Clay County Vibes: South State Bank-Home Mortgages

 Thinking about upgrading to a new home or buying your very first one?

Join us for the latest edition of Clay County Vibes as representatives from SouthState Bank  take the mystery out of applying for a mortgage. Mortgage Banker Wayne Auxier and VP/Branch Manager Michele Riley sit down with Host Mike Cella to discuss your next step in successfully obtaining a mortgage and home ownership.

 Clay County Vibes on ClayRadio: Tuesday, Thursday & Saturday  12 PM & 5 PM

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Coming up next here on Clay Radio, it is Clay County Vibe. Hi, this is Mike Teller. I'll be your host as today we're talking money, mortgages, and making that dream home a reality. We'll be joined in the studio by Michelle Riley, Vice President and Branch Manager of Southstake Bank on Kingsley Avenue in Orange Park, along with mortgage banker Wayne Auccher, also with Southstake Bank. Wayne will be covering all the bases for those of you thinking about buying real estate and what it takes to secure a mortgage in today's market. This is Clay Radio, and you're listening to Clay County Vibes. We'll get started with Wayne and Michelle coming up right after this. My name is Mike Stella, and this is the program that uh tells you a little bit about what's happening in our community. And today uh we do have some folks with us in the studio that I'd like to introduce, then we'll uh talk at length with them in regards to uh home mortgages and some banking and those kind of things. So uh make sure if you're in that market uh place you should uh pay attention because we'll uh uncover some uh good information here for you here this afternoon. All right. So from South State Bank, we have Michelle Riley, the Vice President, branch manager of the uh Orange Park branch. Michelle, it's so great to have you here in the studio.

SPEAKER_00 1:21

Thank you so much, Mike. Glad to be here.

SPEAKER_01 1:23

Good to see you. And uh we're gonna get some contact info and and uh also find out a little bit more about your branch there on uh Kingsley coming up in just a little bit. Also, we have with us uh Wayne Aukshier, right? Is that correct? That is correct. Excellent. Um he's a mortgage brewer, that is, with the South State Bank, and uh he's gonna give us some some tips on what to uh to do if you're in the marketplace or think you're in the marketplace for a mortgage, uh, some steps you can take even without applying for a mortgage to start with, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:50

That is correct, Mike. Well, we like we like to get folks started ahead of time before they find that dream home so that they know they can uh you know secure the financing for it.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

And many realtors, we're not gonna get into to realty at uh this point, but a lot of realtors will tell you that it's best to have all your ducks in a row when you make that offer, it's gonna be a stronger offer for you and a better possibility that you uh you score that particular property.

SPEAKER_02 2:13

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 2:14

Yeah, terrific. All right. So let's talk to uh Michelle uh to start with, because uh your branch is uh located on Kingsley in Orange Park, and it is the only branch in Clay County, and uh that gives people a little bit of a different perspective on your bank than what may be the reality.

SPEAKER_00 2:30

That is correct, Mike. Yes. We are a regional bank. Um, even though we look like we have a small footprint having the one location in Clay, we are located in multiple states: Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Texas, and Colorado. And therefore, you know, we have a uh large presence which gives us the ability to offer amazing banking experiences for our clients.

SPEAKER_01 2:57

Although you have only the one branch in Clay County, there's numerous other branches in the county surrounding Clay, right?

SPEAKER_00 3:02

Correct. Duval, St. John's, Putnam, all the way down to Key West. Yeah. All the way out to Tampa and through the panhandle.

SPEAKER_01 3:10

And of course, uh, in this day and age, you don't necessarily have to visit the uh the branch office anymore, right?

SPEAKER_00 3:16

Correct, yeah. Mobile banking.

SPEAKER_01 3:17

Yeah, that's fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 3:18

Mobile deposits. I mean, anything you could possibly want to do online, you can pretty much do it these days.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

And then out of uh Orange Park, you have the full service that uh folks can enjoy, whether they're uh just a customer or a business customer or what have you. Correct.

SPEAKER_00 3:32

Yes. We love to see our customers, even though they have the online capabilities, come on in, say hi, get a free cookie on Fridays. We bake them fresh right there in the branch.

SPEAKER_01 3:42

Yeah, that's great. That's uh one of the few branches that uh you make a special trip to uh to visit. And then of course, uh you know, at various times there's there's always candy out. It's just uh like uh going home again.

SPEAKER_00 3:53

That's right. Yes. Make it warm and inviting.

SPEAKER_01 3:56

Yeah, that's terrific. I for I forget about the cookies. I'm gonna have to take you up on that.

SPEAKER_02 4:00

It's Friday. What time do we close today?

SPEAKER_01 4:03

Wayne saying you're you're cutting into cookie time now. Uh so Wayne, you're uh a mortgage broker uh with South State. Uh how long have you been uh doing that?

