create your own

Buying a House After Filing Bankruptcy

66
rate or flag this page

By skitterdude


Buying a house after filing bankruptcy is very possible after only a single year. After two years, lender will often disregard your bankruptcy, meaning you will get standard (good) interest rates on your mortage.

Getting a house after bankruptcy really depends on how long you are willing to wait. The two year mark is quite important if you want to get the good interest rate on a mortgage. The idea is to qualify for a conventional loan for your home – and with two years of pristine credit history after bankruptcy; your bankruptcy becomes irrelevant to financial companies.

Look at Your Credit Report

Before you apply for a loan, you should check your credit report; after all, the credit companies will be looking at it. You can buy your credit report online instantly from many companies or you can request a free annual credit report from one of the 3 major credit reporting agencies (though you will have to wait a couple weeks to receive it).

When you look at your credit report, it’s a good idea that you make sure all accounts in the bankruptcy are actually closed. You also need to make sure there are no errors in the credit report; if there are, resolved them with the credit reporting agency. It’s also a good idea to write a letter to the credit reporting agency explaining why you had difficult making the payments. Some financial companies will make exceptions and the bad credit mark will be removed.


Buying a house after filing bankruptcy is a real possibility after a year. With two years, your bankruptcy often is disregarded by financing companies, qualifying you for good credit rates. As with any mortgage, compare lenders’ APR to get the lowest costing home loan.

Improve Your Application to Get Lower Interest Rates

One trick that can help you qualify for lower interest rates on your mortage after bankruptcy is to improve your loan application. The biggest way to improve your application is to have a large down payment you can put down. This will really lower your interest rates. There are 100% financing available for some bad credit mortgage loans, but interest rates will be sky high. If you can put down 20% down payment for a home, you will ensure you get the best mortage interest rates possible.

One other option you may choose it to choose to go with an ARM rather than a fixed rate mortage. ARM’s can offer some of the lowers rates out there, depending on the market. The risk is that the rates can increase.

Shop Online For Mortage Lenders

It’s possible that even with have declared bankruptcy; you may still qualify for conventional mortage rates. The best way to is to look online at mortage loan lender websites and start getting quotes both bad credit ones and conventional ones. You can then choose the best rates. This is a key step, as it can mean the difference between the differences of thousands a dollars, just with a few hours of comparison shopping. This is one of the most important things you can do if you want to get the best rates when buying a house after filing bankruptcy.

Check out the following related hubs:

Print   —   Rate it:  up  down  flag this hub

working