Family Keeps Home after Reverse Mortgage Comes Due By Nancy Bolt, Senior HECM Solutions Counselor available at 239-628-9165
A good thing about working in the same field for a long time is learning how the rules actually affect the borrowers and the borrowers’ heirs. Although I have been sad to lose my old clients, I have been very happy to find a happy ending for their families. When considering a reverse mortgage, many people still believe the “bank owns the home” and not the homeowner. I have assured people this is not the case since 1994. In recent months, I have finally been effective in making certain the family has been able to keep the home of a loved one who has passed on. FHA is not the “ogre” many people expect. They have implemented rules allowing a family member to purchase the home from the estate at current market prices even though the loan balance has continued to grow in spite of property values declining in the last 8 years or so. While explaining that, yes, closing costs are a bit higher for this product; there is a valid reason for it. Now there are a couple local families who have found that the cost of the FHA insurance has been justified when they are able to keep the parents/grandparents home while FHA insurance pays the balance due over and above the current market value.
If someone you know could benefit from funds made available through a reverse mortgage but they have been concerned about not being able to leave the home to their family, now is a good time to have them learn the facts. Public Records will show the amount of the reverse mortgage and the amount of the sale of the home so they can see for themselves. Please refer anyone with questions on an existing reverse mortgage or who is a proposed borrower so I can provide them with a thorough education of what this product can provide and the most cost effective way for them to customize this flexible financial tool to benefit them. No pressure for them to proceed if they are not comfortable! FHA requires they receive counseling from an FHA trained counselor to make certain they are not “sold” something that does not benefit them – and often there are grant funds to allow this service at no cost to the proposed borrower.
There are a few occasions when this is not the best solution, but unless they have all the facts, they cannot make that decision. In fact, some people really need to “right-size” their housing. We now have a few Realtors in the area who have worked with my clients using a HECM (reverse mortgage) for Purchase so that the buyer may retain much of his sales proceeds for other purposes. It is not a difficult process and I will address it in a future positing. Anyone needing a HECM experienced Realtor in the Punta Gorda, Port Charlotte and Cape Coral area should contact Della Booth who is very customer oriented and does a very effective professional job for her buyers.
Della Booth CIPS, SRES, Broker at TIME Realty Services, Inc. cell 239-699-4493, http://www.TIME-Realty.com