MORTGAGE$: Getting a mortgage involves some loss of privacy

Over the decades, maintaining individual privacy has been a topic of growing concern. In this day and age it is no less important. Yet as obtaining credit and, in particular, mortgage financing for purchasing or refinancing a home, has become more and more a part of the American way of life, privacy has had to suffer some. In this article, I will review some of fundamentals of underwriting a mortgage loan that do impinge on a borrower’s privacy.

One of the fundamentals of the sound underwriting of a mortgage loan request is the verification of a borrower's income. In a growing number of circumstances, tax returns are required as a part of the process that establishes the borrower's verifiable income. The most basic type of income is from routine employment. The minimum requirements for verifying an ordinary wage earner is to request two years of IRS Form W-2, a copy of a current pay stub, or to send a Verification of Employment to the borrower's employer.