Consumer complaint received 2020-09-10
Product: Mortgage — Conventional home mortgage
Issue: Applying for a mortgage or refinancing an existing mortgage — 
Company: AMERICAN FINANCING CORPORATION (CO)

In the beginning of XXXX I applied to refinance my home mortgage through American Financing and was assigned a loan officer. He was very courteous, informative, and responsive to the questions that I had about the loan and submitting any relevant information. As time went on and I submitted any missing pieces to the application, I was assigned an additional helper by American Financing to answer questions. 100 % of the time he forwarded my  questions back to the original loan officer because he stated himself he was not qualified to answer them. 

This further delayed any responses that I was getting regarding the loan. After numerous voicemails and e-mails to the original loan officer with more questions I had, I was finally able to make contact with him ( weeks later ) because I asked the receptionist to be assigned another loan officer. He then begrudgingly reported to me that my debt to income ration was too high and that he would need another current paystub from me in order to proceed. ( First of all, why not just give me a call instead of keeping me in limbo for weeks, and return my voicemails/emails? It seriously takes 2-5 minutes out of the day to answer someone and explain what is going on ). I also mentioned that I was willing to have a cosigner support me through the application if necessary. Next, instead of waiting for my most current paystub ( which was a much higher amount than the previous ) and considering the possibility of a cosigner, I received a rejection letter by email with no message or rationale attached. Just a flat denial on a pdf sheet. 

Although speculative, this cold response felt somehow like a sleight to me for asking to be assigned another loan officer? I seriously just wanted answers and to talk to someone consistently about the application because time was going on for days without a response. He even told me that the acceptance/denial was in his hands, so I don't understand why he was unwilling to have a conversation about my financial situation and the factors involved. I even submitted a message from my current employer regarding the stability of my job in spite of the pandemic. 

Not only was this whole process confusing and non communicative, I was also at one point told by the helper that I was pre-approved and that we were going to continue with the application process. The loan officer later told me that he is new, made a mistake, and was looking at the wrong account. 

It felt pretty awful to go from communicating with a very normal, professional person to then being treated like a nobody as they apparently started to realize that my credentials might be too tight for them to consider. 

And if the guy was just busy.. just tell me that! All I needed was a bit of decency in communication regarding what was going on, instead of blatantly ignoring my emails and phone calls. 

It feels snaky to have my credit report pulled ( to its detriment ) and then just bail on the process with no further explanation as to why we were unable to refinance or considering other alternatives.