An Adventure in Refinancing, Vacaville County Reporter
By Vernon Sandusky
August 10, 2003
It was mid-June when my son-in-law mentioned that he had just refinanced his home and lowered his mortgage payments a couple of hundred
dollars that made me think that it was time to look at my own mortgage. I started at www.bankrate.com to see what the current mortgage
trends were for refinancing in California. What I found was that there were rates and then there were rates. After following the links
on several of the lowest quotes, I found that the rates quoted on the lender's home pages were not exactly as shown on the Bankrates page.
Many also required that you call to get the "real" rates.
I finally chose one that, while not the lowest rate, offered the capability of doing a loan application on-line and that guaranteed the
interest rates and closing costs to be the same as quoted at the completion of the application. Being a suspicious sort, I even phoned
the company and talked to a real person before I went through the application process.
So, I began the on-line application at www.amerisave.com. It was straightforward, but it did consume about a half an hour of my time,
or about what an application at a bricks-and-mortar mortgage company would have taken. I had to supply the typical information such as
social security numbers, bank account numbers, loan balances, and more, but it was all done by filling in forms on web pages. I even got
interrupted and had to tell the program to save my work. The next morning, I easily resumed the application process.
Within a few days I received a package in the mail with more forms to fill out including requests for copies of bank statements and places
for real signatures. When assembled and mailed back the stack of paper was about 3/8 inch high or about the same size as any mortgage application.
Following that I received email correspondence assuring me that my loan rate had been locked in, my application received and an appraisal
ordered. The only glitch came when the appraiser failed to contact me as promised and then missed an appointment. It took a couple of
phone calls to get that back on track, but the actual appraisal was the most complete that I have ever seen.
The payoff occurred in late July when we closed with a title company of our choosing, North American Title on Merchant St. in Vacaville,
at a rate of 5% for a 30 year fixed rate mortgage for about 1/5 of a point and $700 in other lender fees. Did I worry as the process was
underway? Yes, but closing costs with a local mortgage broker would have cost me $1500 more. The only tip I have to offer is not to use
one of the mortgage companies that send spam to your email box. Slime like that do not deserve your business.
