When obtaining a mortgage, can they REQUIRE me to be back at work from maternity leave in order to close?

Question

I'm being told that we cannot close until I have a paycheck proving that I have gone back to work. Seems like that could be discrimination.

Answer 1

You are required to have a certain income in order to obtain a loan and it would appear that you don't if you are not working.  The bank doesn't care if you have a new baby or a broken leg, the result is the same--you no longer qualify for the loan.  Be careful--your loan could fall through.

Answer 2

It's not.  It's requiring that your household income be a certain amount of money.  If your husband got a raise in the amount of your salary that would satisfy the bank's requirement.  If your maternity leave was fully paid, that would do it too.

The bank only cares about the money.

Answer 3

If your income is being used to qualify for the loan (and from your post, it sounds like it is) the lender has to see that the income is valid and will continue, so you returning to work is a condition of the loan.  It's not discrimination; you are telling the lender that I make X amount of dollars per year and the lender is requiring that you prove this.  I know when I underwrote loans, I tried to qualify the borrowers WITHOUT using the "maternity leave" income because of this very issue.  Has your underwriter tried this, i.e. qualifying you and your  spouse for the loan without using your income?  Good luck!

Answer 4

The bank that is loaning you money is a privately owned company. THey can have any rules they want.  They have one big concern with inexperienced home buyers.  You think you get an extension since you are on maternity leave.  Many pregnant women think that they don't have to make a mortgage payment if they just had a baby. I'm serious. It's the 14th of the month and the payment hasn't been paid and they don't understand why they don't get a break.  The reason is that the bank is heartless.  Really heartless.  

Which leads up to a good moral to this story.  We should do whatever we can , in the future, to pay cash for our houses.  No more bank rules. None.  Pay cash and do what we please.  I can't tell you how many times i have been made crazy by a mortgage lender (i have bought a lot of houses).  

Sorry for the lecture.  You'll get your loan. /

Answer 5

it depends on how the application was structured.  A big factor is debt to income, or dti.  this factors in your income vs your debt load.  most lenders want a 28/36 front/back dti ratio, fha 31/43 is the limit.  The issue could be that with the maternity leave pay, you don't qualify as you could be outside qualifying ratios.  It's not discrimination, it's reality.  the lender could be cold and say your denied based on your current income but they're not saying that here, they want to make sure your going back to work before they approve the loan, which they have every right to do, because if they don't, you could become another foreclosure statistic.  hope this helps