SPEAKER_02 4:11

Well, I've been, I will say I'm a mortgage banker. Uh yeah. Uh mortgage broker would be shopping out to other shops. We are a direct lender at South State Bank. Um been in the mortgage business uh for almost two years on the lending side, but mortgage-wise, I have almost 13 years of experience um throughout the industry in various different roles.

SPEAKER_01 4:31

So you've you've seen a lot when it comes to mortgages.

SPEAKER_02 4:34

From start to finish, we've seen pretty much everything.

SPEAKER_01 4:36

Yeah, terrific. All right. So uh let's talk a little bit about uh folks that may be uh interested in in eventually getting a mortgage. Maybe they're shopping around just uh casually as to you know what what the price of homes are, what they're able to afford, what they aren't able to afford. There's going to be some questions generated by those thoughts, right? Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_02 4:54

Absolutely. So where do we start? Well, the first question that I like to ask people is, or they will ask me, they'll say, Am I ready to buy a home? Sometimes comes up a lot. Um and kind of put the onus back on them and we start asking them the questions. So, you know, do you feel that your job is stable? Um, that your income, you know, relatively stable, not likely to change over the next couple of years. Um what are your plans with the home? Um are you planning on residing there for the at least the next three to five years is what makes sense. Um and then ideally, if you've saved some money, usually on the order of around three to five thousand dollars, then that's kind of your jumping off point to say, Hey, I need to consider buying a home. Um really the being there three to five years, you're able to build up some equity and build that wealth. Um, but then we start that conversation after that and say, All right, where are you comfortable with the payment? What are you paying now? We and we, you know, go down that road.

SPEAKER_01 5:56

Yeah, so that you get all those particulars, obviously, and you start building a profile, a financial profile that uh you're gonna need at some point to be able to uh make that application for mortgage, and and the realtor will need that as well because a lot of people want that uh information to know what kind of a buyer they're dealing with.

SPEAKER_02 6:12

Absolutely. Um you know, and uh it's not just about a home loan, you know, that's not the glamorous part of it. It's how does it fit into your financial profile? Um if you are planning on this being your forever home, that might be a different loan product than somebody who says, Well, I really only live in homes for about five years before I move. So um, you know, it just we try to tailor our solutions and products to the best needs of the customer, and that is part of uncovering what works best for them.

SPEAKER_01 6:43

Right. I was gonna ask you about that. Uh essentially, uh we're talking j pretty generically at this point in time, but uh there are a number of different uh uh programs that people can get involved in. We're talking maybe about somebody that's just getting into the mortgage uh market, but uh somebody that uh has had a mortgage in the past or has one now and need to pay it off when they sell their home, they may need a whole different set of uh information, right?

SPEAKER_02 7:05

Exactly. And there's products that we can help, what they actually call bridge that gap um and just how do we structure that deal, that transaction, um, if if we need to sell, if we don't need to sell, um do you own other properties and all that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_01 7:20

All right. And so when you're looking at the the profile, um you're also looking at not uh just uh uh revenues uh coming in in terms of uh how much they make, but also their debt, right?

SPEAKER_02 7:31

That is correct. One of the big terms or acronyms that's thrown around is debt to income or DTI. So there's two numbers to that, um, but we calculate that based on what is on your credit reports and your income. Um and we basically come up with a number. Um rough estimate, we can do it very easily. Um if somebody makes five thousand dollars a month, we want to do a rough estimate, usually keep them under 50% debt to income. That means all of their debts couldn't be any higher than $2,500 a month. Um say you have a car payment of $500 a month after that, we've got $2,000 left, and we could probably look at a mortgage payment of about $2,000.

SPEAKER_01 8:13

All right. And uh you mentioned DTI, okay. Is that number higher than it used to be?

SPEAKER_02 8:18

That number has increased higher than it used to be. There's a lot more flexibility with that nowadays. Um, but the old school rule of trying to stay under 40 percent uh is where we'd like to be, but we can push that number a little bit higher.

SPEAKER_01 8:32

Yeah, and the whole purpose for asking that uh that particular info for that information is the fact that uh you don't want people to get in over their head in terms of what they've got to be paying out.

SPEAKER_02 8:41

Oh, absolutely not. We do not want anybody to be house poor, and that kind of leads into one of our conversations of what can I actually afford? So you may be paying most people may be paying rent right now and looking to get into the housing market. We want them to continue to live the lifestyle that they are living. Um, whether that is, you know, concerts, social events, um, do you like to eat out a lot or are you a home cook, those sorts of things. Um we don't want you to buy a house and then be living on hot dogs and macaroni and cheese until we you know and feel like you made a mis a financial mistake by doing so.

