Rain City Guide

There’s a Washington State Mortgage Broker Commission meeting tomorrow, May 7th at the Renton Community Center to discuss the impact of State Senate Bill 6471. This legislation ammends the Consumer Loan Act and Mortgage Broker Practices Act requiring all lenders to become licensed under the Consumer Loan Act (except those licensed under RCW 63.14)

This [...]

Please do not construe this as legal advice, it is not. The sampling below is general in nature and is referencing common escrow misconceptions we see in the course of conducting business.
Here are a few to get started.
1) Escrow firms produce and verify the validity of Legal Descriptions.

Incorrect. In a sale it is the [...]

This is not a bubble post. It is a post about lending.
Having loan officers and mortgage brokers with Fiduciary duties to their clients is a small step in the right direction. Take a guess as to what the paint spells on each of the individuals chests as you read the link below.
Live [...]

Evidently, this is circulating in e-mails everywhere. Depending upon your perspective it could be funny or not so funny. On the one hand it could be a former employee of a defunct sub-prime lender or it could be a customer with a toxic loan. Either way this evokes a lot of [...]

Ninety-one year old Seattle woman’s mortgage mess as detailed by the NY Times.
“……That was the case for Gertrude Robertson, a 91-year-old widow and nurse’s aide living in Seattle who took out an adjustable-rate mortgage of $450,000 in January. Even at her age, Mrs. Robertson was earning $3,500 a month, largely by caring for another [...]

In light of all the mortgage turmoil going on in the sub-prime arena I thought that it may be meaningful to address the awkward situation when a borrower is showing clear signs of “discomfort” with the loan terms presented by the escrow staff during a signing.
I believe that giving real and true versions of what [...]

Today, the Washington State Insurance Commission, ordered Stewart Title Guaranty Company to stop illegal payment and gifts to agents and Brokers.

“Kreidler’s order demands that Stewart Title Guaranty Company “immediately cease and desist” giving or paying anything in excess of $25, calculated in aggregate over a 12-month period, per person, for placing or causing title insurance [...]

This is my Ken Schrammie rant:

How is it that a perfectly capable buyer of a home with nearly 770 FICO scores is placed into a short term Interest Only Adjustable Rate Mortgage with a start rate of 7%– sold with a 3 yr pre-payment penalty?

How do you handle the situation in which same the borrower [...]

Will Hicks lets us know that there are plenty of US embassies still on the market…
Ron Ares leads us to the ultimate real estate ethics guru: Ted Truitt
Because Flipping should only be practiced by professionals…
How not to show a home…
It’s the little things that get so darn messy…
If you’re willing to follow, Marlow leads [...]

Preface: Last week Rhonda Porter brought up the topic of “Are you leaving too much on the table.” The latter part of her post suggests that the Loan Officer harvested the amount of seller contributions that were left on the table. Within the commentary that followed, the question was asked [...]