HOPE for Homeowners
Examples of How Equity and Appreciation Are Shared

These are examples of how the unique equity and appreciation sharing elements of this program work.  Keep in mind that these are only examples, and your actual experience will depend on many things, including how much your home increases or decreases in value

                  
In this example, you and the FHA share this $20,000 when you sell your home or refinance your loan.  Here’s how that $20,000 would be split:

If you sell or refinance:

So, if you sell or refinance right after receiving the new loan, the FHA keeps the equity that was created, and you don’t receive any of it.  On the other hand, let’s assume you stay in this loan and don’t sell or refinance for ten years.  At that point, you’re entitled to half of the equity – in this example, that’s $10,000 – and the FHA is entitled to the other half.

In addition to this equity sharing, you will have to share any future home price appreciation with the FHA.  This means that, if your home has gone up in value between the time you receive your FHA mortgage and the time of your home sale (or other disposition), you will share the amount of this increase with the FHA (less closing costs and a portion of any improvements you have made).  This is a 50/50 split that does not change over time. 

For example, if:

In this example, you would keep half of this, or $25,000.  The FHA would also receive half, which is also $25,000.

But what if the value of the home goes down? 

In this example, the appreciation is actually negative (the home has depreciated), so there is nothing of financial value to share.  As far as the appreciation sharing feature of your HOPE for Homeowners loan, neither you nor the FHA would receive anything.

These examples assume that there are no closing costs when you sell your home and that you have made no improvements to your home.

Again, keep in mind that these are just examples, and your actual experience will vary depending on factors such as:  How much your home is worth when you get a new HOPE for Homeowners loan, how long you stay in your home, and how much your home is worth when you sell.

If the home is sold or refinanced, the homeowner will share the equity with FHA on a sliding scale ranging from a 100 percent FHA share after the first year to a minimum of 50 percent after five years. The lien holder that previously held the highest priority will receive payment up to a proportion of its original interest, not to exceed the amount of available appreciation. This type of delayed payoff will take place until all prior lien holders are satisfied or the amount of available appreciation is exhausted. All remaining appreciation is remitted to FHA.

Mortgage Loan Modification

Your home is an important investment you cannot afford to lose.  You may be eligible for an alternative to foreclosure if you have suffered recent financial hardships:

• You are unemployed or are experiencing a substantial cut in pay or self employment income
• One of the owners is deceased or seriously/chronically ill
• A divorce has affected your ability to make mortgage payments
• You have had to relocate due to loss of employment
• You have an adjustable rate or high interest rate on your loan

What you can do to help keep your home out of foreclosure:

• Complete one of the following financial statements
• Write a “Hardship” letter, explaining what has caused your financial problems
• Include copies of recent paystubs and checking/savings account statements

Send the above information to the Loss Mitigation Department of your mortgage servicer.

Fannie Mae Borrower's Financial Statement

Thousands with criminal records work unlicensed as loan originators

BY MATTHEW HAGGMAN, ROB BARRY and JACK DOLAN
mhaggman@MiamiHerald.com
Gary Kafka, former body builder with a long rap sheet and violent past, wrote millions of dollars in mortgages in South Florida without ever applying for a state license.
Fresh out of prison after serving time for bank fraud, he never went through a criminal background check before selling loans. He never took a competency exam.
He never had to.
More than half the mortgage professionals registered in Florida -- 120,563 -- entered the industry this decade without being licensed by the state, The Miami Herald found.
Known as loan originators, they perform the same job as mortgage brokers but aren't bound by the same rules.
Time and again, industry leaders asked Florida regulators to bring this group under their watch by imposing mandatory licensing. But regulators refused to press for any changes, claiming that lawmakers would never approve.
The state's refusal proved costly during the biggest housing boom in Florida history: Thousands of loan originators entered the industry with criminal histories, state records show.
While The Miami Herald found breakdowns in the state's licensing system for mortgage brokers, the lack of controls over originators created even more problems for an industry steeped in the highest fraud rate in the nation.
The special group was created by state lawmakers 17 years ago to make it easier for lenders to hire people as the industry was growing.
But in the past eight years, more people with criminal records jumped into the business as loan originators than as any other category of mortgage professionals.

