What's a 1003?
If someone were to ask you what a 1003 was, what would you say? The simple answer is that it's your mortgage application. It's the number of the form designed by Fannie Mae, and for most new homebuyers, it's a daunting experience to see all that information. It's broken down into ten sections, which include the following:
Type of mortgage and terms of the loan
Property information and purpose of the loan
Information on you, the borrower
Your employment data
Your monthly income and current housing expenses
Your net worth — assets minus liabilities
Details of the loan transactions
Declarations
Acknowledgement and agreement
Government monitoring data
If you want to see a blank copy of this form so you can prepare yourself, ask any lender you're considering to give you a blank copy — they shouldn't object. After you fill out this form with a lender, by law, the lender needs to send you your good faith estimate (GFE) of settlement charges and your truth in lending (TIL) statement within a few days. As is discussed on page 106, this initial GFE may vary widely from your final estimate, and you should work with your lender to see that it doesn't. If you're working with an attorney, send the GFE to her just to have her look it over for any funky fees or blank spaces that should be filled in with numbers.
You might as well face it now: There is no free lunch in mortgage lending. Lenders may advertise no-fee loans, but they're probably going to eke out their profits in points or other charges along the line. It's your job to question what's in front of you and find out where those charges are.
Why should you be concerned about any blank spaces on your application form? Unscrupulous lenders actually leave boxes blank so they can fill them in later without your knowledge and hope that you ignore the numbers they filled in.
