Now That I've Talked to a Lender...

Continuing the conversation I began in a blog post a little ways back:

Okay, so you've already opened up a dialogue with your new mortgage lender. You've taken the first step in purchasing your new Montgomery County home. Congratulations! Whether or not this is the lender that you actually use for the mortgage itself is irrelevant for now. While you have them on the phone, take the next step and...

Get Pre-Approved!

Most initial conversations with a lender lead to getting "pre-qualified" for a loan. That's great. That and a dollar will buy you a soft pretzel at WaWa. "Pre-qualification" is a bit like looking at a local teenager and saying "she looks trust-worthy enough to babysit our kids."

Getting pre-approved on the other hand goes a long way to showing you agent and the sellers of the homes you will look at together that you are a serious candidate to purchase that home. Best of all, it literally puts you one step closer to owning that home. What would you rather do? Tour a home, fall in love only to go back to your agent's office and find out from your lender that you may or may not be able to swing approval on that offer you want to write? Or, would you like to have the freedom to submit that offer right then and there, confident that your offer will be strong and viable in the seller's eyes, because you already have the necessary pre-approval letter in hand and ready to go? I'd love to chat if you would seriously prefer the former over the latter scenario.

Chew on that for now. Next time, we get to the fun stuff. I hope you having a great Holiday Season so far!