“Dear Steve,
We are in credit card debt of an incredible $40,000. We are trying to refinance our home…We owe $110,000 on it, but its assessed at $265,000. We are wanting to refinance to pay off the cc debt. The problem is, we can’t get refinanced because of our debt level and some late payments.
I called a few credit cards to lower our payments / interest rates but they say our expenses exceed our income (duh) and they refer us to their mortgage people who then tell us we can’t help you because we have some late payments and too much debt. Its a vicious cycle. We can barely make our minimums because of all the changes, etc. What should we do?
What is the first step to getting our monthly payments down, how can we find someone to refinance our home…
Kathy”
The Answer:
Dear Kathy,
It is a vicious cycle. At this time lenders are being very particular about who to lend to.
If you have your heart set on a refi then the best bet would be to check with a mortgage broker that represents a number of different lending sources. This way they can match you up with a lender that might consider you. However, there is no guarantee of success with that route.
If your credit score is 660 or higher then you might want to try an alternative approach. What is you looked into a fixed rate unsecured debt consolidation loan from LendingClub.com and took the $25,000 highest interest ate debt and paid that off with the LendingClub.com loan. It may give you the breathing room you need for now, give you more time to make on-time payments and the LendingClub.com loan will be reported to the credit bureaus which can further increase your credit with more on-time payments?
If you do decide to go the LendingClub.com route, LendingClub is a peer-to-peer lending network and if you let me know I’d be happy to be one of the lenders that invests in your loan.
If you have a credit or debt question you’d like to ask just use the online form. I’m happy to help you totally for free.