If you are applying for a mortgage, all I can say is STAY AWAY from Astoria Federal!
I applied for a mortgage in March. At the end of April my loan officer at Astoria Federal knew exactly the terms I was looking for, 5% down on a new construction condo. Based on my application, request, and binder, Astoria issued a preapproval. Once the contract was signed, and 5% down was applied, they issued by a commitment letter early May.
For three weeks I have called and called and no status can be given. All of the sudden, the underwriters indicated to the loan officer a document from the condo was missing. It is unfortunate I waited this long but never the less, said document was provided. Then comes the wait for the appraisal.
End May came to a completion and over three weeks after the appraisal was done, they still don't have the report.
Now another two weeks went by (the 45 days has passed), still no status. Finally I got my lawyer involved and a bomb went off when they denied the original commitment amount and insisted that we pay an additional 5% downpayment (totalling 10%) —mind you this is after they issued a commitment letter. Supposedly they said the guidelines in 10% for an attached condo. Well they knew it was a condo from day one. They knew it was attached since they had the offering, the contract, not to mention their appraiser physically visited the condo! On top of that, I can't think of a condo that is not attached in one way or another —that's why it's a condo and not a house!
We scrambled to get additional finance —had we not been able to manage to get the extra 5% for the downpayment, we would have lost our dream condo. Although the problem seemed to have been resolved (by us coming up with an additional 5% down payment), the denial letter which crossed in the mail arrived one day later. The reason for the denial was indicated under "Others" and indicated as "We do not grant credit to any applicant on the terms and conditions you have requested." We never requested any condition, their commitment letter indicated that they are granting us the loan financing 95%. On Thursday, June 5, I spoke to our loan officer and was assured that there is nothing else they need and now we're just working on picking a closing date. The next day, my wife who has been very stressed about the situation, called the mortgage processor. My wife does not have a nasty bone in her so I know for a fact the phone conversation would have been nothing less than kind and respectful. The mortgage processor got annoyed that she called only one day, snapped at her about giving at least 24 hours and hung up on her. My wife called me on the verge of tears and I realized at this time that I needed a backup plan and began looking for another mortgage lender.
After we have received a confirmation that they had all the documents needed, the entire month of June went by. Now it has been over three months and I can't even get a courtesy of a reply from Astoria Federal. Needless to say, we went with the other Mortgage Company who came through in the most expedient manner.
I sent a complaint letter to the Astoria Federal CEO Office. I received an expedient response. Albeit they stick to the excuse of the "attached condo", they were kind enough to refund me my application fees. This was a surprising kind gesture from Astoria Federal since I they did indicate that the $500 processing fees were non-refundable. The fact remained —they rescinded their commitment letter which is ground enough to cause a heart ache for anyone applying for a loan and who have made plans and moves based on a commitment letter.
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