Picking Mortgage Insurance Companies

Does a person have the right to try to obtain their own PMI or do they have to accept the lenders choice ?

Don

Don,

I have never, in 20 years, had a client specifically request an MI company. The fact is there are only a few providors of mortgage insurance: PMI, RMIC, CMG, MGIC, and maybe another one or two. The afmorementioned are, however, the larger underwriters. The way the process works is that your lender submits loan files to one or more of the mortgage insurance companies and hopes that they will get an approval. if a MI company will not approve the policy, the lender will not do the loan (unless they choose to self insure, if available). Thus, the loan is really not approved until the MI company says it is insurable.

While you can ask your lender who they use for MI (as most will use several), and say you have a preference amongst their carriers, the real question is who is willing to approve the loan. Generally, the lender will send it to the MI company they feel will get the loan insured. If all are willing to underwrite the loan's MI, I suppose their could be differences in their premiums, but it is probably nominal. In addition to the need for getting approvals, the lenders are likely to lean toward the MI carrier(s) with the lower premiums: lower premiums = lower debt ratios = more approvals = more revenues.

If you still want to pursue this, ask your lender if they will let you select amongst their MI vendors and if there are differences in the premiums.

I hope this helps.

MortgageMaster