How a Quick-to-Close Mortgage Rescued St. Augustine Homebuyer’s Dream of Amazing St. Johns River Sunsets

Steve Carter
Branch Manager | Mortgage Expert | Passionate Cook

Here’s a story about a homebuyer’s dream of owning a riverfront home in St. Augustine nearly got away—until my mortgage team stepped in at the last minute to rescue the deal.

Ken had his heart set to purchase a beautiful home along the St. Johns River.

That home features an impressive 75-foot deck along the back of home—perfect to enjoy amazing sunsets.

Contract signed with the home seller and closing set for 30 days, Ken approached a bank for what he thought would be a smooth approval.

It wasn’t. After a couple of weeks working with the bank, it became apparent that the deal wasn’t going to happen.

The bank got hung up on two issues:

Income: Ken’s considerable income came from an investment portfolio. The bank did not want to work to fully document how he made money.

Home location: The home’s proximity to water made the bank nervous. Without investigating the details, they stuck with their immediate negative reaction and suggested Ken find another home.

With closing date looming, it looked like Ken was going to have to give up on his dream home.

His real estate agent, Lori Neighbors of The Neighbors Team, recommended he give me a call.

“I told Ken about Steve’s experience getting the most difficult lending situations to closing,” Lori said. “I said if Steve can’t get a loan done, it can’t be done.”

Our solution really came down to listening, experience and advocating.

What I heard was that Ken really wanted this home. What I saw was that he had the means to pay for it. It was my job to make sure he got what he wanted.

The major challenge was time. We came into the picture almost three weeks into a 30-day agreement.

Assuring that we could get the deal done, the home seller agreed to extend the closing an additional week.

Next challenge: Fully documenting Ken’s income. This is where experience matters. Over the years, I’ve helped many people with unique income situations—like the self-employed, business owners and contract employees—get the home financing they desire.

The solution here was simply to adjust the income he received from his portfolio. The money for the home was there—we just had to properly document it.

Then we addressed the home’s location. I personally advocated Ken’s strong desire for the home plus his means to maintain the home to the appraisal committee. With this information, the location became a non-issue.

Mortgage approval was quickly granted and we proceeded to closing in record time.

“Ken was delighted. Steve rescued this deal and got Ken the riverfront home he wanted,” said Lori.

We were delighted when Ken left this testimonial about his experience with us on Zillow and Google:

In my 25+ years of experience, it never gets old hearing how we’ve helped people achieved their homeownership goals.

I’ve learned that personally taking time to understand your situation…

• Your home financing goal
• Your real income and assets

…makes a world of difference in locating the home financing you deserve.

That’s the advantage a genuine customer service approach has over lenders who rely just on an algorithm to make quick lending decisions.

And it’s an approach that’s brought me a 100% success rate for the loans I submit for my clients.