'IT'S EMBARRASSING'

''It's more than disappointing, it's embarrassing,'' said Joseph Falk, a Miami mortgage broker and former president of the National Association of Mortgage Brokers, who tried to get regulators to license loan originators in 2002.
''It was pretty easy for someone to enter the industry because there were no standards. If there's no one policing, anyone who wanted to join the industry could do so.''
Pamela Simmons turned to a loan originator with a criminal past in 2005 to refinance her three-bedroom house in Pompano Beach, but ended up losing it.
''This was everything to me,'' said the single mother, tears in her eyes as she stood in front of the house. ''It's the only home I ever owned.''
A review of thousands of pages of court documents, state industry reports, internal e-mails and police reports shows that from 2000 to 2007:
• 5,306 people with criminal histories became loan originators -- a rate of nearly two a day. Worse, those include 2,201 who had committed financial crimes, such as fraud, money laundering and grand theft.
• Even large lenders hired loan originators with criminal backgrounds. The Miami Herald found that in at least 30 companies with 50 or more employees, more than one in five originators had a criminal record.
• Nearly two dozen people stripped of their licenses as mortgage brokers were able to sidestep regulators by becoming loan originators. Nine others who were denied licenses because of prior crimes or regulatory violations were able to do the same.
''It's a huge hole,'' said Ronald Brenner, a former Florida mortgage regulator who once led the agency's Miami office. ''You could get the worst thief in the world, a fraudster to the nth degree, and when he gets out of jail he can come work at your mortgage operation, and if he doesn't have a broker's license, all the better.''
Kafka, 48, joined America's Best Lending in Boynton Beach in 2004 after living in a halfway house.
While his federal probation officer said in court records that Kakfa should not be working in the mortgage industry, he went on to join two other firms without disclosing his past.
Two years after he began to peddle mortgages, he was convicted of cheating lenders of $2.7 million in loans at America's Best Lending by inflating incomes, boosting assets and misrepresenting other finances.
''You never would have guessed it,'' said Philip Sencer, who hired Kafka at a Wellington firm in 2006. ''He was the type of guy you'd invite to your home for a barbeque.''

BURDEN ON LENDERS

State regulators say they don't license loan originators, but they regulate those who hire them: mortgage lenders. The 1991 law allowing originators made it clear: The burden is on the lenders to ensure that everyone follows the law.
If a lender refuses to act on complaints against a loan originator, the state can discipline the lender, said Terry Straub, recently appointed director of the Office of Financial Regulation's Division of Finance.
''We hold them accountable,'' he said. But The Miami Herald found that in at least nine major cases when originators were arrested for mortgage fraud, no action was taken against their lenders.
While Florida requires lenders to report the names of their loan originators every quarter, the newspaper found that hundreds of companies don't follow the law. In the first half of 2005 -- during the peak of the boom -- 355 didn't file required reports, according to the state's own records.
Falk, the former president of the National Association of Mortgage Brokers, said the lack of reporting in the state system allows too many gaps.
The lack of tracking leads to even more problems: Without any central registration and with no requirements for entry, loan originators with criminal histories can move from firm to firm without divulging their past.
There is no state law requiring lenders to check their background.
If they had, they would have found that Kafka spent nearly three years in federal prison for loan fraud in 1999 and illegally keeping an arsenal of guns and ammunition while a resident of Ocean Ridge, near Boynton Beach.
Sencer, who hired Kafka at Financial Security in Wellington, said he learned of Kafka's police record only after federal Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents showed up at his office in 2005. Sencer said that when he met with prosecutors, 'they told me, ''You got duped.' ''
Assistant U.S. Attorney Neil Karadbil, who prosecuted Kafka, said the former loan originator was able to conceal his past while peddling loans, partly because he didn't have to submit to criminal background checks.
''There has to be some way to know in this industry whether you're dealing with a convicted felon,'' Karadbil said. ''At least borrowers or employers should know that.''
Even before his latest conviction, Kafka had a criminal record dating to 1977, including 15 arrests and four felony convictions, court records show. The charges include grand theft, burglary and possession of contraband in prison.
He is now back in prison -- serving 57 months -- for the most recent mortgage scheme.

