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May 2014 applied for VA Streamline Refinance
Loan seeking better rate than currently have.
The representative Christopher Craig, Senior Loan Officer stated they were the best and in their fliers posted on line and mailed They state the following: Defer Mort payments, and receive these immediate financial benefits. All income levels approved, no minimum FICO score no closing costs, refund of your escrow fee.
This is all misleading and false. Mine is not a credit score, had owned residence 6 months VA Loan. Their fees for this loan are about 5, 000 dollars. The loan officers haven't a clue about conventional housing, , manufactured homes, condominiums
or a definition of either All they do is cast your fate to the wind and beware. You may get what you are asking for however, guarantee you will pay for it. It is called loan points, Why don't you check with your current lender and see if you cant compromise on a better rate. Guarantee it will be cheaper. Here I am, end of July and after two attempts, they still cannot perform. Followed my advice and working with my lender 1st Mortgage.. LOWVARATES .IS JUST A BROKER, SAVE LITERALLY THOUSAND GO TO A "MORTGAGE LENDER" BROKERS ARE LIKE USED CAR SALEMEN. WATCH OUT FOR FUNDING FEES. i AM A DISABLED VET WELL OVER 80% FILED FOR 100 IN MAY. LOWVARATES does not listen to what you tell them. They will try and stick you with funding fees. As for an EEM stands for energy efficient mortgage, you are entitled to apply this but lenders will not comply. LOWVARATES had no clue as to what I was talking about. I really dont recommend this company
The complaint has been investigated and resolved to the customer’s satisfaction.
My name is Eric Kandell and I am the President of Low VA Rates. I am sorry you did not the service you deserved and can assure you that you are wrong on many topics you have posted. Feel free to call me directly at [protected] or email at eric at lowvarates dot com. First of all, we are a lender who from time to time chooses to broker our loans when it make sense to do so. We also have closed many EEM loans and are one of the only who will actually do them. VA FF (funding fee) is paid directly to the Dept of VA, and there is no reason for us to try and collect this fee on a disabled vet. Again, I am sorry you did not get what you were after but call me and lets chat. Finally, we have a $250 challenge that will pay you $250 if you get a better deal from one of our competitors.
Sincerely
I would like to clarify a few things here. First of all, yes I am the owner and president of Low VA Rates so know that up front. To quote the gentleman above I am cutting and pasting what he says we offer(ed) in our mailer to him. " Defer Mort payments, and receive these immediate financial benefits.
All income levels approved, no minimum FICO score no closing costs,
refund of your escrow fee. " Then he says that this is misleading and false. We do everything he stated above. You can choose to defer 1 or 2 payments, we do NOT verify income on our VA streamline loans. We do not have a minimum FICO score rule/requirement. And WE DO NOT advertise no closing costs. The exact wording is NO closing cost option available. We also have no control over whether or not an escrow account will be refunded by your lender, but they have to by law.
As far as conventional housing, sure we are not experts there and do not profess to be, hence our company name is Low VA Rates. We do manufactured homes all the time and condominiums too. This particular case that has made this gentleman upset is very abnormal, His property is a manufactured condominium project. I am not going to profess to know how to do those. I have been involved in VA loans for over 15 yrs and this was the only time I had heard of this. We went to our top 3 lenders/investors and did all we could do get the loan done and in the end we could not. We all know that for every 1000 happy clients there is an unhappy one. The sad thing is that the 1000 happy ones won't run to the chat rooms or internet to praise us, but the 1 unhappy person will go to great lengths to make sure everyone knows we failed. Mr Arnke, I wish we had performed better, I really do and I am sorry you are unhappy. However, I will defend our employees and our company. We have helped thousands of people and have a ton of very happy clients that can attest to you that we do exactly as we state we will on our marketing. Final thoughts, if anyone can find a lower rate and lower fees (lower APR) than what we can offer, then we will pay them $250. We would not stand by this lowest APR challenge if we got beat often. To state we are a broker is false, we are a Lender, but yes we do broker some loans when it makes sense. Also to state that a lender can get you a better deal than a broker goes to show you may not understand how the mortgage industry works. Most the time, a broker can shop many lenders and harness that power into a lower rate. Lenders (most) are too large and have too many shareholders to impress and thus they are not able to compete. Sincerely.
