How Long Does it Take to Get A Mortgage Pre-Approval?

How long does a mortgage pre-approval take

For most buyers a pre-approval takes about 1 to 3 days, and a lot of that timeline is really in your hands rather than the lender’s. At PBT Bancorp we can usually tell you where you stand in about 15 minutes on the phone, and once you have your documents together the full pre-qualification letter comes together quickly after that. The more prepared you are upfront, the faster the whole thing moves.

Completing the application

The first step is the application itself, where you share your income, your assets, and your monthly debts so we can see the full picture. This part usually takes 30 minutes to an hour, and it goes a lot faster when you already have your pay stubs, your last two years of tax returns, and 2 months of recent bank statements pulled together. We send out the initial disclosures right after, and for our VA buyers we also pull your Certificate of Eligibility (COE) for you, so that is one less thing you have to chase down on your own.

Credit check and verification

Once your application is in, we pull your credit and verify the numbers you gave us, and this is the step where the lender you pick really matters. Most lenders want to see a 640 or higher before they will even start, but our minimum credit score is 500 on VA purchases and cash-out refinances, which means we can often help families that a bigger lender already turned away. If we need one more document to button things up we will let you know, and getting it back to us quickly is the single best way to keep your timeline short.

The approval decision

After everything checks out we issue your pre-qualification letter, usually within that same 1 to 3 day window, and you can take it straight to a real estate agent so sellers know you are a serious buyer. Keep in mind a pre-qualification is not the final loan approval, you will still provide a few more documents once you are under contract on a home, but it tells you what you can comfortably afford and it gets you moving. If you want a deeper look at how the full process works for Veterans, our VA loan pre-approval page walks through every step.

How long is a pre-approval good for

Most pre-qualification letters are good for about 60 to 90 days. The letter itself is not really what goes stale, it is the documents behind it. Pay stubs and bank statements only show a snapshot of your finances, so once they are a couple of months old we simply need fresh copies to confirm nothing has changed.

If your home search runs long, and in a tight market it often does, refreshing your letter is usually a same-day task. We collect an updated pay stub and bank statement, take another quick look at the numbers, and issue a new letter. Also, if interest rates have moved since your first letter, the refresh is a good time to revisit your comfortable price range, because the same monthly payment may stretch a little further or a little less than it did a few months earlier.

What can slow a pre-approval down

The 1 to 3 day window assumes your documents come in quickly and nothing unusual pops up. A few situations can stretch the timeline, and almost all of them are manageable when we know about them upfront.

• Self-employment. We will need two full years of personal tax returns, and depending on how your business is set up, business returns as well. Having those ready before you apply saves the most time of anything on this list.
• A recent job change. Usually fine, particularly if you stayed in the same line of work, but we may need an offer letter or a first pay stub from the new employer.
• Large deposits in your bank account. Anything outside your normal paycheck pattern needs a paper trail, so a quick note on where the money came from keeps things moving.
• Credit disputes. An open dispute on your credit report can hold up the file, so it often makes sense to resolve or close small disputes before applying.

What many Veterans may not realize is that the COE is one delay you do not have to worry about with us, since we pull it directly through our system at the start of your file instead of waiting on you to request it.

What happens after you are pre-approved

Once the letter is in hand, you are ready to shop. You and your agent can write offers with real weight behind them, and when a seller accepts, we move your file into full approval. You will send over a few updated documents, usually 3 or 4 items, the appraisal is ordered once your file reaches underwriting, and we keep you posted at every step so there are no surprises in the final stretch.

Why we are usually faster

We have streamlined our process so it stays simple from the very first call. We are an FDIC member bank and we also work with over 35 wholesale lenders, so we can shop your loan and keep things moving where a larger company often cannot. On VA refinances our No Score IRRRL program does not even require a credit score, the only requirement is that you have been no more than 1x 30 days late in the past 12 months, so we can often close loans that most other lenders are not able to. While many big lenders take 30 days or longer to close, we close most VA loans in 2 to 3 weeks from start to finish.

Pre-approval timeline questions

If you are ready to find out where you stand, the easiest next step is to let us take a look. Give us a call at 800-697-4371 or fill out our online pre-qualification form, and we can usually tell you in about 15 minutes. Thank you for your service, and let us help you put your VA benefit to work.