A NEW CALLING

Harry Rolle was a convicted felon who had declared personal bankruptcy three times before he became a loan originator in 2001 for International Lenders of South Florida in Oakland Park.
Within months, he found his first victim: Elsa Erarte, a single mother who worked at Walgreens in Miami. Rolle pocketed a $16,000 down payment she had given him while he was supposed to help her find a home, saying it was nonrefundable.
She sued Rolle in Miami-Dade Circuit Court and got her money back in a judgment in 2004. ''It was all the money she had,'' recalled her attorney, Joel Friedman. ''She had spent years saving it.''
But the court case didn't stop Rolle.
The 53-year-old loan salesman went on to cheat four more borrowers through a variety of means: pocketing their down payments, skimming from their loans, and selling their homes without their approval, court records state.
''The guy was a consummate con artist,'' said Joseph Wilson, an investigator for the Office of Financial Regulation, who referred the case to police. ''He had the ability to gain people's confidence by saying what people wanted to hear.''
In 2005, the Miami-Dade County state attorney's office finally prosecuted Rolle as a habitual offender on fraud charges -- for ripping off Erarte and others. A judge gave him a year in jail.
Under state law, there is nothing to stop loan originators convicted of ripping off borrowers from returning to the industry.
Because they aren't licensed, there are no records of discipline or past crimes involving money or moral turpitude -- and no files for public inspection.
Bernard Williams, who pleaded guilty to stealing $6,000 from two elderly women -- the bills ripped from the seams of their clothes -- said he found the easiest route to sell home loans by becoming a loan originator in 2001.
''I didn't have a problem getting in,'' he told The Miami Herald.
Williams, 54, said he decided to sell loans because the market was booming and he knew that ''there was money to be made.'' Over the next five years, he worked for three separate lenders.
But while he was writing loans for dozens of working-class families, he and several co-conspirators were accused by Florida's attorney general of fleecing 80 people of nearly $2 million, according to a civil fraud suit filed in Broward County Circuit Court in January.
The suit says Williams, who has not been criminally charged, joined others in a scheme to siphon money from loans designed to save people from losing their homes. Like Pamela Simmons, several claim that Williams put their homes up for sale without their permission. He and others then pocketed tens of thousands of dollars in profits in each case by charging inflated fees, the suit alleges.
''I worked hard -- three jobs -- to get that house,'' said Simmons, 40, who has five children.
Williams insists he did nothing wrong, saying the suit will be resolved in his favor. ''This is all a headache,'' said Williams, who continues to work as a loan originator in North Miami-Dade.
He refused to talk about his guilty plea in 1994 for stealing from two elderly women, drawing a 30-day sentence and five years of probation.

`FEEDING FRENZY'

As the housing boom exploded in 2001, so did the number of people rushing into the mortgage industry, with loan originators leading the way. But as their numbers rose each year -- 66 a day in 2005 -- so did the number of former criminals.
With home sales rising more than 20 percent a year in parts of Florida, mortgage companies were hiring loan originators at an unprecedented rate, state records show.
''Back then, it was such a feeding frenzy,'' said David Velazquez, 37, a former loan originator in Broward who served time in prison for drug trafficking. 'People were saying, `We need loan originators. We'll train you.' It was so busy. They were pulling in anyone they could.''
In all, more than 5,300 people with criminal histories rushed into Florida's mortgage industry as loan originators since 2000. Even for people who had five or more convictions, there were no impediments to getting in.
According to state Department of Corrections data and county court records:
• Brian Lendin served six prison terms totaling a dozen years between 1983 and 2000 for crimes including grand theft, manslaughter and aggravated battery.
• Rosendo Perez was convicted of mortgage fraud, grand theft and forgery between 1990 and 2000.
• Ronald D. Collins was convicted 37 times between 1983 and 2000 on charges including grand theft, forgery and writing worthless checks.

