Consumer complaint received 2022-12-04
Company: AMERIFIRST FINANCIAL, INC.
State: TX
Product: Mortgage
Sub-product: Conventional home mortgage
Issue: Closing on a mortgage

Complaint:
We started the mortgage process, speaking with multiple lenders to try to find the best interest rate. On XX/XX/2022, we received a pre-approval letter with a quoted interest rate of 7.25 % from University XXXX XXXX XXXX ( XXXX XXXX  ). That same day, my wife went to a distant relative, XXXX XXXX and said we have a 7.25 % from XXXX, can you beat it? while simultaneously submitting an application through his website along with all supporting income documentation. XXXX responded via text ( XXXX XXXX ) that same day after receiving our application and documentation that he could do 7.125 % with no points and provided us with a pre-approval letter ( XXXX XXXX ). At the same time, we were in negotiations with the seller of a property that we had placed an offer on. Upon receiving a verbal confirmation that the sellers would agree to our counter offer we told XXXX XXXX and he locked us in at 7.125 % that night ( Friday XX/XX/XXXX ) and we received the signed contract from the sellers the next business day ( Monday, XX/XX/XXXX ). ( XXXX, XXXX ) Over the course of the next two weeks we were reassured a few times over the phone that everything looked solid and we were good to go. We received a few additional document requests from XXXX, which were provided and they again let us know that everything looked good. In the interest of moving into our new home before XXXX, on XX/XX/XXXX we asked if pushing up the closing a few days would be possible, to which XXXX confirmed that everything was in good shape and moving up the closing wouldnt be a problem. 

Then on XX/XX/XXXX, XXXX got a call from XXXX ultimately saying that the loan was in underwriting and they lost the approval. XXXX XXXX directly tell us what the problem was, but he kept saying that the confluence of three factors played into XXXX not approving the loan- the fact that our debt to income ratio was close to the limit, credit scores were not great, but still over XXXX, and the fact that the property was a site condo. Each of these three things were known at the time of our application and rate lock, and did not change at all through the course of underwriting. Multiple times, XXXX stated to XXXX not to throw anyone under the bus, but XXXX credit score isnt helping matters, your credit is great, but his XXXX doesnt make it easy. Additionally, we asked if the debt to income ratio was an issue, could we pay off debt to bring it down? We have a student loan that has a {$610.00} monthly payment that we were in a position to completely pay off, which would drastically reduce our debt to income ratio, but XXXX just kept saying that it wouldnt help, and that we needed to switch to XXXX in order to close the loan. We additionally said that we could put more money towards the down-payment to make the loan work. Multiple times, we asked what the debt to income ratio needed to be in order to make that be a non-issue, and he was never able to come up with an answer, he just kept telling us that they had tried everything and we needed to switch to XXXX. We didnt understand why switching to XXXX would help with the issues that XXXX was asserting, but he kept saying that we needed to sign off on switching to XXXX in order to close on time. This was obviously not something we wanted to do because switching to XXXX meant we had to switch to a higher interest rate. XXXX provided a screenshot of what he claims were the XXXX rates on the same day that our rate was originally locked, but there was no indication of the date, or that the loans were even based on our information. ( XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX ) The new XXXX rates were not only higher than the 7.125 % he locked us in, but they were also higher than the XXXX rate that we had that same day that we went to him asking if he could beat in order to get our business. We were very untrusting of XXXX at this point and what he was saying, especially regarding the new rates and why we needed to change in the first place, but he kept pressuring us to hurry up and confirm the switch to XXXX and then hurry up and confirm the new rate and added points so we could close on time. XXXX said he would give us a one time lender credit of {$4700.00}, despite the fact that there is no evidence of this on the closing disclosure. He said if we locked in the new XXXX rate, which ultimately covered about half of the points that were required to now lock the rate at 7.375 %. This difference in interest rate amounted to approximately {$100.00} a month increase, and an increase in total interest paid over the life of the 30 year loan of {$37000.00}. Additionally, the points on this interest rate were {$7800.00}. We ultimately signed off on it because we didnt know what else to do. 

After closing on our mortgage, we were still very confused and not given any answers. My wife and I had a few conversations with various people in the mortgage industry and their reaction made us dig into it a bit deeper to try and figure out what happened. After looking up the differences between XXXX and XXXX and not coming up with any significant differences that seemed to affect our loan, we took a deeper dive at the lock agreements and discovered that the original lock was for a XXXX program called Home Possible, which come to find out is something that we never would have qualified for because our income is way to high for this program. ( XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX  ) We also had various issues throughout the entire process that suggest either carelessness or negligence or some level of malfeasance. The pre-approval that he provided represented that he checked income, debt to income ratio and assets with the underwriting system, but later when we asked for the proof that he ran this through the automated underwriting system, he would not provide it. Additionally, our monthly payment went up approximately {$50.00} because of private mortgage insurance. He claims that it failed the final check but that doesnt seem to make sense since there are hard and fast guidelines regarding the amount of coverage needed. ( XXXX  XXXX ) Further, the final closing disclosure he gave us on XX/XX/XXXX was different from the final closing disclosure that was apparently given to and balanced by title on the same day. The discrepancy was discovered on XX/XX/XXXX, two days before closing, when XXXX called the title company to confirm wire instructions. Upon bringing this to XXXX attention, he was unable to provide us with the closing disclosure that the title company had and instead made additional changes and attempted to re-balance with the title company after the sellers had already signed their closing documents, which resulted in a change to their bottom line. ( XXXX XXXXXXXX ) Included are copies of the initial disclosure ( XXXX XXXXXXXX ), revised initial disclosure ( XXXX XXXX ), the initial closing disclosure ( XXXX XXXX ) and the closing disclosure balanced with title ( XXXX XXXXXXXX ).

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation