your husband to knock on doors of the houses already occupied by owners in that community and they'll tell him about their experience with the lender or the builder himself. They have nothing to gain at this point and nothing to lose by telling you the truth.

Thanks for the reply and suggestion. Unfortunately, my husband doesn't have that kind of time available to him. He is at work very early in the morning and leaves late at night. He is not in Texas on the weekends as he commutes back and forth. I was just throwing the question out there to see if I could get any general info.

[KBilly]

Shop your own rates and then see what they offer w/ the discount. I think that you will find that their rate is higher, and you will pay for that discount over the course of the next 15-30 years. There have been many articles about just such things (scams) in the past.

And if your husband can't knock on doors, he really should try and make some time -- stay a weekend once. This is a huge purchase and you should have all the ammo you can.

[bricor]

We recently bought a Drees home and used their in-house lender as well.

NEVER AGAIN.

Here's what I learned from the experience:

Builders offer cash at closing to use them but they make up for it on the back end (at closing) by charging you fees that you most likely wouldn't pay with an outside lender or would typically be negotiated to be paid by the builder. Like paying for title insurance or the title policy itself. The other way they may get you is with points or a slightly higher rate. Alot of people don't think about negotiating closing costs at the time they are starting to build a house. I know I didn't think about it and ended up leaving money on the table because of that.

Do your homework first and know what rates you can get from a third party lender. Also, negotiate the closing costs up front like who pays the title policy and title insurance. (those are the 2 biggies) If you take their deal, make sure the rate is competitive and have them pay those fees I mentioned. Otherwise, their deal may not be as great as it seems.

Drees owns their own mortgage company and they royally screwed up on my paperwork over and over again. And it was almost always to my advantage. I pointed it out over and over for them to correct it. The day prior to closing, the first 3 closing statements they sent me had wrong info. They couldn't tell me how much to bring and to figure it out myself. On the morning of closing, I asked about more errors (in my favor) and they said don't worry about it, it is correct. They even refunded me thousands of dollars because I had brought to much to closing (since I had figured the numbers correctly).

The next day they called and said they goofed and wanted me to close again. I told them to take a hike. It drug on for 2 weeks and they threatened me with lawyers so I paid back part of what they refunded. I was able to negotiate some money back in my favor since they were anxious to close but the whole ordeal was a mess. I can understand an error or 2 but they sent me 3 closing statements the day prior and all were wrong. I think I did ok in the end because I locked in a good rate 180 days prior with no points (something they said they also goofed on) but it really left a bad taste as to how their mortgage company conducts business.

[Trailing Spouse]

Thank you very much for sharing your experience with Drees. We have moved into new construction 6 times in 8 years and every time we have run into sloppy paperwork at closing - sounds like the saga continues no matter who you use (outside source or builder) or where you go. I will definitely make a note about Drees on my research list.

[Trailing Spouse]

Originally Posted by KBilly

Shop your own rates and then see what they offer w/ the discount. I think that you will find that their rate is higher, and you will pay for that discount over the course of the next 15-30 years. There have been many articles about just such things (scams) in the past.

And if your husband can't knock on doors, he really should try and make some time -- stay a weekend once. This is a huge purchase and you should have all the ammo you can.

Thank you for taking the time to share your views, I appreciate it. Since we are doing a company relocation, we will be assigned a lender (bank). We were just wondering if the bank rates/handling of the loan will be all that much better than the builder's lender. When we pick out a builder we will just have to do our own comparison and see who offers the best advantage given our situation.