REJECTION OVERCOME

The Miami Herald also found 31 instances of people with stripped or denied mortgage-broker licenses who managed to get work as loan originators. Others were turned down over incomplete applications.
Florida denied Antonio Ramos a broker's license in 2004 after he failed to submit his arrest record and other documents on his prior crimes. On his state application, he admitted a grand-theft conviction, explaining he was young at the time: ''Please accept me, because I am honest and want to be a success in the future.''
Ramos became a loan originator.
Over the next three years, prosecutors say, he and several co-conspirators embarked on a massive fraud spree targeting luxury homes in Broward County. They inflated home values in Southwest Ranches and used straw buyers to rip off lenders for $8.3 million.
Ramos is serving 60 days of home detention and four years of probation.
The Miami Herald also found that 22 brokers stripped of their state licenses returned as loan originators. Among them: four charged with felonies while working as mortgage brokers, two who dipped into their clients' accounts, and three who were charging excessive fees.
Chris Francis said he knew that he had to become a loan originator to get into the business in 2002. The reason: He had spent nearly a year in federal prison for a $4 million mortgage fraud in Maryland.
''I did my homework, and this was my way in,'' said Francis, who works for a lender in Lee County. He's now in charge of compliance for his firm. ''Who better than me to make sure everything is done right?'' he said.

Alaska has the right idea!  Florida needs to follow their example.
At this time, Florida only requires mortgage brokers to be licensed.  Prior to being licensed, each mortgage broker applicant must attend mortgage broker school, pass a comprehensive exam, be finger printed and submitted to a criminal back ground check.  Bank employees and federally chartered mortgage company employees who work as mortgage professionals don’t need to meet any of the previous criteria.

Doesn’t it make sense that professionals that are doing the same job should be held to the same level of accountability and training? 

Alaska to Require Licensure Exams for Its Mortgage Lending Professions

Tue May 20, 5:52 PM
 
BLOOMINGTON, Minn., May 20 /PRNewswire/ -- Pearson VUE, the electronic certification and licensure testing business of Pearson, announced today that the State of Alaska Department of Commerce, Community, and Economic Development ("Department") has selected Pearson VUE to develop and administer licensing exams for Alaska mortgage brokers and loan originators. The contract was awarded following a competitive bidding process in April and was signed in May.
Alaska joins the growing trend of states requiring a licensure exam for the mortgage profession, becoming the ninth state to do so. Currently, Pearson VUE has contracts with six of these states, including Alaska, making it the leading provider of licensure exams for mortgage lenders, brokers, and loan originators.
"Recent events in the mortgage industry have made the examination program a necessity," said Mark Davis, Director of the Division of Corporations, Business and Professional Licensing.

Fannie Mae relaxes loan down-payment requirements

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Fannie Mae, the largest U.S. home funding source, is setting a single national standard for down payments on mortgages it buys, including areas where home prices are falling, in an effort to stimulate the housing market.On loans it purchases, the company will accept down payments as low as 3.0 percent for single-family, primary residences in all U.S. markets starting June 1. That replaces a policy set in December that mandated higher down payments in markets where home prices are dropping, Fannie Mae said on Friday. 

Fannie Mae's new down payment policy is a "sound" move that could help unfreeze the U.S. housing market and uncover pent-up demand for mortgages, James Lockhart, director of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, said on Friday.
"It's still sound underwriting and makes sense in this type of market," he told reporters after a speech at a Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago conference. OFHEO is the regulator for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.Both companies have tightened standards on loans they purchase, such as mandating higher credit scores, and have raised fees to better reflect risk as defaults and foreclosures escalate.Fannie Mae "will be equalizing the down payment requirements for borrowers in all parts of the country, regardless of local market conditions," Marianne Sullivan, senior vice president of single-family credit policy and risk management, said in a news release.U.S. home prices have tumbled nearly 16 percent from their June 2006 peak, according to the Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller index of 20 metropolitan areas. The biggest losses are mainly in areas that had the most sweeping gains in the five-year record housing surge earlier this decade.

Fannie Mae will accept up to 97 percent loan-to-value ratios for conventional, conforming mortgages through its automated underwriting system, and ratios of up to 95 percent for other loans. A conforming mortgage meets the requirements for loans that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac can purchase.Freddie Mac early this month instituted a 95 percent loan-to-value floor for mortgage it buys, so the down payment can't increase to more than 5 percent of the estimated value, according to spokesman Brad German. It accepts lower down payments on some affordable loan products, he said.

"We are able to adopt this new, national down payment requirement, even in markets where home prices are declining, because our new automated underwriting risk assessment model ... will limit risk layering and assess each loan more precisely," Sullivan added.

The size of conforming loans was temporarily increased in March by their regulator to as high as $729,000 in high-cost areas from $417,000, in an effort to stimulate lending in one of the worst U.S. housing markets since the Great Depression.