SPEAKER_01 9:21

Yeah, you don't want to be digging yourself a hole even before you get into uh into owning the property and having to pay back that mortgage, right? Correct. So that's good. All right, we're talking with Wayne Aukshir. He's a mortgage banker with South State Bank, and Michelle Riley, vice president, president uh and branch manager of the uh branch in Orange Park, and uh we're talking uh specifically uh about mortgages and and how people qualify mortgages and and uh how they uh uh look into those uh uh particular uh programs. And uh, you know, this is where Wayne is uh the expert here, and we're gonna ask him a little bit uh one of the things you mentioned, uh the two-word special uh two words is credit report. Credit report, yes. A lot of people hear a lot of things about credit reports.

SPEAKER_02 10:01

Yes. So sort it all out for us. So first and foremost, I want to make sure that everybody does know that they are entitled to a free copy of their credit report once a year from all the credit bureaus. Um they can pick that up at annualcreditreport.com. Um now, while it won't give you a credit score, it will let you check and make sure that everything that is reporting on your credit is accurate. So if you see anything that's on there that you don't recognize or maybe a discrepancy on an account, that is your opportunity to reach out to that creditor, that trade line holder, that bank, and say, hey, I need to get this straightened out. Um we just don't make sure that you don't have anything that's erroneous on that credit report. And that is again, that is annual creditreport.com. It is a hundred percent free to every single person.

SPEAKER_01 10:54

All right. And so uh the the important thing to remember about the credit report is that it can be corrected if there's wrong entry on it, right? I mean it may take some time to be able to do that.

SPEAKER_02 11:03

That is correct, yes. And there is a process that you would want to reach out to the credit bureaus that can help with that as well. Um, but that is something that you would want to do before you apply for a mortgage or any other loan for that matter, um, and just making sure that information is correct. Um it's gonna help in terms of your pre-qualification, pre-approval, um, just make a smoother process for you. It's not a bad it's not a bad habit to get into once a year to just make sure that it's you know nothing popped up on there that you don't recognize.

SPEAKER_01 11:34

Yeah, my wife and I were in that situation. We had uh sold a house, bought another house, and the uh closing almost didn't take place because they were looking for satisfy uh satisfaction of the previous mortgage, which had been satisfied, but it hadn't been reported. So that was uh one of those things where it took a little bit of time to get the paperwork going back and forth and finally uh it was you know uh resolved. But uh that that's something that could could be there. Absolutely. Yeah. Mistakes are made, not all the time, but uh sometimes, and and that gives you an opportunity to uh get that uh corrected. Uh will that also impact your uh your credit report in terms of increasing the uh the the score if you did have something that was wrong or something that was not uh totally correct on your uh report?

SPEAKER_02 12:16

You so yeah, it depends on everybody's credit profit what it is. Everybody's credit profile is different. Um and the credit score is made up of various things, um on-time payment history, your utilization of credit, um the his the history of your credit, the length of your credit, the type of credit that you have. So there's no one you know blanket answer for that. Um I also want folks to not understand or understand that uh credit inquiries are usually the smallest portion of what makes up your credit score. So I wouldn't be concerned about uh is the lender gonna do what they call a hard pull into my credit. Um that usually makes up the smallest percentage. Um you know, so don't worry about that. Um it's just a necessary step in the mortgage process that when you get pre-approved, they're gonna do a hard inquiry to get that credit score.

SPEAKER_01 13:12

Okay. Yeah. And uh Michelle, we're we got you sitting here all by our loans. We have not ignored you, but we've been into uh credit reports and all that kind of thing. But uh if somebody's interested in getting information about South State Bank and the mortgage, do they have to reach out directly to uh to Wayne or can they get it at the branch office as well?

SPEAKER_00 13:30

Yeah, they can call the branch, come by the branch, also go to our website. Uh Wayne and I work really closely together. And um if if they are interested in a mortgage, they can come see us and we can put them in touch with Wayne very easily.

SPEAKER_01 13:44

Not that we want anybody to ignore Wayne either, but uh just making sure that everybody has uh an idea where they go to get the information and uh be able to start that process. All right, we're gonna take a quick time out, uh, but uh we'll have more with uh Wayne and uh Michelle and we'll find out a little bit more about the the process of uh actually applying for that mortgage and and sort of uh the steps that uh go into all of that until you end up closing and move into your house. And uh we'll uh do that coming up next. Uh you're listening to uh Clay County Vibes here on Clay Radio. If you are interested in uh getting a hold of us uh here at the radio station, you can do so at clay radioonline.com. Once again, clay radioonline.com. Clay County Vibes is heard on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays at noon and at 5 p.m. And uh this uh particular show will air on uh June 2nd, June 4th, and June 6th. So uh keep that in mind and uh hopefully uh you'll tune in for uh at least one of those episodes, if not more than one. If you missed something, you can always uh listen again, and that's why we uh run them uh in terms of the repeats. All right, so uh timeout here. More with Clay County Vibes on Clay Radio coming up after this. Once again, welcome back here to uh Clay County Vibes here on Clay Radio. Mike Seller with you. And of course, if you are interested in uh getting a hold of us, uh the best way to do that is uh online uh at the Gmail account. It's uh ClayRadioOnline at gmail.com. I may not have uh uh done that before. Clayradioonline at gmail.com. All right, so uh we have guests in the studio with us here today. Michelle Riley is vice president, branch manager for South State Bank in Orange Park. Michelle, once again, and if you listen to the uh station on a regular basis, and we hope you do, you may have heard Michelle's voice uh doing the commercials for uh South State Bank. Great job on that, too.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 15:29

