Landing question, American currently living in Canada

[John Vanderbeck]

Hi all,

First post here, just signed up. Been spending a lot of time trying to learn and ran into this site after having bought a few BP audio books off Audible.

I'm in kind of an interesting situation and hoping someone may have some information, experience, or knowledge to impart.

I am a US citizen, but I have been living in Canada for the last 7 or 8 years.  I moved up here for work and stayed all this time.  However, I am looking to be moving back to the as soon as the country gets back on the right track.

My question is kind of two part but both are related, and have to do with getting lending given my situation. As a US citizen I have credit in the US, so I'm not like some Canadian citizen with no US credit. My US credit score is currently around 710-720 and I am working on paying off some cards to get that higher. I am also a Veteran, so possibly have VA loans available to me (I haven't looked into that much yet).

Now on the face of things I would think that with my credit I should be able to get a mortgage if I was in a "normal" situation, AKA living in the US.  However, one of the things I have learned is that the lenders will want to see 2 years of tax returns and 2 years of W-2s.  My tax returns I don't think show income because all my income is Canada and gets deducted on my US tax returns so that I don't pay US taxes.  And employers here don't get W-2s, they give T-4s.

I started a new job recently (about 5-6 months now) and make a healthy income.  My previous job was just shy of 5 years before the company closed the local office and laid everyone off.

So two sides of this: 
1) Is it possible to purchase property while I am still here in Canada using my good US credit even though my forms and paperwork would be a bit off kilter?
2) What about when I move back to the US? Would I need to wait an additional 2 years from then so I had more normal paperwork before I could apply to purchase a home?

Hopefully my questions make sense, but if they don't please let me know and I can clarify.

Thanks in advance for any help!