More good news!  Orlando area real estate sales and prices increase!

2007 has finally come to an end and all signs are pointing to a much better 2008.  There are few of us in the real estate business who can honestly say that last year was not exceptionally difficult.  The past year proved to be a year of drastic changes in our industry with the fall in real estate prices, the crashing of the sub-prime market and the tightening underwriting guidelines. 

According to the Orlando Regional Realtor Association, February 2008 sales increased 13.4% over January 2008 sales.  Also, the median sales price of single family homes increased slightly from the previous month.  The average number of days on the market is still fairly high – 123 days before being sold but the sold prices were very close to the listing prices – 93.21%.  Finally, sellers are being realistic in their expectations of how much money they can sell their homes. 

At the time of the February report, the greater Orlando area had 25,984 homes available for purchase through the MLS.  However, there are also 2,175 homes in the MLS with pending sales contracts, which is good indicator of future sales activity. 

While most of the low documentation loan programs are gone, we still have plenty of loan options for the borrower with good credit, income and assets, including 100% financing with great rates and no mortgage insurance.

Yield Spread Premiums – Should they be eliminated?

The US Senate has a new mortgage reform bill (S. 2452) that would eliminate Yield Spread Premiums (YSP) being paid to Mortgage Brokers. YSP is essentially a commission we are paid by the end lenders who fund your loan. Insurance brokers, real estate brokers and many sales type people get paid commissions rather than getting a fixed salary. YSP allows you, the buyer, to be able to purchase or refinance a home for less money out of your pocket. We all like to get paid for our work. When you buy a car, the sales person’s commission is figured into the purchase price; your insurance agent gets paid a commission to write your home owners and car policies. I think most purchasers understand that they are indirectly paying for commission as it’s calculated in the sales price. Why should a mortgage broker be excluded from this long established practice?

In most industries, commissions aren’t disclosed to the consumer. Haven’t you been curious if you really got a “good deal” on a car purchase or did you make the sales person RICH? Mortgage Brokers are required by law to disclose our commission and I have no problem with that. However, to eliminate YSP would mean that your closing costs would increase.

NOTE that there are greedy mortgage brokers (MB) just like there are greedy people in all industries. Some MBs have taken advantage of home buyers and collected huge commissions. When I started out in this business in 1999, for the most part, 10% commission was the maximum we were allowed to make on a loan. I HAVE NEVER MADE ANYTHING NEAR 10% and I had no problem when this maximum started going lower and lower. Many lenders are capping the maximum commission MBs can make around 3 to 5%. Of course, it depends on the loan size but I would guess my average commission is around 2 – 2.5%.

At this time, banks and mortgage lenders are exempt from revealing their loan origination commissions (in their case, it’s called Service Release Premiums). You, the home loan consumer have no way of knowing if you’ve received a “good” rate. It’s hoped and assumed that your banker, who holds your checking/savings/investment accounts, has your interests in mind but this might not be the case…

In April 2006, I purchased a 2nd home in Cape Coral, FL. Since I had knee surgery scheduled for the first week in May, I decided to use the realtor’s lender of choice – a large bank with whom I’m approved to closed loans. The bank’s loan officer quoted the first mortgage as a 5 year ARM at 7.875%; she was going to charge me 18% for the 2nd mortgage! If I would have closed the same loan for a client, I would have made a pile of money. But we’ll never know what the bank loan officer would have made because they don’t disclose commissions.

I decided to let my good friend, Sandi, do the loan while I recuperated from surgery. She closed both loans through the same bank that quoted the extremely high interest rates to me. Sandi got me a 30 year fixed rate for the first mortgage at 6.875 with a 2nd mortgage at 8.25% AND she was still able to earn $5,400. I can’t imagine how large of a commission she would have earned if she used “the bank’s rates”!

Again, I don’t mind disclosing my commission but don’t you think all loan officers should have the same requirement? If so, please contact your senator and ask them to expand the bill and include all loan originators so we all have the same accountability to our clients.

LICENSED MORTGAGE BROKERS or BANK MORTGAGE LENDERS?
Before we get into whom to pick to do your home loan, let’s make sure everyone understands the difference between a broker and a bank or mortgage company loan officer. A broker is a licensed agent, approved to do business with and for a number of different lenders. A company loan officer or employee is just that – they work for a bank or a mortgage company and their job is to sell their company’s product. If the product is not suited for you, OR you are not suited for their product, you have to go elsewhere for your financing.

