Anyone have experience with Lennar Mortgage?

[Collin Mitchell]

Im in the process of buying (4) new homes from a builder. 

They have been dragging their feet on getting me the contract. Come to find out, it's because they want me to use their own mortgage company. Lennar Mortgage which now offers DSCR loans. The rate is the same or slightly higher but comes with a $9K discount per house. I would prefer my own Lender that I know well but it's appealing as it would make this cashflow much better.

Has anyone ever used Lennar mortgage, an if so, what was your experience? 

Thanks! 

[Nick Belsky]

@Collin Mitchell

I am closing on a primary with Lennar Mtg in about a week.  As others have pointed out, the incentives are crazy hard to pass up on.  I am a licensed mortgage broker myself, so have the resources to test their offers pretty well.   

We went around and spoke with about 5 local builders and visited their sites, did walk throughs, etc... The first 4 had incentives, but when I got back home and ran the numbers through my wholesale channels, I was able to get really close on the rates (they were 6-6.25%, I was 6.25-6.5% on 180 day locks), but I was able to beat them by around $5,000 in cash to close.  Even with their $14k, $15k, $16k, etc... incentives, I was able to beat them out in the end.

When we got to Lennar, it was a bit different and perhaps timing had a role to play here.  We walked a model where it was nearly completed and the original buyer had decided to walk away, so the home was put back on the market at a $15,000 discount of the original list/contract price.  As we discussed this with the agent, she was notified that the price had dropped another $10,000 that morning.  We were there at 10am.  Long story short, we ended locking in a 4.75% on a 30 FRM, got $18,000 in concessions, and another $10,000 off the last contract price.  Too good of a deal to pass up even though Lennar is notorious for not giving way on finishes or upgrades.  The appraisal came in and appraised nearly $30k over our contract price.  All around win-win.  

WIth Lennar Mtg financing, Iwas NOT able to get anywhere close to their rate or cash to close with my wholesale resources. The process is much more choppy and confusing that what I offer my clients with a consumer loan, but we are CTC and had very few conditions to chase down.  We are a pretty clean file.  As one whom does mortgages for a living (and is a bit of an anal control freak with such things) I expected professional courtesy of being a little more transparent with the UW and Title items going on in the background.  They did NOT extend those courtesies even with prompting.

I was forced to use their title affiliate as well, Lennar Title.  My attorney charged a significantly lower settlement fee but if I didn't use Lennar Title, then I'd forfeit my incentives... a practice I despise among builder's lenders, but this is how they trap you into using their AfBAs.  It took a while to get an actual LE even after the initial disclosures came out.  I found as odd.  They did send them but only after asking for them 2-3 times.  Another thing to note is Lennar Title keeps asking for the closing funds to be wired long before we were CTC.  I hadn't seen an initial CD yet and wasn't about to send them anything until I could verify the numbers were at least close.  I should be able to review the CD any day now but flat out told them to quit emailing me everyday asking for the funds.  I will not send them until I see a CD that is accurate.  Again, we haven't closed yet and will be in the next week, but I can't foresee too many things going askew from this point in the process.

I was NOT forced to use their insurance company, Lennar Insurance, to maintain the incentives.  My Brightway agent was able to get me a policy under $1,000 whereas Lennar Insurance was closer to $1,250 for the premium.  We are purchasing in Florida, by the way. 

Overall, not too bad, not difficult by any means, but annoying at times.  Some of the automated emails they send are a bit confusing.  That may only be due to me being intimately familiar with the lending process and they do things quite differently than I do with my clients.

Hope that offers some valuable insight to anyone considering Lennar Mortgage.

Cheers!