How to Tell If Your VA Loan Officer is Legit

In this episode, Jennifer talks about how veterans can verify their loan officer truly understands VA mortgages. She shares critical "trick" questions to ask before you even apply, like inquiries about maximum seller credits, the significance of daycare expenses, and how to interpret a Certificate of Entitlement showing zero. Jennifer emphasizes that working with a knowledgeable loan officer is essential to fully utilize your VA benefits, avoid costly mistakes, and secure the best possible loan terms. Don't settle for subpar service!

Transcript

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You're a veteran and you're getting a VA mortgage, and you want to make sure the loan officer that you're working with actually knows what they're doing. Yep, that happens every single day. There are lots of loan officers out there that like to say they do VA, but they don't actually really know the program that well. So today I'm gonna share with you a few questions that you can ask up front before you even fill out an application to see if they actually know VA loans. This is really important because VA is one of those programs where if the loan officer knows it well, there's amazing things you can do. If the loan officer doesn't know it well, you can end up getting underapproved, meaning not getting properly approved for what you should. You can end up getting close to the finish line and then having your loan blow up, and you can end up not getting as much from the seller as you could have if your loan officer knew the rules. VA is one of the most magical loans out there. I say it all the time, but that's only if the loan officer knows what they're doing. Now, new to the channel, my team and I are one of the top uh purchase teams in America. If you have questions, if you want us to be your lender, give us a call, 786-933-2077. Yeah, we know VA. Okay, so number one question. What is the max closing cost credit and seller concession I can ask for? Seriously, get a pen, get a piece of paper. What is the max seller credit and seller concession I can ask for? Now, the answer is, well, with VA, you can ask the seller to pay all your closing costs as well as up to 4% in seller concessions. I will have a link in the description of this video that lays out what seller concessions can be. We use it a lot to pay off debt. That's what we usually use seller concessions for. Now, if a loan officer does not know VA, they're gonna say 4%. But that's not right, guys. It's all closing costs. That's your title, your escrow, your lender fee, uh, your appraisal, your uh portion of property, like there's so much in closing costs, right? Plus 4%. Do you see how them not knowing that, if they just said to you, you can get 4%, whoa, you just missed out on a whole pot of money right there. So I would usually start with that question. Even if you don't need closing costs, even if you don't want seller concessions, it's a great tell on if the loan officer knows what they're doing. If they don't, they'll say the max you can ask for is 4%. Period. Not true. Not true. Um, okay, the next one. Now, the next one, whether you have children or not, this is, and I'm giving you guys the ones that most loan officers get wrong. Here it is. Let's say you don't have kids. Okay, let's say I'm a veteran, I'm buying a house, I want to test out this loan officer. I don't have kids. I say, hey, yeah, you know, my friend Sally, she's thinking of getting a house, she has a couple kids, she pays for daycare. Does that matter with VA? If the loan officer goes, no, have Sally call me. Daycare doesn't matter with VA, wrong. VA is the only loan, we can say that together, wrong. VA is the only loan where we take into account daycare expenses into the residual income calculation. It's one of those niche guidelines that unless you do a lot of VA, you're gonna miss it. So if you have kids and if you pay daycare, you definitely wanna say, hey, like, do you need to know the daycare? And if they say no, it's not because they have a secret VA loan program, it's because they don't know. They might be qualifying you wrong, right? I'm not even talking correctly because I'm getting so excited about this. It's one of my big fears. You know, I'll constantly ask people, do you have daycare? Do you have daycare? Because it can really change the numbers. It can take an approved to a decline. So if you're a veteran, if you have children, if you pay for daycare, okay, very specific on that wording, yes, you need to tell us. So if the loan officer says, nah, that doesn't matter, they don't know VA. VA is the only loan program where it matters. Here's another one. Let's say this is your second or third time using VA. Say to the loan officer, my certificate of entitlement says zero. Does that mean I can't do VA anymore? If they say, oh, it says zero, yeah, you have no entitlement left then. Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. I've done other videos about this. Certificate of entitlements. Basically, Alice in Wonderland put together a special document for you to decode with your decoder ring. Look, just because it says zero does not mean you don't have entitlement left. You may have bonus entitlement. I see veterans with two, three, four, five houses, and they've used VA on all of them. So the trick to finding out if this loan officer knows what they're doing is you just say, hey, my COE says zero entitlement, does that mean I can't use VA anymore? If they say yes, you've got your answer, they don't know what they're doing, hang up. Now I want to be very specific. If on any of these questions the loan officer gets it wrong and you're a veteran, don't work with them. I I I it boggles my mind to this day when people choose to work with subpar loan officers. Guys, you're not getting a discount for their inexperience. Often you're paying more for worse service and less knowledge. So, really, really, really, like I am giving you the secrets here so that you can make a good decision, so you can maximize your benefit. And working with people who know what they're doing is part of that. Okay, let's do another one. Last one, because I don't want to do this video too long for you guys. If you're active duty, um, say, hey, can I use my housing allowance to qualify? Right? Now, look, some of you guys are watching this and you're like, of course I can, of course. There's some loan officers that don't think you can. Uh-huh. That's how people can end up getting pre-approved for a lot less than they were expecting. It's because the loan officers only using their base pay, they're not using their BAH. So if a loan officer says to you, well, we can't use BAH, they're wrong. Red flag, red flag, they don't know what they're doing. So those were the key questions that I would recommend asking. Those are kind of the trickier ones that we see loan officers get wrong. And look, I think it's totally fine to ask a loan officer any of these questions, all of these questions, before you fill out an application. For two reasons. Number one, before you let anybody run your credit, you need to make sure they're legit. Number two, see how they respond to the questions. If they're rude, if they're annoyed you're asking questions, guys, don't work with them, please. There are so many nice people that want to help you, even beyond my team. Like my team's super nice. They want to help you. Call us, call us. But there's so many nice loan officers in the VA space that know their stuff that want to help you. So just make sure you're working with someone that's willing to answer your questions and knows what they're doing.