There was a very interesting U.S. Supreme Court case decision released in April 2007. It is Watters v. Wachovia Bank. If you are legally minded, you can read the entire opinion here: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/06pdf/05-1342.pdf There is a lot of information and detail in the complete opinion but I will summarize what I know about the case as best as I can.* Now, let me say at this point, I have banked at Wachovia for many years and I love them. I have always received super service from them for my banking needs. However, I have had Wachovia employees contact me over the years about finding a home for their hard to place loans…

Okay, back to the court case and how it impacts consumers of home loans. National banks are exempt from state laws governing their banking activities as they are regulated by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC). The Court ruled that the OCC is permitted exclusively to regulate mortgage companies that operate as subsidiaries of federally charted banks. A subsidiary can have as little as 1% ownership by the national bank.

What this means to you is that the Court’s decision strips state regulators of their ability to enforce existing consumer protection laws and hold bank mortgage lenders to the same standards for licensing, education and criminal background checks as mortgage brokers and other state chartered businesses.

While states works to strengthen consumer protection laws and impose stricter licensing, education and criminal background checks on mortgage originators, the Court’s decision in the Watters case effectively pave the way for lenders to insulate themselves from this heightened state scrutiny by obtaining a federal charter.

I used to originate loans for a bank. I left in January 2001 to start my own mortgage brokerage business because I was so frustrated that I couldn’t get my GOOD CLIENTS to the closing table. As an employee, I was not required to be licensed, I wasn’t required to keep current with continuation education and I wasn’t finger printed to cross reference against a national criminal data base.

One last thing while we’re on the topic of banks vs mortgage brokers – bank employees get paid on volume and number of loans they close. Because almost all of their mortgage clients are bank customers, they get paid a very small amount per loan. They typically close many loans per month and this hopefully rolls into a bonus situation so they can make a nice living. A typical mortgage broker closes fewer loans but makes more money per loan. Who do you think will work harder for you? By the way, all remuneration a mortgage broker receives is detailed on page 2 of the Settlement Statement (HUD); this information is not disclosed on the HUD of a mortgage company of a national bank.

* Actually, I received a lot of help with this summary because I found a really informative article in one of the mortgage publications I subscribe to.

WOULD YOU TRUST A STRANGER TO HOLD YOUR WALLET?
I wanted to use this heading for one of my print ads but the publisher and my account rep thought it was “too negative”. With identity theft being the fastest growing crime, we must all become more aware of what personal information we divulge to strangers.

When you apply for a home loan, you are in essence turning over your wallet to a stranger by providing a copy of your driver’s license and social security card (effective 2003 as a result of the Patriot Act). What’s more, you will also need to provide information on your income and assets, and because a credit report from all 3 reporting companies is required, your credit history becomes part of your application.
Most of us were raised to be trusting individuals so we trust that our private information doesn’t end up in the wrong hands, in the hands of dishonest people and criminals. If this were true, why is identity theft the fastest growing crime?

When you fill out a loan application online or you receive a phone call about refinancing your home, who is at the other end? Do you know these companies and who works for them? How many employees have access to your personal information? What kind of screening process do they use for hiring people? Do they ever allow temporary help for filing, answering phones, etc? Could you meet them in person or find them if there is a problem? How do you know they are who they say they are?

We need to be proactive in protecting our identities. Ask questions that can be verified. Use reverse phone and address lookups to check that someone didn’t start business last week and is working from a cell phone. Check the company’s ownership and licensing through your state records. Check with the Better Business Bureau for an acceptable record. Not having a record with the BBB isn’t necessarily a good thing as it probably means they haven’t been doing business long. Mortgage companies are ranked #10 for number of complaints with the Central Florida BBB.

I’m betting that no one who read the introductory question and answered “yes”. No, they wouldn’t trust a stranger to hold their wallet but they would trust a stranger with their financial and personal information.

I would love to help you with your home loan. I’ve been a Windermere homeowner for over 9 years and you can check me out via all of the sources I’ve listed. Call me if you want information on how to access public records and check me out. The person that does your home loan is going to know a lot about you and you need to know a lot about the person doing your home loan.