Health & Fitness
HARP Program for McHenry County Residents
The Home Affordable Refinance program offers McHenry County homeowners that may be upside down on their mortgage the opportunity to refinance their mortgage in to a lower interest rate.
Don’t frown if you’re upside down! Today may be your day to refinance to a lower interest rate!
Since you’re upside down on your mortgage, you’re probably assuming no lender will ever refinance you! This is no longer necessarily true. Hundreds of thousands of Americans, including many in McHenry County, have been able to take advantage of the Home Affordable Refinance Program, often referred to as "HARP".
While there is a lot of mumbo-jumbo-legal-speak in the program, the idea behind the program is simple. Prior to the HARP program, homeowners who had made their mortgage payments on time, but had a high interest rate compared to current market rates, were still unable to refinance due to a lack of equity in their home.
With the HARP program and with the new HARP 2, many Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae owned mortgages now qualify for a refinance despite the lack of equity you may have in your home. This means, for example, if you owe $200,000 on a home currently valued at $150,000, you may still qualify to refinance into a lower rate.
The HARP program now allows qualified borrowers to refinance into a lower interest rate no matter how far upside down you may be on your home.
And here's the icing on the cake... If your current mortgage loan does not require Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI), either will your new HARP mortgage.
And there may be sprinkles on that cake's icing as in some cases; a new appraisal is not even required!
HARP loans have fixed rate options for up to 30 years.
As with all typical conventional home mortgages, income, credit score and other guidelines do apply.
See if you qualify for the HARP program and put cash back in your pocket!
