Building Your Custom Home For Dummies. Peter Economy

second loan so that you can put down a smaller down payment. The primary lender must agree to this arrangement. In either case, the seller has the ability to foreclose if you miss payments. You need your real-estate agent or an attorney to draft the note and security instrument to make sure everyone is properly protected.

When is a seller more willing to carry the financing themselves? A seller may agree to carry paper if the property is hard to finance through banks or if they — for whatever reason — are anxious to sell. The seller may also want to defer the taxes due from the sale of the property; carrying paper allows the seller to pay taxes only as you pay off the loan. You gain no real advantage when the seller carries the financing unless the loan’s terms are more favorable than any other lender offers you. Most construction lenders require the seller to be paid off when they fund the construction loan. Few institutional construction lenders allow a subordination of a seller carry.

      

Some sellers want a premium if they’re going to carry paper. Furthermore, many sellers still want to check your financial wherewithal, so credit and income can still factor into their decision. Ultimately, you can negotiate the best deal with a seller if they’re getting all the money expected from the escrow, so having the seller carry may not be the best route.

      Using private or hard money

      Hard money comes from private investors who specialize in making loans on real estate. Hard-money lenders generally aren’t concerned with credit or income. They hope to make high-interest yields or make money by taking back your property through foreclosure and selling it at a profit. Typical hard money runs a number of percentage points higher interest than the prevailing market rate, plus 5 percent of the loan amount in upfront fees, called points. This high interest seems expensive, but if banks or owners won’t give you a loan, then this choice may be better than not buying the lot at all. Because hard-money lenders like equity, they usually want as much as a 50 percent down payment.

      Making sure the loan period is long enough

      Lot loans come in a variety of lengths, but few lenders offer them for more than five years. Your lot loan needs to be in place until the construction loan pays it off. Most projects can make it to the construction-loan phase within two to three years. If you think you’re going to take a long time to design your home or that you’ll need to save your money for a long time before beginning construction, then you may want to search for loans that last more than ten years.

      How long it takes to begin the building process can vary wildly. The ultimate amount of time is based upon your local planning departments, how picky you are with your plans, how busy the current construction climate is, and many other factors. Figure out how long you think it will take and double it to be safe. Most of the delay factors will be beyond your control.

      Stop! Don’t pay off your lot yet!

      Contractors, consumers, architects, and many others often tell you that you must pay off your lot before you get a construction loan. This is the biggest myth in the custom-home-construction world. Actually paying off the lot isn’t a good idea unless it’s absolutely necessary. The following sections explain several good reasons to keep a loan on your land until you’re ready to build.

      You need cash on hand to fund your project

      Buying your land is just the beginning of paying people in a construction project. The architect, the engineer, the well and septic people — and many others — all need to be paid along the way. The permitting process can suck your cash as well. These people and processes can add up to tens of thousands of dollars. If you run out of money because you put all your hard-earned savings into your land, finishing the build on your new home can become a nightmare. Having cash in your pocket is your best protection for keeping your project moving along. Check out Chapter 8 for more on this subject.

      Money put in is expensive to get out

      Few lenders have refinance programs for land loans. And in most of those cases, they only let you replace an existing loan. Rarely does a lender give you a refinance loan where you’re taking cash out of a piece of land. That means that after you put money into the land, it’s gone forever — at least until your construction loan has started. Your only choice will probably be hard or private money, which can cost 5 percent of the loan up front and 10 percent annually. This increase compared to institutional lot loan pricing is an expensive price to pay for money you already had in your pocket to begin with.

      Cash reserves are required for construction loans

      Banks want you to have cash on hand before they give you a loan. The amount of required reserves varies from bank to bank (see Chapter 10 for specific details). If you’re short on the bank’s cash requirements, it won’t give you a construction loan — even with a paid-off lot.