Terrific. All right, and uh with her uh is uh Wayne Aukser. Wayne is a mortgage banker with South State Bank and has uh many years of experience in the banking business, and we've been talking mortgages, which is what uh Wayne specializes in. And you know, we talked a little bit about credit reports.

SPEAKER_02 15:45

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 15:46

But sort of in a generic sense, but uh it it does come down to a specific score, though, that is what is counted when you apply for a mortgage, right?

SPEAKER_02 15:54

It is, yes. So minimum score is a 580. That is usually what I call your ticket to the ballgame. Um will get you in the door um and keep things kind of rolling along. Somebody who may have top-tier credit we consider around a 780 and above, um, but anywhere in there is a approvable score or at least off the jump. All right, so 580 to 780 is uh is gonna be pretty good. Well, uh we would like uh you know, six fifty, six eighty, we're getting into the better range. Uh but you know, somebody that may have some marks on their credit from in the past, uh I would say don't shy away because you feel like you've had something in the past. Um you know, a 580 is something that may be approvable.

SPEAKER_01 16:40

Um but but there may be some work that needs to be done prior to to uh having a successful mortgage with a 580 score.

SPEAKER_02 16:48

That is correct. Just because you have that score does not guarantee that we can do a mortgage transaction.

SPEAKER_01 16:54

Right. But uh at that point then you're able to also tell them maybe that there's uh maybe there's a mark on the credit that uh they find is wrong or something else maybe. Exactly. Maybe they don't have great credit but they have a very high income. Does that balance it out at all? Or sometimes we can take it helps.

SPEAKER_02 17:10

Um the other thing is we can look at credit modeling. Um and are we do have options that will show us, hey, where can you improve, depending on what the situation may be, how many how much funds that you may be available to use towards something of that nature. Um we can help get your credit up to an approvable letter level if we do find that it is not there to begin with.

SPEAKER_01 17:31

And uh that may be as as simple as maybe they have too many credit cards?

SPEAKER_02 17:35

Could be.

SPEAKER_01 17:36

They're not used, but they have the access to be able to run those credit cards up.

SPEAKER_02 17:41

Uh true. They might be an authorized user on an account that they may not know about. So all sorts of scenarios could be you know lead to um sometimes it's no work or no money to get that credit score up. Other times they may have to pay things off. Um it would help you know improve that score.

SPEAKER_01 17:56

Okay. So uh we've got uh the numbers as far as those are concerned. Is that the first thing that you look at?

SPEAKER_02 18:01

Well, when we apply, the first thing that we look at is you know, we want to know what do you do for a living, what sort of assets do you have on hand? Assets, income, um, credit is the other piece to that. So we're gonna take all of those things and put them together and paint the picture for the borrower as to what sort of home loan may fit best for you, what may you be able to afford. And what about uh if they're a cosigner on something? How does that impact their application? So if they're a co-signer and it is on their credit report, we do have to take that into account. Um there are certain situations where we may be able to exclude that debt if we can show that somebody else has been paying on it for a certain amount of time. Um each individual's situation is a little bit different.

SPEAKER_01 18:48

Okay. So what you're saying essentially is that uh you know, no two mortgage applications are probably going to be alike.

SPEAKER_02 18:55

That is that's an understatement.

SPEAKER_01 18:56

And so so that uh makes uh makes it a challenge then as you go looking through those things to check all those boxes off and uh maybe some uh other things that uh enter into the application.

SPEAKER_02 19:06

Absolutely. It's always a puzzle that we're trying to put together. Um so the more information that we get up front, the better off, the easier that it is. I know sometimes it does sound like a lot, uh, but we like to get that heavy lifting done up front so that if you do find that home and you're under contract, we're not asking for, you know, more and more bank statements and you know, hey, I need extra pay pay stubs and that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_01 19:29

Yeah. And in terms of uh moving forward, would they then at the end of this application process, would they then be able to get a letter of commitment from uh from the bank up to a certain level of spending?

