irvine123 said:
"However.... very few can get approved for the purchase. I am talking in the 3-5% of applicant range"
As you are in the "trench", I will take your word for it for 3-5% you mentioned above. I am curious though why the large % of irvine homes went into escrows are actually closing per IPO's data? Where is the disconnect between your 3-5% number and the large % in irvine?
Only 3-5% of all people whom come to me wanting to buy a house can actually qualify for financing to purchase that home.
Simple as that. Homes are still selling of course, people DO get financing. I have done several local sales in the past 2 months. The percentages are what they are... you can try to spin them anyway you'd like...
FNMA, FHA, Portfolio, hard money, etc... I cover the whole gambit. I am most definitely 'In' the trench... and it's filling up with water. I think my nose is just barely above the waterline, currently.
The reasons people can't qualify? Many do not have the required downpayment. For those who do not have it - they cannot usually qualify for FHA, due to the very restrictive income requirements. Others may have the income, but lack credit. It's like building a house from bricks. In the past, if you had even 1 brick, you were thrown 100% financing with whatever exotic terms you needed to make it work. Now, unless you have ALL the bricks, and they are made of gold, you will not be able to obtain what you need.
That's the short of it. I will maybe make a post and put this in detail later, if time allows.
A quick example - someone called me this week asking what it would take to buy an OC house with only 3% down. The house was around 750K. The only program that allows this is FHA currently (due to loan size/LTV). It is maxing out the FHA right against the temp limit, too. At about a $729,000 loan amount, taking into account property taxes, HOA, and the FHA insurance, you need to PROVE an income of over $250,000 a year for 2 years - current to qualify for this. That is just the front end DTI requirement. And you better hope you don't have too much credit card, auto loan, student loan, store credit, other loan, etc. debt out there either... the back end ratio will kill you.
Oh, and FNMA just released their new guidelines yesterday, which are effective June 1st, 2008. The new guidelines clip out about 1/3 or the people who can currenlty qualify for a loan. They are much stricter - lower LTV's and CLTV's, they have imposed steep credit score requirements, etc.... that should make it even more fun for Joe and Jane consumer!