Negotiate lower fees and costs on your reverse mortgage

Trying to negotiate fees and costs with several different lenders can be a difficult process and requires careful coordination, precise timing, and expert knowledge. There are many spots where you could be led astray, get confused and fail to find the best deal for yourself.  Some lenders, for instance, may not even reveal all of the reverse mortgage programs available to you; they could show you only a few…  higher margin products.  Don’t be persuaded that all lenders offer exactly the same reverse mortgage programs and rates.  They don’t!

Worse, not all lenders have access to the reverse mortgage programs that provide the most money to you.  Fixed Rate reverse mortgage products, for example, presently offer borrowers much more money than any adjustable rate product.  But not all lenders can offer you a fixed rate product, so you might never even know about it.

Then there are 3rd party fees and costs including some “junk fees” that might get added to your overall expense.  Some of these fees can be negotiated and some even eliminated.  Do you know what fees to challenge?

Negotiate Other Reverse Mortgage Fees and Costs

While most loan officers are ethical, you could run up against a lender who intentionally “lowballs” fees and costs… or encourages overestimating your home value just to win you over from a competitor.  By the time you get to the closing many weeks later,  those numbers have changed drastically.  Surprise!  It does happen… not often, but it does happen.  Do you know how to fairly estimate what your appraisal value should be?  Hint – it’s not your assessed (tax) value and it’s probably much less than you think.  A good loan officer will help you through this calculation.

Author – Robert H. Irving, CSA
Senior Reverse Mortgage Consultant

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