Surprising bank products to help finance your projects

In this market it can be difficult to get financing for your projects, but don't lose all hope. Some banks have programs that you may not know about. One of the keys to getting financed either on the front end or the back end is to check in with your local bank. Banks are always trying different ways to keep their customers and while it may not seem that way you may be able to talk to a banker and find ways you didn't think possible to get access to money. Their are several different ways, such as regular mortgage loans, home equity lines of credit, business loans, business lines of credit, bank credit cards, etc.

 One specific example I can give you is this: A customer of mine had recently purchased a foreclosure property at auction and had rehabbed it in about 6 weeks. The purchase price when he bought it was 120k. He put about 35k into repairs and was looking for longer term financing that he could not get anywhere else on the secondary market because of "seasoning" issues. When we looked at the application and the appraised value, the property was now worth 260K. Our final loan to value was 70% and we did the loan based upon the good credit and low loan to value. The borrower did a "zero points" and "low closing costs" (about $500) equity line of credit and we have a solid customer who will come back in the future and hopefully refer others to our bank.

So the moral of this story is this: Check in with your local bank or credit union and see how their programs work. You may just be surprised at what they have to offer.