Qualifying with rental income from Airbnb

 Loan Guidelines, Residential Mortgage  Comments Off on Qualifying with rental income from Airbnb
Nov 202017
 

For more information, please contact me at (512) 261-1542 or steve@LoneStarLending.com.

By G. Steven Bray

With the growing popularity of Airbnb and other short term rental options, Freddie Mac has updated its conventional loan guidelines to allow you to use that rental income to qualify for a mortgage. However, the conditions for inclusion are rather tight.

To use short-term rental income for qualifying, you must have a two-year history of receiving it as documented on Schedule E of your tax return. Freddie contends that short-term rental income tends to fluctuate, so a historical view is needed. You can expect Freddie to take the lower amount or an average of the two years as qualifying income. Also note that short-term rental income for your primary residence, like renting out your home during SWSX, will not count as qualifying income even if you do it every year.

Freddie announced one other significant change to its guidelines for rental income. If you don’t have at least one year of investment property experience, Freddie will limit the amount of rental income that can count as qualifying income to 30% of the net rental income from your investment property. Freddie says the limit addresses the risk that rental income is a new type of income for the borrower.

Freddie says the changes are effective Feb 9th of next year, but some lenders may implement them earlier.

LLC-financed rental homes won’t prevent use of Fannie loan

 Investment, Loan Guidelines, Residential Mortgage  Comments Off on LLC-financed rental homes won’t prevent use of Fannie loan
Apr 172017
 

For more information, please contact me at (512) 261-1542 or steve@LoneStarLending.com.

By G. Steven Bray

One of the more frustrating loan guidelines encountered by rental property owners is the limit on the number of financed properties. Fannie Mae limits the number to 10 – 4 for best-rate financing. While Fannie hasn’t changed that guideline, it has changed which properties count towards it. Previously, properties financed through an LLC counted towards the limit. Now, if the borrower financed the property through an LLC so that the borrower is not personally liable on the mortgage, Fannie excludes the property from the total.

This should be a nice change for investors who use multiple financing tools to manage their properties. Investors often use shorter-term bank loans to finance the initial acquisition of a property, and bank portfolio loans often will allow a seasoned LLC to sign the note. Now, if the investor wants to roll a property into long-term, lower-rate, conventional financing, those short-term loans won’t get in the way.

Keep in mind that financed primary residences and vacation homes still count towards the total. Also keep in mind that some lenders will count a spouse’s financed properties towards the total even if the spouse isn’t on the new loan. Finally, remember that the limit only includes one-to-four-unit residential properties. Anything else, including land, commercial properties, and timeshares, do not count towards the total.

More leverage for investment properties

 Investment, Loan Guidelines  Comments Off on More leverage for investment properties
Oct 312016
 

For more information, please contact me at (512) 261-1542 or steve@LoneStarLending.com.

By G. Steven Bray

Since the financial collapse almost a decade ago, rental property buyers have been stuck with a minimum 20% down payment for conventional financing. Not only had Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac not forgotten about all the high-leverage loans they purchased that went bust, but the mortgage insurance companies also got burned. And for conventional financing, you need mortgage insurance to go higher than 80% leverage.

That has changed. Mortgage insurance companies have an appetite for rentals again. At this time for buyers with 680 or better credit, we’re able to accept a 15% down payment.

Of course, you’ll pay a premium for the mortgage insurance. Your MI rate would be roughly 50% higher than what one would pay when buying a primary residence. On a $200k loan, that equates to a monthly MI payment of about $102 assuming good credit. However, it only takes about 5 years to pay the loan down to 78% of the purchase price, at which point the mortgage insurance gets cancelled.

One way to cash out an LLC-held rental property

 Investment, Loan Guidelines, Residential Mortgage  Comments Off on One way to cash out an LLC-held rental property
Apr 162016
 

For more information, please contact me at (512) 261-1542 or steve@LoneStarLending.com.

By G. Steven Bray

Yesterday, we discussed how Fannie Mae has rescinded a portion of its loan guidelines concerning investors’ ownership of properties in LLCs. Specifically, according to conversations with Fannie, the change means an investor must move a property into his or her name 6 months prior to being eligible to take cash out of the property.

However, Fannie left open one avenue for cashing out a property in an LLC. It’s called the Delayed Financing program. If an investor purchases a property using cash, and holds the property in an LLC, the investor may pull out up to 75% of the equity within the first 6 months of ownership as long as all the members of the LLC will be on the cash out loan.

Note the two important conditions: It must be a cash purchase, and the cash-out refinancing must close within 6 months of purchase.

I suspect Fannie may eventually realize how silly the conflicting guidelines are, but the inertia that must be overcome to correct them is pretty grand.

In the meantime, please don’t forget that neither Fannie nor Freddie allow you to close a loan with an LLC holding title to the property. You must close in your name. Many investors move properties to their LLCs after closing, but be aware that doing so could trigger the loan’s “Due on Sale” clause.

Fannie makes it harder to cash out rental properties

 Investment, Loan Guidelines, Residential Mortgage  Comments Off on Fannie makes it harder to cash out rental properties
Apr 152016
 

For more information, please contact me at (512) 261-1542 or steve@LoneStarLending.com.

By G. Steven Bray

Investors who choose to hold their properties through LLCs need to be aware of a recent change Fannie Mae made to its loan guidelines. The guideline in question was called Continuity of Obligation, and Fannie enacted it in response to the financial crisis to combat fraud. The guideline established a timeframe a party must have owned a home prior to being eligible for refinancing.

For investors, the guideline specifically identified a property held by the investor in an LLC as meeting the requirement as long as that same investor was refinancing the property in his or her own name.

Earlier this year, Fannie rescinded the guideline in whole. The problem for investors is that means Fannie also rescinded the specific carve out for LLCs. Based on recent conversations with Fannie, without the carve out, an investor must first move the property into his or her own name prior to refinancing.

This becomes a big deal if the investor is trying to cash out the equity in the property. Fannie Mae still has a 6-month “seasoning” requirement for cash out loans. Without the LLC carve out, the investor now must move the property into his or her name 6 months prior to being eligible to take cash out of the property using a Fannie loan.

There still is one option available to investors using LLCs, and we’ll look at that tomorrow.