Home loans with every number on the table.

Start here

Your loan-to-value

—LTV on this scenario

Loan amount

—

Cash down

—

Every valuation decision below hangs off this one number. On a refinance it is the balance over the estimated value, not the price you once paid.

Path 2

Value acceptance plus property data

—for a property data collection

Who visits

—

Turn time

—

A trained data collector walks the house with a floor-plan app. No appraiser, no opinion of value. Offered when the engine will accept the price but still wants eyes on the condition.

Path 3

Hybrid or desktop appraisal

—typical Utah fee

Appraiser visits

—

Turn time

—

A licensed appraiser writes the report from data somebody else collected. Common on rate and term refinances where the file is strong but the engine will not waive.

Path 4

Full interior appraisal

—typical Utah fee, form 1004

Turn time

—

Paid

—

The default. An appraiser measures the house, photographs every room, pulls three to six closed comparables and reconciles them into one opinion of value.

Automatic disqualifiers

When no waiver is coming

Sevenfiles that always get an appraiser

• New construction and anything not yet finished
• Two to four unit properties
• Manufactured homes
• Gift of equity and non-arm's-length sales
• Jumbo and portfolio loans outside agency rules
• Texas 50(a)(6) equity loans
• Any file where the engine returns a Refer

An appraisal waiver is an offer, not a right. It can also be withdrawn if anything in the file changes before closing.

Option 1

Pay the gap and proceed

$13,500extra cash at the table

Cash to close becomes

$62,000

Payment barely moves

$2,570 vs $2,652

The gap is not financed, so it is cash on top of your down payment. You are also buying at above appraised value, which shows up on the day you sell.

Option 3

Split the difference

$477,500meet in the middle

You bring

$54,500

Seller concedes

$7,500

The common outcome when both sides want the deal. Write it as a price reduction, not a repair credit, so the loan amount actually changes.

Option 4

Reconsideration of value

3 compsthe most an ROV may submit

Typical turn time

3 to 7 days

Success rate

Low without new sales

You may challenge the report through the lender, never directly with the appraiser. An ROV has to point at closed sales the appraiser missed or a factual error in the adjustments grid. Disliking the number is not grounds.

Option 5

Use the appraisal contingency

Earnest moneyreturned, if the contingency is live

Utah deadline

Set in the REPC

Waived it?

Deposit is at risk

Buyers who waived the appraisal contingency to win a bidding war do not get this exit. That is exactly the trade you made, and it is worth pricing before you make it.

Who may give it

Donor eligibility is a short list

Relativesby blood, marriage, adoption or guardianship

• Parent, grandparent, sibling, child, aunt or uncle
• Fiance, fiancee or domestic partner
• FHA also allows an employer, a labour union or a charity
• The seller, in any form
• The builder, the listing agent or the buyer's agent
• Anyone with a financial interest in the sale

A gift from an interested party is not a gift, it is a seller concession, and it is capped and disclosed differently.

The paperwork

What the gift letter must say

Five factsor underwriting sends it back

• The dollar amount and the date of transfer
• The donor's name, address and phone number
• The donor's relationship to you
• The property address the funds are for
• A statement that no repayment is expected
• Anything that hints at a side agreement to repay

A gift that is secretly a loan is occupancy fraud on a mortgage application. Underwriters read bank statements looking for exactly that pattern.

Seasoning

Sixty days changes everything

60 daysin your account before it stops being questioned

Statements reviewed

Most recent 2 months

Older than that

Generally not sourced

Money that has sat in your account across two full statement cycles is treated as yours. Anything newer needs a paper trail: the donor's statement showing the withdrawal, and the wire or cashier's cheque landing in yours.

The exceptions

When you must have skin in the game

$24,2505% of your own funds on a second home

Two to four units

5% own funds

Investment property

Gifts not allowed

The 100% gift rule is a one unit primary residence rule. Step outside that and the agencies want to see that some of the money is genuinely yours.

What the rate is worth

The saving, like for like

$349a month on the same balance

Over the remaining term

$104,656

Today's sample rate

6.125%

This is the honest comparison: the same $290,000 at the old rate against the same $290,000 at today's. It is the single largest number in this whole chapter.

VA only, and it matters

Whose entitlement is on the hook

Substitutionthe only clean way for a VA seller

Buyer is VA eligible

Entitlement swaps

Buyer is not

Seller's stays tied up

A veteran who lets a civilian assume the loan keeps their entitlement locked to that property until it is paid off. They may not be able to buy their next home with a VA loan at all. Sellers routinely find this out too late.

What it costs

Fees on an assumption

$1,450VA funding fee, 0.5% of the balance

Lender processing cap

$300 plus credit report

FHA assumption

Credit review required

Far cheaper than originating. There is no new appraisal and no new title policy in most cases, though the servicer still underwrites the buyer's credit and income.

The practical problem

Servicers are slow

45 to 120days, and the servicer sets the pace

Typical purchase close

21 days

Who approves it

The servicer, not us

Assumptions are processed by the seller's servicer, which has no deadline pressure and no incentive to hurry. Build the timeline into the contract or the deal dies waiting.

The one that is never assumable

Conventional loans

Due on salethe clause that ends the conversation

A new loan here costs

$2,652

At 10% down

$436,500

Fannie and Freddie notes call the balance due when the property transfers. If the seller's loan is conventional, an assumption is simply not on the table, whatever the rate is.