Mortages In DR

NMoose wrote:

Hi All and Good Morning,

New to the forum but joined due to the energy and great quality of conversations-responses! We live in Ontario but plan to make DR a place to hang our hats in winter and eventually spend all the time there. Sosua, Encuentro area is what we like so far. Interested in knowing if anybody has ideas and thoughts on getting Mortgages from Scotia Bank.

I will start with this and than once browsed the forum (to save Y'all) if answers are there will post more.

Many Thanks!

Hello, You can get it only from ScotiaBank in Canada, to get it here if you are not legal resident or citizen you can not apply for one mortgage

Canada will work.... pledge your Cdn assets as security

I seem to remember this being done.

Thanks @riva31 and @Willieweb.

I worked with both ScotiaBank and Banco Popular for a mortgage in Cabarete.  I’m a US citizen and first approached Scotia as I figured the Canadian connection would make it easier.
I was wrong. ScotiaBank stalled (or just fiddled around) for months. In the meantime I approached BP through my developer. I was approved about 2 months later.  Of course that is molasses slow compared to the US, but great for here.
ScotiaBank did finally approve me a month after BP.
From my experience they will only approve 50% of the amount. Interest is higher here and is variable. All transactions are in USD.  All in all BP has been good to work with.

We, too, have applied for a mortgage with Scotiabank.  How many months did it take from application to approval?  What loan percentage of the purchase price did they approve?

We observed that they (Scotiabank) made statements about information off our US tax returns that was clearly erroneous.  They seem to be stalling for no good reason as if they're afraid to make a decision.

Hello everyone.

I don't work directly in a bank but I am a real estate agent in the DR Each bank works differently, depending on nationality you can choose one bank or another. Obviously they are all very rigorous with the documents to be submitted. One good thing is that in the DR you don't need to be a citizen or resident to take a financing if you buy a home here and still live in your country. There is also a way to apply for residence visa by investment (depends on the amount of your purchase or investment)
I am at your service for any help in terms of looking for a property and what is necessary for bank financing. My name is Angelica Ruiz and I work at Algonovo Real Estate they can locate all our information on the web or on my WhatsApp.
I hope this information will be of your help
Greetings

Getting a mortgage here also depends upon the property.  Not all banks will mortgage any property.  Some properties they are not interested in at all.  That may tell you something.  If you get a bank mortgage it usually means the property is safe and secure.  The bank will hold the title and if there is any question about the title, they won't give you a mortgage.

New developments often have an association with 1 or more banks making mortgages easier to obtain.  It's usually the bank the builder has borrowed from to fund the project.

Welcome Angelica. Please take an ad in our classified section.  Thank you for the information on mortgages, it's helpful .

One correction, investment in real estate alone does not qualify for investor status residency.

@angelicaruiz90

We got a mortgage with Scotiabank - they lock in the rate and it was competitive and now with it locked is dramatically lower than our rate in Canada. The rates are locked for 2-5 years - you choose the term and then they renew without you choosing or negotiating the rate.

They are slow - we got a pre-approval as I asked for it - then we waited a few months after we finalized the sale. It almost meant we lost the house but since it is so slow - no one else could get cash any faster for the house we were buying. We also put it in the terms they could not take it back due to finance processing - the home sellers didn't want to honour it but if they didn't we would have fought it...

Also to be clear they don't review things the same as we do in Canada ( we are also from Ontario) and like many things their rationality doesn't always make sense but it isn't out of them being unjust or dragging their feet - it is just very uncommon to have mortgages and they do honour them to Canadians and Americans and no - you don't need to be a resident - but you do need to have a good down payment. We had less than 50% but it was close to 40%. Scotiabank is slow and commonly the people you are working with are not financial experts - we got frustrated sometimes but in the end it is a certain department and they approved - we had three people helping us in the local office and going in between us and the approving finance department and I am an Accountant - I had all the documents lined up and ready and it seemed to take forever...

I would recommend working with them but cover all your basis - ensure all your signed documents allow unlimited timing for the finance approval - and get a pre-approval. Pre-approval is not guaranteed but it does help to know if you have a chance of getting approved. In the end I asked them to show us how they calculated the debt and by paying some very small amounts it allowed us to reach the target ratio (it is NOT the same as here) and this was only in the final stages - they can't give you those numbers until the final hours. But they can tell you the interest rate upfront and tell you likely what you will be dealing with.

Best of luck! We love our home in Sosua

Glad it worked out for you.

One question about all your comments, you said your rate is better than Canada,  what rate and term did you get?  What would it have been in Canada?   

And I totally understand if you don't want to post that on a public forum. 

At the time the rate was 2 or 3% in the DR and in Canada it was 1-2% but because it was locked we are now at 2.5 or 3.5 (can't remember) but in Canada its 5-6% because in Canada its variable  - it depends on when you get the mortgage but the rates are good - considering its the DR

My only bad experience in the DR are the banks.

i had to put 60% down because the house was appraised at a lower price because they deemed it would take the area anlong time to be developed. I do not want the area to develop.

The bank took a long time to give the mortgage and came up with conditions at the last minute such as:

• Lower valuation of the house although we know the house is worth a lot more
• 10 year mortgage
• fixed interest rate for only 2 years
• re-evaluate mortgage after 2 years
• We had to set up a savings with the bank from which they withdraw the monthly payments

We used Banco Santa Cruz. They had a very good internet banking system: BancaNet and they changed it to a bad system. I used to transfer money via RIA (kind of a Wester Union) because they charged $3.50 only per transaction. My bank suddenly stopped accepting these transfers - now ee have to use Citibank who charges $50.00 per transaction.

My advice is to pay off the mortgage as fast as possible once you get it to avoid dealing with banks.