Mr Arnke, thanks for taking the time to share your frustrations here online. I am sorry we were not able to get your loan done. I hope you undertsand that Chris and everyone else that worked hard on your loan was just as bummed out as you were to find out that no matter how much we tried, we could not get your loan done. I will attempt to clear the air and explain the truth here.
First of all, to call into question the ethics of our marketing or to compare us to a used car salesman is sad for two reasons. 1. You apparently do not like an entire segment of this great country, used car salesmen. and 2. we do offer almost everything you state we put in our flyers, but realize one thing you state is false. We do not say there are no closing costs for the advertised rates. We state that their are no out of pocket expenses and you can elect a no closing cost option if you want. I am certain when you called us you were offered rates with both costs and no costs and given the choice.
All our VA streamlines are the same, we have no minimum FICO or credit requirement. We have done loans below 520 Fico and we even have the ability to do a streamline without ever once looking at your credit report. You and all clients have the choice to defer 1 or 2 payments and I have never heard of a lender once paid off that does not refund you your escrow account. So for anyone reading this, we do what we say we can do.
The reason we could not do your loan as I am sure you have run into in more than once, is that the property type is very abnormal. We were dealing with both a condo and a manufactured home in one. We do both VA condos and VA manufactured homes, two property types that very few companies will touch as I am sure you know sir. However, we came to find out that you had a manufactured condominium and frankly in 15 yrs of professional loan experience this is the ONLY time I have even heard of this property type. When Chris first told me that you were denied due to property type I assumed he was wrong and went to bat for both you and our company only to be turned down by all our top lenders. This was a huge bummer to us all due to all the work we had put into this.
I am sorry again that we did not get your loan done. However I will defend Chris and my company. We are ethical, hard working and we are experts on VA loans. Are we perfect? Of course we are not. I wish every client that we made happy took the time that those unhappy clients took to share their feelings online. It is sad but true that only about 1-3% of statisfied customers share online, but likely 95% or more of the unhappy ones are very willing to share their bad feelings.
I wish you well sir.
Eric Kandell
President
Low VA Rates
I get these all the time to. I was wondering if they were legit. Thanks for the info.
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Weather true or not, scammers exist everywhere and have the best in business and investments. This is appears to be very close to "if it is too good to be true, it probably is". The president and owner got nutz to stand toe to toe. I strive to satisfy 1000 out of 1000 customers which I hope is the reason for my success. Business to business, reevaluate. Please stop sending this solicitation in the mail. After the first notice, the second and third are pointless.
We had a bit of a nightmare experience with this company but not sure all of it was due to the company and some of the people there were quite nice to us. In the long run, however, the deal set us back financially and put us in unbelievably tough spots. I don't know the reason for this and maybe our particular loan officer had just too many irons in the fire. Things were done in a very haphazard manner and there were some big frustrations along the way---longs periods of time with no information, no returned phone calls, erroneous directions, broken promises, downright dishonesty and last minute scrambling. Its hard to see my veteran husband treating so poorly by a company that advertises that it is serving veterans. We had very good experiences with OCWEN/aka Freedom prior to this but they get lots of very negative feedback as well. I can only report my own experience.
