[♥♥The Queen Has Spoken♥♥]

Many moons ago when we took out a VA mortgage we were not given the choice of lender. The VA approved the initial loan. Then the loan was sold to a lender who had to accept the mortgage rate approved by the VA.Now if you mean VA as in Virginia you should have been more specific. In that case shop around... Do your own foot work, Because only you can find the best mortgage for you.

[Kara C]

interest rate around or under average. anyone w/ experience?

[rosern37]

VA mortgages have higher interest rates than conventional loans. There is also the matter of the funding fee which is a percentage of the loan. You can pay this in cash or tack it onto your mortgage. You don't need a down payment, that's a good thing. I think the funding fee is 3% and goes up with each mortgage after the first one. We bought our first house for around 119K and the funding fee was around 4K. Our second house, I think the fee was more like 5% or something. Also with a VA loan you don't have to pay PMI insurance which can be hundreds per month tacked onto your payment. Positives of a VA loan: no PMI and don't have to come up with a down paymentNegatives of a VA loan: big funding fee and higher interest ratesI guess it depends on your personal situation and how long you will be in the house. If you don't pay a down payment and add a big funding fee to your loan, you end up upside down right off the bat, especially in this market. But the market will turn around in time but will you move before it does? If so, you may still be upside down on your mortgage and lose even more money when you sell your house. One other thing that happened to us with the VA loans was the red tape and paperwork slowed things up a bit. They require so many things. For instance, we had to send off digital pictures the day before we closed to show that we had splash blocks on the down spouts. If we didn't send the pictures, we wouldn't have closed. The VA also has their own house appraisers that you must use to have the loan approved. There are only certain appraisers that are VA appraisers and usually there is only one guy who does all the VA appraisals in a large area. So the wait can be long and they are usually a**holes because they know they are the only one and you need them and they don't have to be nice. This has just been our experience. We are now in our third home. We went conventional this time and have the best interest rate ever, 5.5% on a 30 year fixed. Our first house was 7% and the second was 6%. Third times a charm!