SPEAKER_02 19:42

That is exactly right. And that's what they're looking to do, and that's what our realtor partners look for as well. Uh with a pre-approval letter. Um so that means we have checked your credit, we've verified your assets, we've verified your income, and you are free to go shopping for a home that is in X price range, X dollar amount. Kind of work into that number with some estimates of taxes, insurance, um, and build, like I said, paint that picture, build that file, and come up with a price range that they can shop again, each individual borrower, their certain needs. There's a bunch of different type of loans that are out there. So I mean we can delve into that. I know there's a lot of questions about that.

SPEAKER_01 20:18

All right. And in terms of that the letter of commitment, that doesn't necessarily mean that you automatically, you know, walk in and get the money. There's still a process that has to be done, right? I and I I would think that that whether the beginning uh or first-time uh application for them or a mini-term application down there for somebody who's had mortgages, that that is still a source of confusion, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 20:39

It can be, yes. So even though you do have a pre-approval letter, um you still have the property has to uh meet all the guidelines of the loan program. The loan still has to go to underwriting for review. So they still are the ultimate sign-off on those asset statements, those income documents, and all those uh items. But from our initial review, we do our best to make sure that we dot all the I's and cross all the T's. If I did it every time, I'd be an underwriter. Um But uh yeah, we just we make sure, do our best to make sure that we got every all the documentation that we needed. And but yes, the process does occur after you uh sign a contract on a property, and that process from contract to finish is usually about 30 to 45 days.

SPEAKER_01 21:26

Okay, and as part of that process, that's also when they're gonna be doing uh appraisals of the property, also inspections, those kind of things.

SPEAKER_02 21:33

That is correct. Once you're under contract, is the clock is ticking, the bank orders the appraisal. You obviously want to make sure that you do any home inspections to make sure that the property is up to snuff. You're not hopefully not going to have any surprise repairs that pop up on you. Also, that's the time when we were going to need to get homeowners insurance uh ready to go for when you uh take ownership of the home. Um so there's a lot of moving parts that go on. Um, I'll be honest, there's times when herd Hurdles pop up and we just find out, figure out ways to get over those hurdles throughout the process.

SPEAKER_01 22:07

Very good. All right, we're uh talking with folks from uh South State Bank here this afternoon or this evening or this morning, whenever you might be uh watching uh our programs run so many different times and repeats that uh folks can pick them up at various times. So when you say good morning, you're really saying all those other things too. But uh Michelle Riley is the vice president and branch manager at the uh Kingsley uh Avenue office in Orange Park. And uh, Michelle, how does somebody get a hold of uh your branch?

SPEAKER_00 22:32

Well, they are more than welcome to stop by. 1440 Kingsley Avenue is our location. We love to see our customers. They are always welcome to call. Our direct number is 904-541-3900. They are also welcome to visit our website, southstatebank.com.

SPEAKER_02 22:52

All right, very good. And uh, Wayne, how does somebody get a hold of you? Well, the easiest way to get a hold of me is calling 904-322-0398 is my direct line. Uh, email is also the other best way. Um Wayne W-A-Y-N-E dot aukshire, A-U-X-I-E-R at southstatebank.com.

SPEAKER_01 23:13

Terrific. All right, and uh, we'll also uh be repeating that again if somebody is interested in uh jotting it down. They didn't get to the pencil and paper fast enough or what have you. Now uh one of the words that you mentioned was uh uh different programs, I guess or a couple of words, but numerous different types of uh mortgages that uh that are out there in the marketplace, and depending upon your standing, maybe one may be better than another. How do you determine that?

SPEAKER_02 23:36

So we're gonna take a look at the borrower profile and what their goals are to begin with. There is no one loan program that is inherently better or worse than any other loan program. Um they all serve the purpose of getting folks into homes. Um it just w depends on what may work best for each individual borrower. Conventional is a term that you may hear a lot. Um that is 70% of the mortgages originated in the United States are a conventional mortgage. Um there are also FHA mortgages. Um, those are generally for folks that may have had a a mark on their credit in the past, um, but they have some advantages and disadvantages over conventional mortgages. Sometimes there's lower down payment requirements, um, and you can stretch a debt-to-income ratio on an FHA mortgage more so than you can a conventional mortgage. Uh other types that are out there, we do have a VA mortgage for veterans, uh, active duty or spouses of veterans. Um again, advantages, it's 100% financing, which means you can buy a home with no down payment. Also, there are USDA mortgages that's in the rural areas. Those do come with some income restrictions that are on those. And then also within all of that, there are fixed rate and adjustable rate mortgages. Um a fixed rate is what most people opt for. It's a stable um up to 30 years, it won't change your interest rate over that time period. An adjustable rate has a fixed period. We start off with usually between three and ten years of a fixed period, and then that rate can adjust uh whether that be up or down. Now the advantage of that is if you plan on living in that home for a shorter period of time, you can sometimes take advantage of a lower interest rate. So again, when you speak to a borrower, that's kind of what you're trying to determine which one of these loan products may be the best fit for them.

