Did you know that if you have a poor credit rating, getting car finance can actually help improve your rating considerably, allowing you more financial freedom in future? It often seems like a catch 22 situation - you have a low credit rating, and can't get credit, yet having credit helps improve your rating.
Not everyone appreciates that having car finance, a car loan or other credit arrangement can help improve your credit worthiness in the eyes of most lending institutions. You might be forgiven for thinking that having credit will lower your rating, since it's obvious you already have existing commitments.
Although it's certainly true that if you have a huge mountain of active credit agreements, loans, store cards and credit cards, your chances of getting car finance or any other form of credit or finance are low, but this is only in cases where the number of credit arrangements is excessively high. The most important point is that those credit arrangements demonstrate payments being made regularly, on time and in full.
As long as this is the case, then your credit rating will still be good, and you stand a good chance of getting the car finance, car loan or credit you need. But what if you do have missed payments, defaults, even CCJs or arrears on your mortgage?
Certainly getting car finance can prove much harder in such cases, and you may already be in the situation where you have applied for cars on finance or car credit finance, and been declined. It's not a good feeling being declined for car loans, and these days it seems to take very little to knock your credit rating down. The economy has been bad, and credit companies have become very much more conservative, with the result that missed or late payments get punished harshly, the letters being sent out worded more forcefully, and patience seems thin on the ground.
But if you can get car finance, then you will be able to help start to rebuild your credit worthiness. Although your credit history may show missed payments, late payments or other problems in the past, you may now find yourself in a much more stable situation, with either those arrangements paid off, or agreements in place.
But unless you're prepared to wait six years for your missed payments, defaults and CCJs to automatically clear from your credit history, how else can you repair the damage caused? The answer is simple - get credit, and start paying it off on time. You'd be surprised the difference it makes to your credit rating having a car finance arrangement which demonstrates that you are paying on time, in full, every month.
As long as you keep up the payments, your credit rating will improve every month, cancelling out much of the damage caused in the past, and helping you to get back on track much sooner than the six years it would otherwise take. But this still brings us to the same problem it would seem - how do you get the car finance that's likely to improve your credit rating if your credit rating is already a disaster?
The answer is to use guaranteed car finance. Perhaps you have heard of guaranteed car finance arrangements - they're car finance deals for those with poor credit ratings, or no credit history at all. Rather than using your credit history to judge whether you'll be able to pay the monthly instalments they assess your income and expenditure as it currently stands. As long as you have enough income to pay the monthly payments, you'll be guaranteed car finance.
This means that you can afford to buy a new car, as well as improving your credit rating. It's essential to make sure of two things though. Firstly, you absolutely must keep up the repayments, otherwise the improvements to your credit rating will be lost. Secondly, make sure that you approach a car finance company which allows you to use your guaranteed car finance to buy any car, from any dealer, rather than being forced to choose one of their own cars.
With just a single phone call it really is possible to get yourself a new car of your choice and improve your credit rating all in one go.
Showing posts with label Help. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Help. Show all posts
Friday, July 20, 2012
Friday, May 25, 2012
Help! My Fsbo Appraisal Came In Too Low!
First off, DON'T PANIC. An appraisal is an opinion of market value given by a licensed appraiser on a particular property at a specific point in time. The key word here is opinion. Appraising is not an exact science otherwise there would be no need for appraisers and all anyone need do is get a value from online services like Zillow.
Even though licensed appraisers all have to adhere to the same set of guidelines approved by the Appraisal Foundation, there are so many variables involved that the end result can only be described as an opinion of value. This does NOT mean that the appraiser's opinion is not a correct valuation; it just means that there can be more than one opinion that is correct. These differing values are supported by the appraiser's choice of considerations, and the weight given to each of them, which affect the house being appraised. The differences in appraised value can be even more marked if one of the appraisers is from outside the area where the property is located as opposed to the value given by a local appraiser.
What to do. If you had an appraisal done when you priced your home for sale, get in touch with that original appraiser and ask them to do an updated appraisal for you. Tell them that the value is coming in lower than the amount they appraised it for and you need documentation to support your price. You will probably have to pay for this, but the cost should be lower if the original appraisal was completed not too long ago. If the re-appraisal supports your sale price, get in touch with the buyer's lender immediately and present your case for this value to be accepted. If the difference in value is considerable, the lender might insist on a third appraisal and/or an appraisal review.
