Legit or not (mortgages)?

Quote from someone28624 : So I'm looking into refinancing my house right now. My current lender, Wells Fargo, offered me a 20 year mortgage at 3.5% with half a point. Decent, coming from my current 5.4% rate. My dad thought I should shop around a bit, so I have been. Dad found this website, mortgageloan.com, and submitted an inquiry. Since then I've had 3 banks call and talk to me. One of them, Federal Savings Bank, offered me a 20 year mortgage at 2.875% without points. This seems to good to be true. I haven't given them any info like my social security number yet. The website this person gave me is http://kellytolster.thefederalsav...fault.aspx. Is this legit?

It's hard to say w/o knowing your mortgage balance but that does seem too good to be true. I could give you that on a 15 but 20 seems notably higher. Check out www.provident.com or www.amerisave.com and see how those compare to what you're getting elsewhere.

IMO there is a lot of bait and switching going on at the moment so I would personally only go with companies I know about, or can find out about. I've gone through Amerisave, as have several people I work with, and all have had a great experience. Also know others here have gone through provident and had a similarly good experience.

I was in a similar situation at the beginning of the year. Had a WF Mortgage, wanted to refi, called them they were not very competitive. Started shopping online and found that most of the places with the super low rates, had huge closing costs and other fees. They were also very pushy sales people who would not run rough info for me without giving them my SSN. I wanted basic things like my credit is X, here is the zip code, my balance, and I wanted rates and an estimate of closing costs and most could not deliver. I found a local bank who ended up having rates nearly as low as online, and the cheapest closing costs I could find. They also gave me estimates. The process was smooth and it was great.

So my advice is shop around, and look at all fees, not just rates. Don't count the local guys out either until you have checked.

http://joemetzler.com/predatory.htm

2.875% with no points on a 20 year is BS. Even if they sell direct to Fannie/Freddie, there's no way. I'm at 3.375% today on my 20 year with no points and that's pretty competitive.

As their 30 Fixed rate is 3.99% on their website ( https://secure.thefederalsavingsb...ly-now.php), I am guessing their 20 Fixed is 3.875% and not 2.875%.

Plus, their site showing 3.99% for a 30 Fixed is not competitive at all (and should be in the 3.625% area to be considered good).

For a company that claims to be "a leading web-based mortgage lender" their web site has little to be desired and the link is a boilerplate page that inserts a loan officer and mini-application conduit.

Boomancini's rate of 3.375% on a 20 is indeed competitive and I cannot see doing it any lower either.
The rate of 2.875% is in line for a Fixed 10 Year or 3.00% for a Fixed 15 Year, but definitely not a Fixed 20. (Plus keep in mind that the loan amount, Loan To Value and Credit Score all have an impact on your pricing.)

-Adam
Old Hippy & Mortgage Pro