I hate dealing with big banks. It started a couple of months ago. I had new clients that came with their own loan officer. They wanted to deal with their “own” bank. The bank is Wells Fargo. The loan officer seemed competent and had been recommended by their previous real estate agent. They asked what my opinion was….My opinion is that my loan officer can get a loan done in about 2 weeks and that big banks have lots of hiccups where one department does not deal well with the other departments…. Somehow this always makes the loan take 2 or 3 weeks longer with a lot of hand wringing at the end. I told them this and gave them the name of my favorite loan officer….
They chose the big bank….. OK I can deal with this….I never have had a loan close easily with a big bank and I still haven’t…. That includes US Bank, Wells Fargo and Bank of America….I have heard bad things about Chase but since I haven’t closed a deal with them I can’t include them on the list. I was surprised when Sandy told me it would take 5 weeks to close the VA loan…. So I put December 29, 2011 in my contract (Sandy picked the date). We bid the day before Thanksgiving….The inspection came back on November 30…. On December 2 I was told the appraisal was ordered….By December 15 the appraisal still wasn’t done. The appraisal finally came back on December 19…. The latch on the slider needed to be fixed… We knew about the latch from the inspection but we figured we would fix it after closing… The loan officer told me that the deal was going to final underwriting… By 12/22 the file was still being worked on. On 12/23/2012 at 10 AM (the last working day until Christmas) the underwriter asked for the previous employers verification….These people had been through final underwriting with the same bank in late October on a different deal and had made it through….I have always coached my buyers to give the underwriter whatever they wanted no matter how silly it seemed… I convince my buyers to try to make the phone call to corporate headquarters and by some miracle the HR person sends the docs 2 business days before they usually do. Meanwhile I had my handyman fix the latch and a couple of other things…. I called the bank to tell them that all was ready… It took them until Tuesday to get the appraiser back out… Final underwriting also completed Tuesday or Wed. All the time the loan officer kept saying we would close by the contract date of 12/30 I was always reminding her that the date was 12/29 and we needed an extra day for FEDEX…..She told me that couldn’t happen but we could get it done by 12/30…. So now we get to 12/28 and that is where the fun really began….I hate dealing with big banks….
The hud comes out at 6 PM on 12/28… It looks sort of OK….Fast forward to 9:49 AM the next morning….Email says docs will be out in a few minutes….I talk to title….The lender left money on the table from the 3% closing costs….That is annoying….I submit the receipt for the inspection… I talk to the processor, the loan officer, the escrow officer.. The processor and the loan officer keep telling me I will have docs out any minute … I get lunch…I make more phone calls and Emails… I meet a repairman at a rental…I am now spending full time trying to make the docs come out….I am fielding calls from the listing agent… He is furious….He blames the whole problem on me…. He also got the same email stating docs will be out in a few minutes…. The escrow officer calls and asks me to intervene…I hate dealing with big banks… I get a phone number for a person higher up the food chain….She talks to me and tells me docs will be out soon….. Finally 5 PM comes and all goes quiet…. Defeat… I put out the addendum for closing on January 3… Of course I need to talk to the listing agent and the buyer…. Not much to do….I try to relax with NETFLIX….The other agent starts emailing me…..They get harder and harder to deal with….He starts with blaming Wells Fargo and the loan officer…No problem with that I am pretty annoyed with them… Then he states that his 90 year old clients have a loss for the home (which was bought for a sick daughter that died) and that they would have to wait until the 2012 tax cycle to claim their tax loss…. I feel awful but I can’t make it happen short of going to California to get the signed papers…
Finally I remind him about the serenity prayer….I have worked for days to make it happen on time….I can’t make it happen on time… I am going to try to relax so I can tackle it in the morning…..He doesn’t respond after that….
Today its 10:49 AM I have been yelled at and hung up on by the person further up on the food chain… I didn’t yell I just asked about the docs…(the one preparing the docs)… I have spoken to title, the loan officer (twice), the processor (three times)….I still don’t have docs….I have talked to my clients…. I have not talked to the listing agent yet. I have nothing to say…I am out of contract… I assume we will close… Right now I want to scream I HATE DEALING WITH BIG BANKS!… We have penalties for not preforming perhaps banks should too….
What can I do about this situation? Not much except:
1) Blog about it…
2) Discourage my clients from using big banks…
3) Push my loan officer on my buyers because I know she will get the job done….
4) I am planning to take my rental accounts out of Wells Fargo (after the mortgages are paid in January) and go to a smaller bank…. I will write a letter to the management so they know why I am changing banks…
5) Do you think I could put it in my political blog? Big banks are getting a lot of bad press lately…
Now I sit and wait for loan docs to come in…..I want to take my loan and go elsewhere but that will take another 2 weeks…. For the final time I hate dealing with big banks…
I started my life as a chemist…. Well that is not true I started my life as a baby (just like everyone else). I took a BS and MA in Chemistry. In all my working career (short because I took care of my kids) people rarely what I was doing and if it had any implications in the world. The conversation started like this. “Debbie what do you do? ” “I am a physical chemistry graduate student.” They would take a step back then trying to regroup they would ask what my husband did. I would tell them he is a math graduate student. At that point they would usually find someone else to talk to….. Fast forward 3 kids and 25 years later. I am a real estate agent and I ran for Congress. I have2 kids who are college graduates, one starting grad school and the other starting college. People do not ask me what I think of the political situation (I have to force that on them). They ask me the market conditions. What is their home worth and whether I think the market is rising or falling? What do I think will happen in next few months…. Can people really get loans?
Debbie Holmes
Boise Homes Report 