SPEAKER_01 25:32

Right. And uh can they do that just under one application? So will you then make that recommendation that they maybe look at another one if it looks like they might be able to save a little money in terms of their monthly uh mortgage payment?

SPEAKER_02 25:44

Absolutely. So when we do the pre-approval, we are, as I like to tell my clients, we are playing in a sandbox. Um we are just moving things around, and if we don't like the way things look, let's take a look at this other option. Would you consider this? Um and we're just kind of playing with numbers to see what might work best for them and give the borrower the option. At the end of the day, the borrower is the boss. Right. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 26:10

Uh we're gonna take a time out here, but when we come back, maybe we'll talk a little bit about the fact that um not only just the the revenues and the payback of the mortgage is something you've got to consider, but there's some other things that factor into uh buying a house, something like, well, I don't know, property taxes, uh insurances, uh HOA or CDD uh uh charges. So we'll talk a little bit about how that factors in as well. Uh we're talking with the the folks from uh South State Bank, Wayne Aukshir, the mortgage uh banker, here with us, giving us uh answers to a lot of questions about what uh happens when you want to go apply for a mortgage to buy a house, and Michelle Riley, vice president branch manager, who reminded us earlier in the segment that it's Friday, so they have cookies at uh the branch on uh Kingsley Avenue every Friday.

SPEAKER_00 26:54

Fresh baked in the morning.

SPEAKER_01 26:56

Done. We're out. We're we're headed off to uh Kingsley. Collect those cookies. All right. So uh we're back with more here on uh Clay County Vibes on Clay County Radio, and we're back with more after this. Hey, welcome back to Clay County Vibes here on Clay Radio. My name is Mike Tella. Good to have you with us. If you are interested in getting a hold of us, please do drop us a line on Gmail. It's uh Clay RadioOnline at gmail.com. Once again, Clay RadioOnline at gmail.com. We're visiting with folks from the uh South State Bank. Michelle Riley is the vice president and branch manager of uh the branch on uh Kingsley in Orange Park, and we've got Wayne Aukshir, the uh mortgage banker who's been kind enough to give us some time today to talk uh all about uh mortgages. Uh and we've been primarily looking at uh a lot of uh I don't want to say beginner kind of mortgages, but uh folks that maybe not had a mortgage or maybe didn't have uh mortgage that was in their name or something to the effect of those kind of things. And so uh we're still uh working on that. And of course, uh Michelle's been telling us a little bit about uh the wonderful things that happened at her branch office, especially on Fridays with the uh freshly baked cookies. You know, I get a big swamp of uh people coming in there. They're gonna be uh looking for those.

SPEAKER_00 28:12

Yes, Fridays are definitely our busiest days.

SPEAKER_01 28:15

Yeah, no reason to think otherwise with uh with cookies there. All right. So uh you had a good point uh during the break that you mentioned, and maybe you'd like to ask uh Wayne that question.

SPEAKER_00 28:24

Yeah, for sure. So uh Wayne, I live out in the Lake Asbury area, which is booming with new construction. South State Bank does offer construction of permanent loans. It could be. And I would love to learn more about that.

SPEAKER_02 28:36

So yeah, so we've been talking a lot about the traditional mortgage that people think of. There are options for, I guess I will call it non-conventional mortgages. Um construction to permanent being one of those items. So if you do have uh, you know, a builder in mind and a dream home that you want to build on some land, um, that is something that we do. Um outside of that, we also have a lot loan program. Um so if you just want to buy vacant land, maybe you're thinking about building your home in the next year or two, um, but you find that parcel of land you want to build on, uh, you can secure that now with financing. Um have doctor loan programs as well. So anybody in the medical professional field, um, you know, certain professions are able to access that doctor loan at you know better uh better terms than maybe a conventional mortgage construction-wise, but yeah, we work with builders. Um, everything is kind of a seamless integration. Um and uh, you know, it kind of rolls, it's a one-time closing where we roll into a fully amortizing mortgage once your construction period is over. Um, and we've helped folks with that as well from Jacksonville Beach all the way out to Putnam County. So work with builders all over the area. Construction loan, is that different than a bridge loan? That is different than a bridge loan. A bridge loan is uh on your existing home taking out equity uh in order to buy a new home. It is a yeah, a bridge loan is a short-term loan. A construction to permanent loan is a full 30-year loan.

SPEAKER_01 30:08

Okay, so if you're in a house and you're you're you bought your uh land and your building on that, uh that would be a bridge loan if you had to take out uh equity from your existing home to to uh pay for that.

SPEAKER_02 30:18

And you yeah, you wanted to do a short term and uh make a down payment, maybe uh on a new property.

