First buyer programs...

[Kimono_skunk]

Hellos, a new member here, and was perusing the forums to see about some advice i can ask for.

I live in Elkton, Maryland, but hoping to move to middle-south delaware, or to north carolina in the next few months. Hopefully We can find a manufactured home in the areas we are looking into.

Ok, about me and family, I am married with a 2 year old daughter, and wife stays at home taking care of her. I am a truck driver home with a workers comp claim I am waiting on, and about 3 months recovery time with my knee.

My credit rating is fair, at about 560, while my wife's credit is in the 620's. We started going through the paces of qualifying for a first time buyers program for a home when I got hurt just this past march. I let my creditor's, and landlord know I was hurt on the job, and they know I am fighting for workers comp, and i'll be getting the payments / settlement within a month. I let the mortgage counselor know of our situation, and put everything on hold.

The mortgage company said if I got my rating about 580, they would qualify us for a home with nothing down. From 150-200,000 stick built home value, with a mortgage about 1,000 a month. However they could not use my wife's rating because I am the bread winner, so to speak.

My questions are as follows...
1. Are manufactured home plans easier to qualify for than regular homes? Because I 'did' qualify before, just had to get my credit rating number risen about 18 points.

2. My credit rating, due to my being hurt on work, may take a nosedrive due to bills from creditors and such, even tho I let them know about my workers comp. What can I do? What if my 2005 Dodge Neon gets repo'd, while I am litigating for my WC?

3. Are there plans where my wife's rating can be used at all in conjunction with mine, to make things easier?

4. And modular homes themselves, are there a lot of styles available? I do like a lot of 2 stories 'stick built' homes in developments I had seen here in Delaware.

5. Does anyone on here have a modular home here in delaware or north carolina they want to sell, for a 'rent to own' or a mortgage I can qualify for? Please let me know... smiles.

Thats about it for now, and any other comments or tips will be most appreciated, and I'll do my best to reply as soon as I can.

Kimono_skunk, and family.

[Juliem]

Like your wife, I am also a stay at home mom. My husband's credit is outstanding but mine is poor do to a bk (90% medical bills due to an injury) before we married. I have been trying to get financing through my bank for our land and they told me that they could put me on it and base it off my husband's credit score. I was told some banks will average or some will look at the highest credit score regardless who is bringing in the money; the man/wife is still one unit. Look around for a bank that will take both into consideration. I have been told FHA/Fannie Mae is about the only way that most banks will finance a manufactured home. First we were dealing with a mortgage broker. That didn't work for us. We shopped around at the dealers, and it seems since they have so many contacts in the finance industry, they know what works and doesn't work. We are paying more apr for FHA and because we are going manufactured, but what we had to consider is our bottom line cost, space, quality, etc. Regardless of what the finance industry things of manufactured/modular homes, I feel confident that I am getting a well built home for my money (Hopefully I'll feel the same way when we move in next month). Another thing I learned is that all modular means is that the manufactured home is off its frame (Unless there is a better interpretation, that's what I've been told). So many dealers will put it on a permanent foundation although the cost will vary (I learned that early on when I was to be charged 14K for permanent, actual cost may be only around 6K as the builder/dealer I am dealing with now is offering permanent foundation for less than half the cost. Plus its built under HUD code, which means an engineer will examen it before they start moving the house).

Anyway, I have been learning a lot off this forum and I have been shopping around for over a year (It's taken a few rotten deals as well as 8 months to sell our house, so I have had time to do some reasearch). I highly recommend the Ebook by John Grissim that is offered on this site. It will tell you almost everything you need to know, how to shop without getting locked into anything, what to look for, how the manufactured home is built, what homes are rated the top manufacturers. By reading that, plus looking at the ratings, we narrowed our choices to two manufacturers. From that, I understood construction processes, insulation ratings, quality, number of houses built, etc. Plus there are so many floor plans out there that you will get dizzy looking at all of them (and most of them are so beautiful inside and offer more upgrades than any site built in our price range). It would take you several days of shopping to look at all the dealers/builders, specs, options. It can get emotionally draining and exhausting!

Sorry to go on and on like that...I saw your post and having been in a similar situtation with credit scores with the husband and wife being on a different rating tier and the delimna of trying to sort out what's best, I had to interject what I do know so far... I wish you and your family the best of luck on everything, speedy recovery and happy house hunting!

[Kris]

How would you rate your experience? I too stay at home and was wondering about ho wthe credit rating would work. What home did you decide on?