Philadelphia Weekly

REAL ESTATE

3 top mortgage pricing gripes

Many shoppers encounter inaccurate rates, third-party fees

By Inman News Feed

Add Comment | Comments: 0 | Posted Jan. 10, 2011

Bottom line: To price-shop effectively, lenders must be provided with all the information required to price accurately; borrowers must be protected against locking abuses; and prices of third-party services must be locked as well as loan prices. There is no set of mandated pre-application disclosures that would meet all these requirements.

But mandatory disclosures are not the only game in town. There is a way to assure competitive prices for both the mortgage and third-party services. Next week, I'll offer the first in a series of articles on how to do that.

The writer is professor of finance emeritus at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Comments and questions can be left at www.mtgprofessor.com.