A stated income loan is a mortgage where the lender does not verify the borrower's income by looking at their pay stubs, W-2 (employee income) forms, income tax returns, or other records. Instead, borrowers are simply asked to state their income, and taken at their word. These loans are sometimes called liar loans or liar's loans. Stated income loans were originated by

Ameriquest Ameriquest was one of the largest United States sub-prime mortgage lenders until its dissolution in September 2007. Among the first mortgage companies employing computers to solicit prospective borrowers and hasten the loan application process, ...

Reasons for stated income loans

These loans are nominally intended for self-employed borrowers, or other borrowers who might have difficulty documenting their income. Stated income loans have been extended to customers with a wide range of credit histories, including

subprime In finance, subprime lending (also referred to as near-prime, subpar, non-prime, and second-chance lending) is the provision of loans to people in the United States who may have difficulty maintaining the repayment schedule. Historically, subpri ...

borrowers. The lack of verification makes these loans particularly simple targets for

fraud In law, fraud is intentional deception to secure unfair or unlawful gain, or to deprive a victim of a legal right. Fraud can violate civil law (e.g., a fraud victim may sue the fraud perpetrator to avoid the fraud or recover monetary compens ...

. Stated income loans fill a gap of situations which normal loan standards would not approve. For example, a standard rule is that a customer's mortgage and other loan payments should take up no more than 45% of the person's income. This would seem prudent for a person just owning their main home. However, a real estate investor may have multiple properties and for each may receive only a small amount more than their loan payments on each house, but end up with $200,000 in disposable income. Nevertheless, a non-stated income loan would decline this person since their debt to income ratio would not be in line. The same issue can arise with self-employed borrowers, where the bank with a fully documented loan would include the borrower's business debt in their debt to income calculation. Stated income loans also help borrowers where fully documented loans normally would not consider the source of income as being reliable and stable, such as investors who consistently earn capital gains. Fully documented loans also do not consider potential future income increases. Another type of loan that uses the same principles is the no income disclosure loan. In August 2006, Steven Krystofiak, president of the

Mortgage Brokers Association for Responsible Lending A mortgage loan or simply mortgage (), in civil law jurisdicions known also as a hypothec loan, is a loan used either by purchasers of real property to raise funds to buy real estate, or by existing property owners to raise funds for any pu ...

, in a statement at a Federal Reserve hearing on mortgage regulation, reported that his organization had compared a sample of 100 stated income mortgage applications to IRS records, and found almost 60% of the sampled loans had overstated their income by more than 50 percent. In 2010, the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, restricting stated income loans, went into effect. Section 1411 of the Act states: "A creditor making a residential mortgage loan shall verify amounts of income or assets that such creditor relies on to determine repayment ability..."Section 1411 of Financial Reform Bill

August 2010 Currently, lenders are conducting their own version of income and asset verification. Stated income loans are still offered typically by small local banks. Qualification requirements are based on stable employment, good reserves, good FICO and no less than 40% equity position in the property. Stated income loan availability changes state to state, county to county.

References

{{Reflist

Reasons for stated income loans

See also

References

Further reading