anita luo brooklyn Real Estate

Due to sub-prime crisis and the wall-street meltdown, banks are tighten their lending requirements.  All mortgages has to be applied with stated income, which means those no-income/no-assets loans are history.  I have seen 2 deals fell thru recently since the buyer didn't show enough income to support the loan amount even they could put 30-50% down-payment.  For condos, it's even worse.  Most banks requires the building has minimum 51% sold(or In contract).  Check related article below;

http://ny.therealdeal.com/articles/15078/elert

So, if your tax return shows less than $30k per year, check with the bank before you start looking to make sure that you are still qualified.  You may not approved for the FHA loan limit!

A friend of mine try to purchase a property all cash, 50% of the fund is coming from a home equity line who he opened 2 years ago. 2 weeks before the closing found out the line is freezed by the bank?%#% 

If you have a equity line, check before you use it, most of the banks are no longer letting you use the line unless your income qualifies.  Especially WAMU, CitiBank, WellsFargo, etc.  Heard BOA is more flexible, but could change any day! 

Here's a recent article from Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/02/realestate/02mort.html?ref=realestate