3 Renovation Financing Broker Tips for Your Toolkit
Especially in competitive markets, your borrowers may not always find a home that comes with everything they want and need. With a renovation loan, your borrowers could expand their home search to include fixer-uppers or refinance their loan to fund upgrades to their current home. Either way, a renovation loan means just one set of closing costs, one hit to their credit, and one monthly payment to keep track of. To make the most of renovation financing opportunities, try our top three renovation financing broker tips.
3 Renovation Financing Broker Tips for Your Toolkit
- Understand the scope of each borrower’s renovations
- Promote energy-efficient upgrades
- Stay up to date on current renovation trends
Understand the scope of each borrower’s renovations
Not all reno projects are created alike, so it’s important to understand the scope of what your borrower has in mind for their home. This allows you to accurately match them to the best renovation home loan for their goals.
Promote energy-efficient upgrades
In some cases, your borrower may be able to qualify for more financing (and enjoy more tax benefits) if they use their renovation home loan for energy-efficient upgrades. As you help your borrowers find the best loan for their renovations, make sure you communicate that energy-efficient upgrades could help them save money now and in the future with lower utility bills. Popular upgrades that could qualify include installing solar panels, switching out old appliances with ENERGY STAR-rated replacements, and improving insulation.
Stay up to date on current renovation trends
If you want to promote home upgrades to your borrowers, make sure you’re providing relevant and timely examples of what’s possible with a renovation loan. For many homeowners, renovation loans are a way to achieve their desired home style for a lower cost than buying a home that already incorporates all the features they want. They might not be aware of the wide range of projects that a renovation loan could actually finance. While trends change, as a general rule you’ll want to make sure your borrowers know that their loan can fund upgrades that increase the home’s value the most.
Cardinal Financial Wholesale’s Renovation Products
Now that you’ve got your top three renovation financing broker tips in the bag, it’s time to get to know Cardinal Financial Wholesale’s renovation product suite. Whether your borrowers are purchasing a fixer-upper or upgrading their current home, renovation financing at Cardinal Financial Wholesale provides a smart and convenient path to achieve their goals.
FHA 203(k)
FHA 203(k) loans can help finance major and minor updates to an existing home. Our Standard and Limited programs make it easy to fund project and mortgage costs in one convenient loan.
CHOICERenovation®
Freddie Mac CHOICERenovation enables borrowers to purchase a home that may need repairs (or refinance the mortgage on their existing home) and include the renovation costs in the loan balance.
CHOICEReno eXPress®
Freddie Mac CHOICEReno eXPress is for homes in need of small-scale repairs. Like CHOICERenovation, this loan enables borrowers to include the necessary funds for renovations into the mortgage balance.
EasyPath Renovation
EasyPath Reno is a program that allows borrowers to roll mortgage and renovation costs together, without having to hire a contractor or make big purchases on a credit card. Designed for home updates completed through major retailers like The Home Depot, Lowe’s, and Menards, EasyPath can be used with our conventional renovation mortgages.
EasyPath highlights:
- Down payments as low as 3.5%
- Loan amount can be based on the projected value of the home after renovations
- Leverage the same interest rate as the home loan instead of borrower’s credit card
- Down payments as low as 3% to 5% for purchase transactions
- Purchase and refinance transactions are eligible
- Cardinal makes 100% payment to the retail store to purchase and install the project
- Fixed and adjustable rates available
Ready to reach more borrowers with Cardinal Financial Wholesale’s reno loan offering? Get in touch with our renovation team to learn more.
With a renovation loan, your borrowers could refinance their current loan to finance upgrades, or purchase a fixer-upper.