SPEAKER_01 30:25

And uh uh how uh extensive is uh taking out a bridge loan for somebody?

SPEAKER_02 30:30

Well, I'll have to defer to Michelle because our bridge loans are actually done by our branches. Oh, okay. Yes. Sorry, I didn't mean to throw you uh into the mix here, Michelle.

SPEAKER_00 30:38

That's okay. Yeah, so we use the equity, like we were saying, in the existing home that they're currently residing in, it's got to be the primary residence. Take that equity, it makes an amazing down payment. So if you have $100,000 worth of equity that allows you to put that into a new property, the home of your dreams, once you sell that house, you pay it off.

SPEAKER_01 30:56

Uh one of the things that we talked about a bit is uh the uh other factors that are included in your debt to income ratio. Didn't talk about all the expenses, and part of those expenses are are what we call the the big T-word taxes, right? Taxes, insurance, yep. So those those are things that people have to be aware of because they they're gonna be responsible for paying them as well.

SPEAKER_02 31:16

That is correct. When you buy a home, those are thing costs that come along with it. So when we're qualifying you on a mortgage payment, we're not only qualifying you on the principal and interest based on your loan amount and interest rate, we also have to factor in the property taxes for the property that you're looking to buy, homeowner's insurance, because you are required to carry homeowners insurance. Also, you may be subject to a homeowner's association. So while that is not part of your payment uh on a mortgage basis, we do have to factor that in because it is tied to the property.

SPEAKER_01 31:48

And so that also goes uh with not only HOAs, but uh also in our area we've got a number of CDDs too, community development districts, which uh actually becomes uh collected as part of your uh property taxes uh that comes from the the county, although it gets uh you know funneled off to the CDD, but uh they they still collect it. Correct. Right. And uh so that that can make a big difference in terms of what uh somebody can afford if uh that is uh truly, you know, you start adding all those things in.

SPEAKER_02 32:16

It does. And sometimes folks are uh taken aback by that, uh, but we just try to paint the whole picture for them and say, hey, this is what your principal and interest would be. We're gonna do our best to estimate the insurance taxes. Once we have a property, we obviously have the taxes that are on record for that property. Um now, those are items that we would call escrowed items. Um so folks do have the option, depending on the loan program, that if they feel comfortable paying those on their own once a year, they are able to do that. Uh again, it's not for every borrower, not for every loan program. Um, but do be aware that we do have to factor those costs in whether or not you escrow for those items or not.

SPEAKER_01 32:57

All right. One of the other things that we haven't talked about is uh included in that is uh uh maintenance and repairs. Is there a specific number that you used as a part of the formula in terms of uh you know taking care of the property? Obviously that's not included as part of the uh the mortgage process, but uh certainly in your debt-to-income ratio, that's a number that they've got to be aware of, right?

SPEAKER_02 33:18

Well, it's not anything that we take into account in qualifying for a mortgage. Um, but we certainly would like folks to have a safety net, a security fund there if an unexpected expense pops up. Um there is an old school rule of thumb for about you know three months of of home expenses in a secure savings account. Um I can think of a bank that might be able to open one up for you. Um so but yeah, uh it is advisable. If you're looking to purchase a home, there are expenses that can pop up from time to time, um, and having a safety net there is definitely a great idea.

SPEAKER_01 33:59

Yeah. All right. Let's talk a little bit about uh the the process itself in terms of uh the uh paperwork that you're gonna need to fill that mortgage out to verify those numbers that you're giving uh to the bank as as you move along. So what what kind of things are we looking to?

SPEAKER_02 34:14

Uh same as uh you would for your taxes or well a very basic high-level view. Somebody that is a what I call a W-2 earner earns a paycheck. Um we're gonna look for two years of W-2s, we're gonna look for sixty days worth of your most recent bank statements and thirty days of your most recent pay stuffs. Uh-huh. That's kind of the basic vanilla, what do I need starting forward? It's not a whole lot of documentation, but it's gonna allow us to develop a revenue stream or an income stream and document your assets.

SPEAKER_01 34:48

Uh uh if somebody's getting part of those assets as a gift from somebody, mom or dad, or somebody are giving you how does that work into the factor of uh all these numbers you're dealing with?

SPEAKER_02 34:58

So we just have to document what that gift is. We you do need to know the amount, and then we'll just trace that into your bank statements wherever they may be giving it. Another option is to give that gift at closing at the settlement, so you can do that then. So that is part of one of the pitfalls of mortgages is we don't like to see large deposits on your bank statements. Um, if they're there, they need it would need to be explained. So that's one thing we try to avoid is uh, you know, part of the pitfalls of mortgages, large deposits, job changes, moving money around a lot. You kind of want to settle your finances down uh at least for 60 days before applying for a mortgage. And is that what they uh refer to as seasoned? That is exactly correct.