What if you didn't get an appraisal before you priced your house? Well then, you have a couple of options. Obviously, the first is to get your own appraisal done and hope that it comes back at the price you need and, if it does, then proceed as above. If this second appraisal also comes in lower, then it would appear you have overpriced your house to begin with. You can then either lower your price to the appraised value or ask that the buyer to come up with the difference in cash if they still want the house, or you could carry a second for the difference. Most buyers won't do this unless there was a burning desire for them to have that particular home. If you then decide that you still want to sell, you can put the house back on the market at the appraised price.
The other option is to challenge the appraiser's findings. This can be very difficult and time consuming. To do this, you will need a copy of the appraisal, not just the summary. The best thing to challenge is the comparable sales the appraiser used. Remember, these are homes that have sold and closed, not those still on the market. Look at these very carefully and then go visit them to see if they are truly comparable to your house. You need to make sure that the appraiser is comparing apples to apples. If there are comps used that are not similar to yours, maybe in a different tract, different and lower quality builder, a builders value priced model, different school district, in the county instead of the city etc. then you have a strong case for an appraisal review. Rather than just going to the lender and saying that the wrong comps were used, you have to go armed with comps that will support your claim of a higher value. To do this, you will need to go to the County Recorder's office and search for homes that are similar to yours which have recorded as sold within the past six months. The more recent solds are the best and most accurate ones to use. When you look at the appraisal report, look carefully to see what adjustments the appraiser made to the comps to compensate for amenities that you do or don't have in your house. Sometimes you might find incorrect allowances made for a/c, pools, spas, new roof, landscaping etc. These all have value but not the same value as the price you paid for them.
After reviewing everything carefully and you can't find any glaring discrepancies in the report, then the best thing to do is accept the findings and move on. If you sold your house using a real estate agent, then there are things that they can help you with, but that's another topic.
Even though licensed appraisers all have to adhere to the same set of guidelines approved by the Appraisal Foundation, there are so many variables involved that the end result can only be described as an opinion of value. This does NOT mean that the appraiser's opinion is not a correct valuation; it just means that there can be more than one opinion that is correct. These differing values are supported by the appraiser's choice of considerations, and the weight given to each of them, which affect the house being appraised. The differences in appraised value can be even more marked if one of the appraisers is from outside the area where the property is located as opposed to the value given by a local appraiser.
What to do. If you had an appraisal done when you priced your home for sale, get in touch with that original appraiser and ask them to do an updated appraisal for you. Tell them that the value is coming in lower than the amount they appraised it for and you need documentation to support your price. You will probably have to pay for this, but the cost should be lower if the original appraisal was completed not too long ago. If the re-appraisal supports your sale price, get in touch with the buyer's lender immediately and present your case for this value to be accepted. If the difference in value is considerable, the lender might insist on a third appraisal and/or an appraisal review.
What if you didn't get an appraisal before you priced your house? Well then, you have a couple of options. Obviously, the first is to get your own appraisal done and hope that it comes back at the price you need and, if it does, then proceed as above. If this second appraisal also comes in lower, then it would appear you have overpriced your house to begin with. You can then either lower your price to the appraised value or ask that the buyer to come up with the difference in cash if they still want the house, or you could carry a second for the difference. Most buyers won't do this unless there was a burning desire for them to have that particular home. If you then decide that you still want to sell, you can put the house back on the market at the appraised price.
The other option is to challenge the appraiser's findings. This can be very difficult and time consuming. To do this, you will need a copy of the appraisal, not just the summary. The best thing to challenge is the comparable sales the appraiser used. Remember, these are homes that have sold and closed, not those still on the market. Look at these very carefully and then go visit them to see if they are truly comparable to your house. You need to make sure that the appraiser is comparing apples to apples. If there are comps used that are not similar to yours, maybe in a different tract, different and lower quality builder, a builders value priced model, different school district, in the county instead of the city etc. then you have a strong case for an appraisal review. Rather than just going to the lender and saying that the wrong comps were used, you have to go armed with comps that will support your claim of a higher value. To do this, you will need to go to the County Recorder's office and search for homes that are similar to yours which have recorded as sold within the past six months. The more recent solds are the best and most accurate ones to use. When you look at the appraisal report, look carefully to see what adjustments the appraiser made to the comps to compensate for amenities that you do or don't have in your house. Sometimes you might find incorrect allowances made for a/c, pools, spas, new roof, landscaping etc. These all have value but not the same value as the price you paid for them.
After reviewing everything carefully and you can't find any glaring discrepancies in the report, then the best thing to do is accept the findings and move on. If you sold your house using a real estate agent, then there are things that they can help you with, but that's another topic.
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