I knew I was correct in throwing away their flyers every month to refinance my VA loan. After being bombarded, I finally caved in and called them December 2014. I was told they could refinance my interest rate from 4.25% to 3.25%. I explained that my debt-to-income rating had shot up since purchasing my home in May 2014, and that my current lender tried to refi but couldn't due to my debt-to-income. I was told in an e-mail that they "do not take that into consideration at all". A few days later I got a call saying the only option for me was a VA Hybrid Loan. In my opinion, one of the worst options because the interest rate changed. I was told this is my only option because I'd "overextended myself". I asked if he was referring to my debt-to-income ratio (the same thing I explained to him about beforehand) and he tried to convince me he wasn't referring to that and kept trying to pitch the Hybrid Loan. This company is scandalous and the reviews on them are accurate. They've got a B- rating from the BBB, so I was prepared for the lies. The guy tried telling me I had a 598 credit score when the day before, I pulled my report from Experience and it was 688! If my credit is so bad, how do I qualify for the Hybrid Loan and not a fixed 30 year, 3.25%? Veterans please stay away from this company. Please throw away their mail. They are liars and dealing with them is a waste of time.
Thank for the information, it was very helpful. I was about to cave in.
The reviews of our company are not accurate, if you would like to see the reviews on Low VA Rates, go to Google and type in Low VA Rates Zillow Reviews.
http://www.zillow.com/profile/Low-VA-Rates/Reviews/
You can also see our reviews on yelp!
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As for pulling your credit scores, each credit bureau has a different score. And while Transunion may have a 598, equifax may have a 698. The reason why the scores are so different is due to the fact that all creditors do not report to all bureaus. You may have a collection that only reported to 1 of the credit bureaus, and it will impact the score of the reported bureau. However it won't effect the other two.
My name is Chris Craig, I was the loan officer taking care of Mr. Arnke. A client of mine just let me know that she saw this review, so I thought I should just chime in with what went wrong with this loan. I hope it wasn't really my service that prompted Mr. Arnke to write, but rather frustration with the loan not closing. This loan was for a manufactured home (mobile home). Initially when I spoke to Mr. Arnke about the home, he explained that the home was coded and zoned as a condominium although it was in a manufactured home park by a golf course. During the process of the loan, in underwriting, it was discovered that the home was classified as manufactured and was insured as manufactured. Because the home was not a single family residence or a condominium, the loan was eventually cancelled with the lender (this particular lender did not fund loans on manufactured homes). I admit I should have dug a bit more into the situation initially. If I would have fully understood the zoning issue we wouldn't have started the process with that lender. I certainly didnt want to lead Mr. Arnke on, and I wont make that mistake again. It does go to show you that a clear conversation with a Loan Officer initially can save a lot of headaches. Please call me with any questions, [protected].
Sincerely,
Chris Craig
I had a bit of a nightmare experience with this company. I sent an email to Eric Kandell, but he never reply to me. I did everything they asked me to do and more. Ricky Nelson was the person who was supposed to helped me, and his assistant Jeanette Johnson, whom I called numerous times, for the most part, they didn't even bothered to called me back or answered my emails. I was requested to send them paperwork ASAP, but my loan was never completed, and they still have me waiting, well according to them the loan was approve, they did check my credit, told me it was poor, which by the way I did inform them from day one, and it is now 3 months. Well, things were done in a very haphazard manner and there were some big frustrations along the way, longs periods of time with no information, no returned phone calls, erroneous direction, broken promises, and last minute scrambling. As a veteran of 18 1/2 years of active duty service, I was treated so poorly by this company that advertises that it is serving veterans. This is only my own experience, and as of today, I am no longer going on with this refinance.
I do often receive such letters and number of times contacted them back for lower my loan %. Some times the representative do admit that I got a good deal as it is, and they could do nothing (I got 3.5% what is pretty good), but LOW VA RATES always play games. First they start telling you how much you going to save cause you "do not need to pay 2 months" what is obvious misrepresentation, you still need to pay those 2 months later on. Then they give you bunch of unrelated numbers over the phone. Unless you are mortgage professional and do write those numbers down, you not be able to make any seance out of it. So when I did write all this down, i find out they will charge me over 13K in closing costs, what is ridiculous. At the moment I am doing refinance with different company that offered same %, but charge less then half in closing costs. Plus provided clear good faith estimate with exact numbers.
