2010 Good Faith Estimate Clouds the Picture

The new Good Faith Estimate, which must be used with all loan applications completed beginning Janaury 1st, is intended to let borrowers shop for the best closing costs.  Because of the nature of the new form and its potentially punitive elements, however, it may reflect those costs in a magnified manner.  It order to be sure they will not be susceptable to overruns, banks and brokers must be coy in the way the costs are configured.  The result will be an appearance of higher closing costs.  Also beacuse different costs are packaged together. borrowers will need to go to a seperate itemization page to see all the individual costs.