delays in the mortgage process, but could put you and you into considerable financial danger. Once the borrower has found an NMLS-certified loan officer, the preliminary discussions of the loan can begin. This is the first step in the loan process we discussed earlier: Origination. Once all loan disclosures are executed and all income and assets data are provided, the transaction moves into the second phase, which is Processing. The loan processor works with the loan officer to handle the loan’s documentation and tasks. For example, they are in charge of ordering the appraisal, doing title work, verifying income and deposits, checking the debt-to-income (DTI) ratio, and a multitude of other loan-related items. Once the loan processor assembles the loan package, they submit it to the underwriting department, beginning the third stage of the loan process: Underwriting. As stated earlier, underwriting is the process of poring through the buyer’s submitted information and making sure it jibes with the requirements of the loan organization. The underwriter will focus on matching the applicant’s income, assets, credit information, property title, and home appraisal to the lender’s lending guidelines. If everything meets the organization’s requirements, a loan is offered and a closing date set. If something doesn’t look right or there is some sort of issue, the loan is denied. Granted, the terms of a mortgage loan may have as many as 100 conditions to be met. After all, most mortgages are for fairly large sums of money, and lenders don’t want to be haphazard with their finances. With that in mind, the underwriter and loan processor may not be individual people, but rather teams of people. Sometimes the entire processing and underwriting departments of a lending organization are working on one particular loan.
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