The Mortgage Process: Steps, Tips and Other Information
4 Essential Steps to Closing your Loan on Time
1. Complete Your Mortgage Application
The first step in the mortgage process is to complete your mortgage application on our secure online digital platform. In minutes verify your income, assets and credit then auto-underwrite.
2. Upload Your Documents
Next, upload the credit documents that are listed below to our secure webportal:
- The most recent 2 year's W2s for all borrowers
- 30 full days paystubs for all borrowers
- Name & phone of supervisor (we will call them 3 days prior to closing)
- 2 months bank statements or asset statements (all pages showing sufficient funds for closing)
- If Self-employed: Most recent 2 year's business & personal tax returns (all pages and schedules)
- Copy of all borrowers' drivers' licenses and social security cards
- If VA: DD214 & certificate of eligibility
- contract of sale on present home (if selling)
- Contract on home purchasing with cancelled earnest money check showing it cleared
- Sign the disclosures, intent to proceed and then you'll be asked to pay the appraisal fee
- Please send your homeowners insurance agent contact information to:
Tina Walker - contract of sale on present home (if selling)
3. Loan Approval, Underwriting & Conditions
You will then receive your credit scores and interest rate options. Please call your loan officer to discuss your options & lock in your rate once under contract.
You cannot lock in an interest rate until you have a property under contract. Once your loan is locked in, you will receive loan disclosures to esign and off to underwriting your loan will go!
Once your loan comes out of underwriting, you may be asked for additional documentation that the underwriter may need to clear your loan for closing. Please upload these conditions as soon as possible so you can start the closing process.
You will receive an initial closing disclosure as soon as the file is in closing. A final closing disclosure with all verified fees comes next.
4. Closing Your Mortgage Loan
Your final closing disclosure is reviewed with you, your closer and loan officer then you are ready to wire the cash required for closing to the title company (24 hours prior to closing).
You may get the wire instructions from the title company. Then sign your closing documents and become a happy homeowner!
Finally, artificial intelligence and data-driven algorithms have brought life to a new generation of mortgage professionals.
7 Important tips for ensuring a smooth transaction
- An appraisal can take two weeks or more to come in depending on the market. Appraisals are paid for up front once you are under contract. The rest of the funds for closing will be paid at closing. Most title companies, where you close your loan will ask that you send a wire from your bank to the title companies bank for the cash needed for closing 24 hours prior to closing. You will receive wire instructions to complete this task. No personal checks – Bring all borrowers ID’s to closing.
- If you are cashing in a 401K or stocks, or bonds, there are very explicit rules to show proof of receipt of funds and proof of deposit of funds for the underwriter so please do not move money or deposit any money other than normal paychecks without first discussing this with your loan officer.
- If you will be receiving a gift for a down payment, there are explicit rules for required documentation so please discuss this with your loan officer up front. The gift donor will have to sign a Gift letter we will provide to you and send in a recent bank statement with all pages proving they have the funds available to gift to you.
- The underwriter will confirm the accuracy of data by reviewing your credit, income and asset documents, contract, title commitment, survey, homeowners’ insurance binder and an appraisal on the property. The underwriter may come back and ask for additional items which is common.
- Your loan processor Tina Walker will call you to request these conditions to submit to the underwriter for a clear to close. Once we meet the underwriters’ conditions, your loan will then go to the closing department to draw your closing documents. You will receive an INITIAL Closing Disclosure that may not be completely accurate and may change a bit, but we need this signed by law a minimum of 3 days prior to closing so please return it quickly.
- The closer will draw closing documents with attorneys and send them to the title company. Together we all will verify final fees and schedule a time for closing. Your loan officer will review these final fees on your final closing disclosure with you prior to closing or you can call Alex King to review: (214) 762-1111
- Do not purchase anything during the loan process - not a refrigerator, washer or dryer, car, new credit cards or anything please. If your fico scores drop or your debt-to-income ratio increases, your rate can increase. or it can move your loan from a loan approval to a decline. Please wait until after closing to purchase anything for your own best interests. If we see new inquiries on your credit report the day before closing, you will have to explain them. If you took on new obligations since underwriting, the loan has to go back to the underwriter to see that you still qualify with the new obligations. No new credit cards. Please be extremely aware of this.
How The Brighton Bank Hybrid App Works
The Perfect Loan Application
Our Hybrid Digital App is designed to ask clients the exact questions needed to complete the perfect mortgage application in a conversational way that's easy to understand.
FULL CREDIT REVIEW
Hybrid App pulls a credit report and in seconds reviews the scores, outstanding liabilities, and minimum payment obligations.
INSTANT DIGITAL ASSET VERIFICATION
Hybrid App is integrated with almost every bank, allowing clients to digitally verify and approve assets through their secure bank portal in seconds.
AUTOMATED UNDERWRITING APPROVAL
Hybrid then verifies the client's self-reported income or True Income through our Work Number integration and runs the loan application through an automated underwriting system taking the guesswork out, streamlining the approval process.
APPROVED LOANS & RATES
After the approval is complete, Hybrid runs through thousands of programs to present a list of all of the available approved loan options and interest rates.
PRE-APPROVAL LETTER
Once a loan option and interest rate are selected, a client can either download a pre-approval letter or continue to submit their loan application to AI Underwriting Bot which we call GAR Genius.
SUBMIT TO AI UNDERWRITING
Through the Hybrid App, clients can update changes to a purchase price or loan amount, review disclosures and e-sign. Now, a process that takes mortgage companies days to complete is now done in minutes - Submitting a loan has never been faster or easier.
If you need more information, please feel free to reach out, our expert staff would be happy to answer any questions you may have.