Everything else is prefect there. The internet company is great and the speed and connection is awesome, the electric company is great. These two companies deal online and it is very easy to pay them or to change your plan. They are also very responsive and competent.

My house is in Las Terrenas and the price already went up many folds from one year ago.

good luck

A note about wire transfers and attendant fees:  I use Banco Popular.  I am able to write a personal check to myself and deposit to my USA account without any charges   Funds clear in a couple of days.

I am also Canadian, You will have to verify interest rates to see which is most affordable but have you considered using a line of credit from Canada?  If you own a home in Canada it should (given your financial status) be easy to establish a line of credit with enough money to pay for your purchase in the DR.  This is the route I took 10 years ago and paid cash for 2 apartments from my LOC.  When I sold my house in Canada, I paid off the line of credit.  At that time the interest rate on my LOC was much, much lower than any mortgage in the DR not to mention, no red tape or paperwork.

@berthold24 Check out Remitly. I use it to transfer from my US bank to BSC all the time. The fee depends on the amount transferred, but it's a lot less than wires!

I also use Remitly and find it is excellent - sometimes it will transfer in just a few hours and not costly. I also checked and I think the Scotiabank rate now is between 8-9% so a little high but not dramatically different than current rates...

@Tripp789

Hi, oh God this process was painful. I can speak for the the other banks but Scotia the worst. they are non sense, anything they told us didnt click at all for us. we started the whole application process first week of March. sent them every single document they requested us more than 3 times. and because they take forever to pre approve you the documents expired and you have to keep resending them to the bank. We got frustrated couple times.

also communication with them is horrible, they dissapear on you at a point that we request to change the representative to finalize the process.

Not only that, they calculared the debt/income wrong. They didnt use our real salary even having our employment letters,,  Paystubs, Tax returns and W2 Documents, and OMG everything from us. they pre approved us, only our profile they said. and lower our request amount around 30,000 arojnd end of May. Then the process doesn't  end there, we found an appraisal person that did the appraisal and provide all the property information to the bank. we keep sending same documents over and over around 3-4 times. Yesterday they told us that the application is approved with a condition, they wanted to see where the money for our down payment is coming from. we with our HELOC and some of our saving. we didnt take the money right away from the LOC and dint put it in our account so they told us is been or for less than 30 days. he keep saying we cant do a downpayment using the LOC, im like what? people use the LOC all the time to invest and do whatever they want with it. Well he finalize the conversation saying that this application  will be rejected after being preapproved, and I have the sense that he was looking for money on the side. PEOPLE RUN AWAY FROM SCOTIA

@snowinpalm

in my experience and based on what I read before they are the WORST, slow I understand but they will keep requesting you same documents over and over saying that they expired. they dint do standard process between the same employees and everyone will tell you a different thing. they calculate things wrong then come to you and say they will fix it but dont recognize they did wrong they will come with a blah blah blah always about the ”bank policies” that any of them make sense.

@planner

we need help? we had a bad experience with Scotiabank yesterday and found this forum really informative. I wish I can talk to a manager at a bank because we have the feeling that the repredentative wabted some $ on the side

@Adalharis

The sad part and unfortunately you will encounter that experience many times with any businesses or government agencies in the DR...it's a big adjustment for many that move to the DR. Hope things go better for you

What a terrible experience you had.

@CHRISTOPHER DAVID56

what is the contact you have for scotia?

I can tell you that all the banks are the same. We had an unreal experience at BHD.  I have no idea how they can continuously lose documents, over and over again.  They change and adjust as it suits them!  We managed the process but it took 6 months and constant management.

In my opinion, reporting this to a manager will get you nowhere!

@Tripp789 glad you found a bank that could help you, I work in the industry and this is an aspect of the buying process I dread as I’m use to the faster New York  pace, two months sounds about right as far as the average turn around time. There are some local lenders that go up to 70% most will issue the loans in pesos and some don’t require an international credit background check. Definitely having patience is key.

@Tripp789 can you please clarify your process a bit more as it is not clear what you mean.

I think your process is about avoiding transfer fees when depositing monies into your DR Banco Popular account…yet unclear.

Thank you.

@ondami

Very simple process,  exactly the same as in the USA 

I deposit a personal USA check made out to myself and deposit it into my DR USD account.  it usually clears within a few days.

easiest and cheapest way to transfer money.  The only catch is you have to be in The DR to do it.  BP will not accept digital app deposits from out of country 

Gracias!  I thought that is what you meant.

@Tripp789

Hi again,

Question, I read you post before and we also applied for a mortgage at Scotia and was now thinking of BP, but they rate in BP is super high compared to Scotia. We have been working since beggining of March with Scotia got pre approved and still today nothing has being finalized. I am curious to know how bad or long was your process once you got pre approved? It seems like when we request for an update they all say different things, or that the system is down (me coming from DR know that this is an excuse customer service use to keep the customers quiet and happy).

Did you stayed with Scotia or BP?

Thank you so much in advance!

We never got approved by Scotia because they fiddled around so long (3-4 months) and then BP stepped up and approved us.  Scotia only reacted at that point asking for us to reconsider them!

BP wasn’t all that speedy either, taking about 2 months   All in all i have to say we’ve been happy with BP.  their mobile app and website aren’t great but usually work, and with the mortgage you’ll be assigned an account rep who will help with issues 

Thank you so much for responding. thats about right, they being holding us around now since fist week of may that we got pre approved, the worst is that they dint give you an explanation of whats going on and give stupid excuses. Thanks to your comment about BP we just started with them this Friday!!!! thank you! 🥰

@Tripp789

Do you have a contact at BP? I am about to start the application process which I am dreading after reading this thread and being a Canadian