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How is the U.S. Government Shutdown Effecting Buying a Home?

Posted by kim carpenter on January 7, 2019

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How is the U.S. Government Shutdown Effecting Buying a Home?

When buying a home, most people need a mortgage to purchase a home. There are multiple loan programs that are government mortgages which require mortgage lenders to contact government employees that are associated with these loan programs. Since the government is shutdown for the 2^nd longest shutdown in history, as of 1/3/2019, here are things that could affect buying a home or delay the process until government ends the shutdown:

Social Security Admin: If a potential new homebuyer is collecting social security income and does not have an award letter to prove their current income, then that will most likely delay the home buying process since they will need to request new documentation from the IRS.

USDA Loans: Potential new homeowners can be pre-approved for a USDA loan still, which is a 0% down loan for rural areas. USDA has said they will NOT accept new loans until the government ends the shutdown and employees are back to work. This is critical during this event that no one accepts an offer on their house listed for sale from a potential buyer that is pre-approved for a USDA loan because it will cause a long delay. There are other mortgage alternatives for 0% down if time is of the essence.

NFIP (National Flood Insurance Program): The NFIP will not issue new flood insurance policies during the shutdown. Loans using programs where the property is in a flood zone and those programs require an NFIP policy, and that policy was not issued prior to the shutdown will be impacted. Loans on programs where private flood policies are permitted may not be impacted as private flood insurance companies will be able to issue policies.