SPEAKER_01 35:44

So it's you can tell I've had a few mortgages in my lifetime.

SPEAKER_02 35:49

Uh but but that's important, right? Because that is important. It makes uh underwriting the file and the approval process a lot easier um if there's not a lot of questions that are raised based on your financial um statements. All right. You were talking about financial statements. It's not just bank accounts, um, it could be retirement accounts, brokerage accounts. All those things can count towards your assets. Again, just depends on the the type of the account. What can we count? Um savings accounts, bonds, uh money market accounts, they can all count towards assets if you were to need them.

SPEAKER_01 36:26

All right. And as far as um finishing up uh our thoughts on uh mortgages and that kind of thing, uh what's the uh time frame that they should be looking at in terms of applying for a mortgage?

SPEAKER_02 36:37

So uh a simple loan pre-approval can sometimes be even done in less than 24 hours. Um other borrowers have a more complex profile and can take uh you know three to five days to get that. Uh it also depends on the information that we're able to obtain from the borrower. If there's missing information, we will come back and I say, hey, before I can issue this pre-approval, I need to get document X, Y, and Z. Um at that point, you're free to go shopping. Sometimes the shopping takes the longest part uh finding that home. So that you you might be out there waiting for that home to hit the market, as we talked about earlier. Then you, if you find that home, you go under contract. Sometimes it can be as short as 30 days until you're owner of that home and walking away with the keys.

SPEAKER_01 37:22

And uh, what about the um uh difference uh between maybe a fixer-up and uh and a home that's ready to move in and needs no repairs at all? It's uh prime uh real estate. Is there is there a mortgage that allows for that or the bank to allow for that?

SPEAKER_02 37:36

There is, as a matter of fact. So depending on the extensiveness of the repairs, we do have renovation loans um that can do anything from redoing a kitchen to installing a pool to if it the work is super extensive, we would need to look at a construction product, but we can use a construction product on an existing property if the renovations are uh you know of that nature.

SPEAKER_01 38:00

All right. So that uh it seems like uh you've uh got pretty much programmed for every circumstance.

SPEAKER_02 38:05

Well, you seem to think so.

SPEAKER_01 38:06

Yes. I'm sure there'll be somebody throwing something at you at some point uh that uh is unexpected. Anything else that uh either one of you want to uh throw out there?

SPEAKER_00 38:15

Well, Wayne, you talked about W 2 borrowers. I know we do uh lending for self-employed borrowers. Do you want to touch on that real quick?

SPEAKER_02 38:23

Yes, absolutely. So depending how you report self-let me back up. Self-employed borrowers are you know perfect candidates for home mortgages as well. I wouldn't want anybody to think that if I'm self-employed, I can't get a home mortgage. What we will need, depending on how your business is structured, uh, we're certainly going to need your personal tax returns. Uh, may also need business tax returns if you file those. Also, alternatively, there are some folks that maybe um don't want to show tax returns. Um so there are alternative qualifying income loans, such as bank statement loans, um, that are available out there as well. So whether you are a W-2 employee or self-employed, there are mortgage options that are out there for you. Terrific. All right.

SPEAKER_01 39:10

Uh, Wayne, why don't you tell us how we can get a hold of you again? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 39:14

Yeah, thank you, Mike. Uh, you can reach me um by phone 904-322-0398, text abled as well on that. Or you can reach out to us at Wayne.aukshire at southstatebank.com. That is W-A-Y-N-E. Southstatebank.com.

SPEAKER_01 39:36

Terrific. All right, that covers that. And Michelle, how do we get a hold of you?

SPEAKER_00 39:39

Well, I'd love for you to come see me at the branch up. Especially on Friday. Uh Cookie Day. 1440 Kingsley Avenue in Orange Park. I can also be reached 904-541-3900.

SPEAKER_01 39:53

All right, terrific. Well, uh, Wayne, Michelle, thanks so much for uh stopping by and uh uh helping us uh sort of unravel uh the uh aspects of uh going ahead and getting a mortgage and all the things that go into that. I hope folks that uh either they're seasoned uh uh mortgage uh getters or uh or uh new people to the uh the marketplace. I hope we answered a bunch of questions for you in regards to uh what it's like to go through that process and the different products that are available. Uh once again, uh Michelle Riley, thank you. And uh Wayne Aukser, thank you. We appreciate you uh joining us here in Clay County Vibes. And thank you for wherever you might be listening to us here today. Uh, we appreciate uh the fact that uh you tune in and spend some time with us here on Clay Radio. And of course, as always, you can get a hold of us at Clay Radio Online at gmail.com. Once again, this is Mike Seller. Go out and make it a great day. We'll talk to you again next time right here on Clay Radio.