Over the past several quarters, cash has dominated condo purchases in Las Vegas. There are a couple of reasons for this. One, many of these condominiums are attractive to investors for cash flow and the other is that it has been extremely difficult to obtain financing for these projects. It looks like that is changing.

 Source: GLVAR.

The information below is courtesy of PHH Mortgage:

PHH Mortgage has made some changes as of late to help financing on condos become a reality.  I will break down each segment  of the market (Conventional, FHA and VA and Homepath) to share with you what PHH requires of your condominium communties.   

 Conventional financing- Borrowers buying primary residence, second home or investment property.

If there is a FNMA 1028 approval (see attachment), it does not matter if primary/second/investment home, we DO NOT obtain a condo questionnaire or verify owner occupancy.  For example, Newport Lofts has a FNMA 1028 approval that expires 7/31/2010, a person buying one of these units as a primary/second/investment property would be subject to the same lending guidelines as someone buying a single family residence. 

What has changed?  Before if you had a condo on this list, we would not send a condo questionnaire but WOULD verify that the development has over 51% owner occupied.  No longer is this the case. 

 FHA Financing- The attached link is to FHA approved condos in the state of Nevada - the simplest way to search is to search by zip code as community names vary from tax records and assocaition name in comparison to this list.  For a client trying to purchase a condo utilizing FHA financing and the condo is on this list, the ONLY thing we will verify is that the owner occupied ratio is 51% and over.

 https://entp.hud.gov/idapp/html/condo1.cfm

 VA Financing- The attached link is to VA approved condos in the state of Nevada.  For a client trying to purchase a condo utilizing VA financing and the condo is on this list, the ONLY thing that VA requires us to verify is that the condo complex is 100% completed and 70% of the units are sold and closed.  That is it!

 http://condopudbuilder.vba.va.gov/2.2/frames.html

 Homepath Financing- If the property you are trying to buy is homepath eligible, the ONLY thing we will verify is that the project is not a condotel. 

Now you can start looking at condominiums. PHH is removing the roadblocks and opeing up a segment of the market that has been dominated by cash. First time homebuyers buying an $80,000 condo will recieve an $8,000 tax credit. Time is running out on the tax credit. Remember, the tax expires on November 30, 2009, which means buyers should be in escrow by mid-October at the latest.

Ray Melton and Dave Reichert

PHH Mortgage