HSBC Approves Mortgage? Cathay?

4-1-13 10:30am Mon. (*2)

      HSBC called Leona a short while ago on the phone to say our mortgage was approved, but only for 5.3 million NT, not the 5.65 million that we applied for. Their reason for doing so was that the size of our patio was too large and shouldn’t be included as a ‘living space.’ They give mortgages for what they call living space value and, living space alone, our new condo unit isn’t worth the 5.65 we agreed to pay; only 5.3 million NT. What that means is we can have the mortgage but have to pay 350,000NT ($11,666us) more out of pocket in addition to the 1,595,000NT ($56,500us) we originally thought we’d have to pay, a total of $68,166us (2,045,000NT) down, a 36.51% down payment, with 1.99% interest.

      Meanwhile, Cathay, who sent an assessor to the condo last Wednesday, hasn’t responded, yet. Leona doubts that we will get a mortgage from them because the application is in her name and she has no regular income in Taiwan or even America any more. The HSBC mortgage, on the other hand, is in my name and I’m ‘choosing’ to take it out for Leona to buy a condo with. I have a current income from my pension; HSBC doesn’t mind that my income is overseas. Later (I don’t know when) Leona will ‘gift’ half of the condo to me and put my name on the deed. Richard Hartzell, when I asked, agreed that was the way to do it. Leona asked her sister-in-law, at whose favor we’re applying for a Cathay mortgage, to find out what her bank has decided. In the event that they will give us the mortgage we asked for, and perhaps even with 20% down, not 30% as HSBC offered (now actually 36% down out of our pocket) we would take the mortgage from them, but Leona doubts they will offer it to us.

      I ripped off what I thought was the hips to a flower we were growing on our balcony. They were actually blossoms. I didn’t know, I didn’t ask Leona beforehand and Leona didn’t show me what she meant when she talked about the plant before. I have a history of killing plants or ripping out useful or nice growing things.

      I was just about to go out bike riding after seeing the forecast on Accuweather on-line. I decided to go upstairs with Sweeney for the second time today and see what developed. When a few raindrops fell, Sweeney headed for the door and we came back down. That’s when it started pouring.