Real Estate Agent Assistance

How can real estate agents partner with MBOH to help people buy homes?

MBOH welcomes many opportunities to partner with the real estate community - through our Homeownership Program, which helps people buy homes, our continuing education classes, and our ongoing communication with professionals in the real estate community. MBOH offers three general types of homeownership programs to help finance loans for low and moderate-income borrowers.

Regular Mortgage Bond Program offers an interest rate lower than the market rate, which makes your client's purchasing power go farther, and, MBOH provides closing cost assistance to every buyer in this program. MBOH pays the lender their fees, so there are no origination fees or discount points at closing. This helps in two ways: the buyer's required cash to close is lower, and you are never in a position to ask your seller to pay this portion of the buyer's closing costs. More details can be found by clicking here .

Mortgage Credit Certificate Program provides eligible homebuyers with the opportunity to buy a home by keeping more money in their pockets each month. An MCC reduces the amount of federal income tax homeowners' pay, giving them more money to use toward their mortgage. Under this program, a homebuyer selects any loan other than an MBOH loan, and attaches a federal income tax credit to their loan. Lenders can use this tax credit to help qualify the buyer for the loan. It is important to remember that this is a tax credit and not a loan. More details can be found by clicking here .

Set-aside Program is designed to help buyers who don't qualify under either of the other two programs. Many times, these buyers can afford a monthly payment, but are struggling to save their down payment and closing costs. Or, they face an "affordability gap", the difference between what they can afford to purchase, and what homes in their area actually cost. In this program, MBOH partners with cities, counties, non-profits, and others to complete a purchase. The homebuyer takes out a loan from MBOH for as much as they qualify for, currently at 5.25%, and the non-profit steps in with the balance. This difference can be as little as $1,500, or as much as $45,000, depending on the location in the state, and the needs of the buyer.

Requirements for Homeownership Programs: Each of these programs has requirements that must be met for both the buyer and the property. The current Regular Mortgage Bond and MCC Programs income and purchase price limits can be found under Documentsinsert link here.. Sponsors on the Set-aside Program set their income limits usually at or below 80% of area median income. Terms and Conditions for the various Set-asides can be found at Special Programs Documents link here.. The Set-asides require approved Home Buyer Education for their clients in order to qualify for the down payment and closing cost assistance. Home Buyer Education classes are available statewide through a network called the Montana HomeOwnership Network. The schedule of upcoming classes can be found on their website http://www.nwmt.org/schedule.htm, or by calling 1.800.318.0268.

If this sounds confusing, please take heart. MBOH has been helping families buy homes since 1977. In our last fiscal year alone, with your help and hard work matching families with homes, we financed the purchase of 1,745 homes statewide, for $189,215,000 in home sales.

Continuing Education Credit for Real Estate Agents: MBOH also offers continuing education classes, in the mandatory topic of Finance, to help real estate agents understand the details of the various programs. MBOH does not charge a fee for these classes. If your organization would like to schedule a class, please contact: Jeannene Maas, 406.841.2851.

About MBOH: MBOH is a state agency, but does not receive any state or federal funding, and is solely funded by the private sector. MBOH sells tax-exempt bonds, and uses the proceeds of these bond sales to provide loan funds for people to buy homes. The governor appoints board members. The board meetings are held monthly, and are open to the public. During summer months, the board takes the meetings to various locations across the state. The board always welcomes input from real estate agents, lenders, and others concerning the direction and scope of programs. Please call 406.841.2840 for location and time of next board meeting. Thanks for taking the time to read through this, and we look forward to hearing from you!

updated 1/23/06