Are mortgage lenders your LinkedIn profile?
Confronted with excessive mortgage charges, 6.62% for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage on the time of writing, and hovering dwelling costs, lenders are turning to social media websites like LinkedIn to raised perceive debtors.
Kevin Leibowitz, president and CEO of Grayton Mortgage, advised Realtor earlier this month that whereas the lender doesn’t have “an official course of” for wanting by a borrower’s social media accounts, they could nonetheless verify unofficially.
“It’s useful to take a look at LinkedIn profiles through the utility course of,” Leibowitz advised the outlet. “It may give a clearer image as to the job historical past, description, size of employment, locale, and so forth.”
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The data may be mandatory as a result of “generally, a borrower does not present a full image of what they’ve completed for the previous few years,” Leibowitz defined.
He acknowledged that lenders may use LinkedIn to fill in gaps in employment and create an entire profile of the borrower.
So, whereas lenders primarily look at financial institution statements, credit score reviews, and tax returns when assessing a borrower’s historical past, their notion of a borrower may be influenced by social media platforms like LinkedIn.
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What ought to debtors do to maximise their probabilities of getting a mortgage? Mike Olson, a senior underwriter on the lender Second Road, advised Realtor.com that each element on LinkedIn ought to align with what’s written on a mortgage utility. This implies the identical job titles, places, and dates.
He additionally really useful refraining from writing posts “that would elevate purple flags,” like posts about monetary stress or job loss.
The median value of a house bought within the U.S. within the closing quarter of 2024 was $419,200, up from $338,600 within the final quarter of 2020.