I do NOT say "do not do business with them", but absolutely read NUMBERS. Do not take anything over the phone with out right it down and calculate.
David Zlotin
I receive these mailers all of the time, too. And I was interested in doing business with them until I found this post...But not because of what Mr. Arnke says. What appalls me is how the President of the company and others from Low VA Rates have responded to Mr. Arnke. Please note how argumentative, defensive, and hostile they are. The President says, "[I] can assure you that you are wrong on many topics." Mr. President, please know YOU are wrong! The customer is always right! If you want to do well in customer service and the business world, you might consider this mantra and serve your customers better. Secondly, the President attacks Mr. Arnke: He says, "1. You apparently do not like an entire segment of this great country, used car salesmen." Really? This comes across as protesting too much (ever read any Shakespeare?) and as a hostile attack towards a customer. So what if you lose one customer due to a bad experience...but shame on you for attacking them in public and losing more customers. That's just bad business...
Thank you for making it very clear that I should not contact your company for any business. Best of luck to you and I hope you figure out really soon how to treat customers, whether they are right or wrong, like respectable people and worthy of your time/service.
The fact that the owner and employees are putting too much personal information confirms the lack of professionalism. I am also a disabled veteran and it seems that serving our country wasn't enough, but people seek to take advantage of us as well.
High pressure sales men hat's it said one thing and did another, I wouldn't do the loan guy got mad called me a idio het said I didn't under stand variable rates, Im locked in at 3.8 if I went with them 2.75 but year 5 I could be 6 percent plus I owed 187, 000 if I went with them I would be at 200, 000 and back to 30 years that's some cost to refiance save not even a percent for 5 years could go to 7 just crazy used car sales men.use veterans united great company hands down.
Hi Mike,
I would truly be interested in who called you and ### here at Low VA Rates. That is completely unacceptable, and definitely who we want to be as a company. I'm sorry that the LOAN did not work in your best interest, but I can assure you that we really strive to take care of our veterans, and we have thousands of reviews of third party platforms that will verify that. Have a wonderful day!
Not* who we want to be as a company.
I am not a fan of Low VA Rates. They lie and are scammers be aware of false advertising. They charge the highest fees they can and be aware of there tricky financing. Just check how much they charge for financing. Don't trust them!
Hello Flyboy90221,
We are a VA approved lender, and have an A rating on the BBB. We can assure you that we do not scam anyone, or false advertise as it is against the law to do so. We value ourselves as a reputable company amongst the veteran community. The fees that we charge are disclosed numerous times throughout our documents sent to our borrowers, with a breakdown of fees, in accordance to the CFPB regulations. We comply with all laws, federally and locally. We are sorry you feel this way about our company, but we truly value our clients and potential borrowers. Have a wonderful day!
Low VA Rates operates with questionable business practices and they take advantage of veterans especially older ones.
I am about to go to our local news outlet about their business practices. They have preyed upon my father and now he has no idea what is going on with the refinancing of his mortgage. He has called them many times in the past 2 weeks and they kept gas-lighting him with emails telling him everything would be set by December. They have put him in a situation where his mortgage hasn't been paid for 2 months. I will be calling our attorney in Monday. In addition I have a cousin is a news reporter and I went to college with a reporter who does finance news with MSNBC. I will make it my mission to find out what is happening with this company until I get some kind of response.
The Loan Officer's name is Jacob Clark and my name is Karen Baker.
Ms. Baker,
We are very interested in your complaint. We do not like to hear that someone feels that their loved one is not getting the all-star treatment they deserve. We really strive to help our veteran community, and it leaves a bad taste in our mouth when we hear we are missing the mark. We have sent your complaint to our loan officer's manager, and he will be reaching out to you today to help us resolve any issues your father is having. Thank you for letting us know, and we look forward to bettering this situation.