Moving from England to America, can I get a loan to buy a home?

clairehair

You will not have US citizenship when you marry , you will be a permanent legal resident. You have to be married to a US citizen for 3 years before you can apply for your citizenship. You can like you say retain your British citizenship as well. I like you was British and married a US citizen. You can buy a house in the US even if you don't live here actually and certainly as a legal permanent resident BUT your British credit is useless here, they only consider US credit and it take time to build that up and your British job history is also useless, you are in effect starting all over again when you move here. You also do not take over your wife's credit. Hers if it is good will help a joint mortgage application but you have will have no credit at all here initially and lending companies told us that was worse than bad credit and your credit score or lack of one will put up the interest rate, if they will even lend at all in the current climate.

However, housing is much cheaper here than the UK although the exchange rate now for you is as bad as could ever be but if you have a house or flat in the UK that when sold and provides a decent equity you might have enough to buy a house outright here or put a big enough down payment that would negate the higher interest payments being an issue. I know a small flat in the Uk is going for a minimum of 200,000 pounds where my parents live and if you were lucky enough to have bought anything before the boom then you will have a tidy equity.

Or you might have to do what we did and that was for me to start building up some US credit. Buying a car or taking a small loan and making the payments, getting a credit card or even joining a gym and making the payments will start to build it up but it takes time, years actually.

There is a lot to learn when you immigrate about all sorts of things and I learned the hard way as I went along but I was about as ill prepared and ill informed as you are but it was still OK in the end.
If you have any other question about moving from the UK to the US , I accept email and would be happy to answer your questions if I can.

Good luck in your relocation and be ready for the homesickness as well-Thats always a surprise to those who come here, especially from a country thats is not third world.

Are you coming over on a fiance visa or as a spouse of a US citizen? The fiance visa has some work restrictions and you have to apply for a work permit whilst the visa for a spouse has no work restrictions and you will be a legal permanent resident immediately. There are a few options when it comes to visa but the fiance visas ( K1 and K3) are non immigrant visas initally and before you adjust status it might affect your ability to get a loan although not to buy a house outright but that is just a presumption and you would have to confirm that with a bank etc Something to consider though. My husband and I looked at the two fiance visas when we first met and decided to marry first in the end before applying and then apply for the immigrant spousal visa after we married ( CR1 if you have been married less than 2 years). For as long as it takes to get the fiance visa and as restrictive as they were we decided to get married fist and then apply. Actually we married in the US , I went home, he applied for a visa to the UK and he went there, petitioned me from England and then went back to the US, I stayed in the UK and then went over to the US later, although I am not suggesting you do anything as complicated as that!

Yak Rider

Unless you have a substantial down payment you'll have difficulty. Your UK credit history will be useless in the United States. Since you just arrived you'll have no job history.

Still if you can muster a large down payment (50%) for a home in an area with stable prices, not falling, you will find a lender. The interest rate they charge you will be higher than usual.

In the USA most home loans are for 30 years at a fixed interest rate. Variable loans were popular a while ago but they are what dragged our banking system down into the sewer.

slowzap

If you plan on doing everything legally, then I wish you the best of luck, but you'll probably have a hard time making it.

On the other hand, if you're not a US Citizen & you don't have a job or just work for cash with out paying taxes, it should be pretty easy to get a home mortgage and lots of other gov. assistance. In fact Bank of America specializes in giving credit cards to illegal aliens.

lin t

Just buy a Big Shed... thats what most of them live in or Trailers.
And they all live on Credit. (Even seen them use plastic to buy a Pack of 20 cigarettes)

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