Posted by River City on November 17, 2004 at 07:27:28:
Your best bet would have been to go to a mortgage company and have a mortgage originator pre-qualify you for a loan. Normally co-signers do not help poor credit. Co-signers help improve ratios of income vs debt. $45,000 is a lot of money to put down on a loan. You don’t indicate the area you live in (state), so I don’t have any idea as to the value of the homes in that state. You might would not have qualified for a $200,000 home, but you might would have qualified for a lesser home putting down that much. I certainly would not have handed someone $45,000 and not have my name on the title.
If your sister/brother actually used someone elses name in obtaining the loan, they are now involved in a case of identity theft and there are serious consequences, whether or not the other person decides to prosecute. If the lender finds out about it, this loan is history and you are all in big trouble.
Just remember that mortgages are backed by the United States government. When you commit fraud against the mortgage company, you are committing fraud against the U.S. government and they can fine and imprison you and anyone else involved in the fraud. The mortgage loan application has this statement on it above where the applicant signs his/her name.
I once processed a mortgage loan where the applicant altered his divorce decree to indicate that he didn’t pay child support. I found it kind of strange since the child lived with the wife and the child was in elementary school, so I called his attorney and verified that he did in fact pay child support. The funny thing about it was that he qualified with the child support payment. There was no need for the fraud.
People are so strange…Is committing fraud to purchase a house worth the risk of going to prison?