davidw76

Hello everyone

I was wondering how feasible it is to get a mortgage soon after arriving in the US on an L1 visa? I would have about a 20% deposit available but no credit history as I havent lived in the US since 2002 (for 3 years) and I have since closed all my accounts there.

My preference would be to find a month-to-month rental and then buy asap but I'm hoping I don't have to wait too long!

Is it possible for the employer to act as guarantor?

Thanks in advance for any advice

Just Jenney

Are you sure you have NO credit history in the US? If you had one before it might be still out there. Have you tried looking up your credit report? Might be worth it just to see what's on there, if anything.

~ Jenney

Ruslan124

You will find a number of companies that will be willing to give you a mortgage. It is possible they will charge you a higher interest rate but you can remortage once you have built up a credit history. The easiest way to find a mortgage would be through a mortgage broker. I am sure if you let people know where you are locating to, someone might give you the name of a reputable broker.

fatbrit

A reputable broker is a bit of an oxymoron. But I agree with your advice: a good broker is more likely to find a box to fit you than a bank since s/he has many more lenders and plans to choose from.

2point4

I got a mortgage in Houston after being in the US for 4 months.
It was 100% of cost (no deposit) and at a rate of 6.5% with $4k down at closing. The broker I know builds an alternate line of credit history with the lender from your out of the US documents ( wage slips, bank balance and reference etc etc).
I would say we got a very very good deal and now have our own house instead of renting.

Anyone interested send me an IM.

tampapilot2003

2point4 will you please contact me at <<email address removed>> I would like to know more about the mortgage you are talking about...Thanks..Ken

rayburke

Hi 2.4, we are moving from Aberdeen to Houston in April, could you please mention the recommended broker that helped you build this credit history? It would save a lot of pain! My e-mail is <email address removed>.

Thank you.

gryff31

Hi,

We have only been in the US for 4 weeks, after relocating from UK on L1 Visa, We have not credit history at all in the US but the Bank of America have been really helpful but we have had to put down 30%. But the Interest rate is quite reasonable.

You may be lucky and they find some sort of credit history from last time you were here in the US, if not they did a credit search from the UK for us, as we had a mortgage there, and they contacted a few off our old suppiers eg SKY TV and Severn Trent Water.

It can be long winded tho, and at times you feel your not winning but stick with it.

Good Luck

Emma

MsElui

we have been here 3 months on an L1. We are getting our mortgage sorted now. they want 5 or 10% down (our choice) and will do an international credit check. This seems to involve us giving them details of people we had credit with in the uk (our choice of who we tell them about, includes utility bills etc). They then conference call those people with us on the line. We give enough detail to the uk people to confirm its our account and we want them to talk to the credit agancy and then the credit agency asks their questions. We need to give them 4 or 5 companies to ring. They dont seem to actually contact the uk credit scoring companies - even though they are sister companies (ie they are called experian, equifax etc - which exist also in uk).
Gets harder if you want a loan over about $420k as thats classed as a jumbo loan and requires a 25% deposit etc.

Mskills

I just "closed" today, and finished appeasing the mortgage company's underwriters literally yesterday!

Send me a PM and I will put you in touch with my agent, she was really great - and is now an "expert"!

Even if she can't help (wrong location etc), she can probably steer you in the right direction.

ellymgrant

Hi there, we have moved from scotland six weeks ago and are currently renting. Looking to buy, and after seeing your message would be interested in finding out who you went with for a mortgage.

ChocolateBabz

We have been here four months now (also from Scotland) and are currently jumping through hoops with Chase to try and get our mortgage sorted. Because of the 'Credit Crunch' they are having trouble getting loans through where folks have no Credit Score (like us). We have provided everything from UK credit checks, to wage slips, to pension statements, previous mortgage references, bank references from UK and still they insist they need a credit score. We have only just got our US credit cards and basically as long as we have made one payment we will have a score and then they will be happy. Doesn't matter if all you spent was $5 on Starbucks just so long as you have a score. The system is absolutely nuts especially as we are putting down about 68% deposit. Also if we were putting down a 20% desposit we would get a lesser interest rate. So because we are putting down a large deposit they will charge us more .

johnh009

I would not buy at the moment. After Bush's bailout of the financial corporations, the national debt will be 11 trillion. This means inflation, a lower US dollar, a possible lower US credit rating, and subsequently further declining house prices.

As the Romans said: "People get the goverment they deserve".

Amazing, Clinton left a surplus of 155 billion. I suppose they will just print more money.

Ray

yere right course it was ...

chartreuse

We're hoping to get approval on our mortgage next week (before we move, incidentally). We went with a local bank who have experience with expats.

The way it went for us was, the loan officer at the bank got in touch with a department of Equifax (USA), based in NJ, who specialise in international credit reports for mortgage loans only. I sent through a pdf of my UK Equifax report, then conference called with EQ in NJ. We rang up a selection of my open accounts, all she wanted to know was current balance & date of last payment (she got the rest, credit limit, date of opening etc from my UK EQ report).

Then EQ in NJ turned all of that into a report, which they faxed to the bank and mailed a copy to me.

Fingers crossed, that's it. If (and I'm hopeful) this works, it's a conventional mortgage, up to 95% LTV, at 6%ish. Which is a lot better deal that the foreign national mortgages I looked at (7%+, 70%LTV max).

So, one question to ask banks might be - do you know how to get an international credit report from Equifax?