Need your 'two cents'! How far in advance to get 'pre approved'?

[Ashley Sanchez]

Quick question: How far in advance should I seek a pre- approval or 'get qualified' for a mortgage loan to purchase a home? It seems that I have had to pass up at least 2 realtors now because after our first conversation I wasn't ready to 'buy today' or 'get qualified' to purchase a home. Then, 2 mortgage bankers haven't even called me back or even entertained my questions for preparation because after our first conversation I have over the minimum credit score to get qualified and they felt I didn't want to have them pull my credit to get qualified because I have over 700 credit score. My main focus right now is lowering my DTI that's 49% now and not have any inquiries hit my credit while paying down debt to lower my DTI. Should I worry about my DTI because of my score? When getting pre-approved, does that count as a hard or soft inquiry? Seems people forget you must build a relationship first before trying to find out a persons credit situation. I mean I may not buy today but depending upon your relationship you build I may buy today. I mean my thinking is if you try to rush the process then I will get stuck with a crappy house with issues and you walk away with a commission and I'm left stuck paying a note. Sorry it has been hard work to get my score where I want it and I don't want it to go down for my stupid decisions or small mistakes. I appreciate your 'two cents'! Lol!

[Chris Mason]

Hi @Ashley Sanchez,

Most of that relationship stuff you desire comes with what's relevant to your particular situation, which can only be discussed with a credit pull and all the standard necessary paperwork. I'll give about 45 minutes of my time with no credit pull, tax returns, bank statements, etc, and that's a lot relative to what most of my peers will entertain. Some of my peers, successful ones included mind you, spend no more than a stock email with a paperwork checklist, and wont talk longer than five minutes until they have all that paperwork in-hand.

There's only so many hours in the day, and ten million tire kickers out there. There are no stated income, stated asset, and stated credit loans, so there's really no point in spending more than a certain amount of time with someone based on stated income, stated credit, and stated assets.

45 minutes is my time cap for folks with stated income/assets/credit, and again that is considered long. Every lender has one, with it being entirely possible to be successful with a 5 minute + 1 stock email time-cap.

I hate to say it, but if you want more than any individual lender's time cap worth of time (be it 5 minutes or 45 minutes, depending on the lender), you're going to have to cough up the paperwork and get your credit pulled. Time is the most important commodity that any real estate professional has. You're only going to get so much of it based on stated income/credit/assets. Relationships are a two-way street.

It's not that anyone hates you, it's just that there's not a lot to talk about without tax returns, credit, bank statements, paystubs, et cetera.