How Mortgage Insurance Works

Typically, when the down payment on the purchase of a home is lower than 20% of the value of the property, mortgage insurance is required. Mortgage insurance comes in 2 forms: private mortgage insurance (PMI) and lenders mortgage insurance (LMI). Both are policies that protect lenders from the possibility of borrowers defaulting on loans. The lender purchases the mortgage insurance policy and passes the premiums down as a fee added to the  borrower’s monthly mortgage payments.

A mortgagee (or borrower) must qualify for mortgage insurance by meeting certain conditions that have been set forth by Fannie Mae (the Federal National Mortgage Association). Such conditions include:

                * qualifications of the borrower;

                * type of property borrowed against;

                * size of the mortgage.

A mortgage that’s insured by having met the required conditions is then eligible to be resold in the mortgage-backed securities market, allowing lenders to sell older mortgages and thereby originate (or make) more new loans than they otherwise might be able to.

Fortunately for buyers, the costs of getting mortgage insurance can be folded into the monthly mortgage payments via a process known as capitalization. Premiums capitalized this way then provide a further tax deduction in any jurisdictions that permit mortgage payments to be tax deductible.

As many borrowers are unable to afford a 20% down payment and thus required to pay mortgage insurance, a financing technique was developed to aid them in still being able to afford buying a home. This technique involves a first mortgage (or primary mortgage) that covers 80% of the purchase price, and a second mortgage for another 10% of the purchase price, leaving the borrower to come up with a down payment of only 10% of the purchase price. This financing technique is familiarly called: 80-10-10.

In the case of 80-10-10 financing, the interest rate on the 10% second mortgage is higher than that of the first, but the requirement for paying regular mortgage insurance premiums is eliminated. This makes the 80-10-10 financing technique a more affordable alternative despite the higher interest rate on the second mortgage, and allows borrowers to pay down the mortgage debt faster. The two mortgages can then be combined once the borrower’s home equity reaches 20%, once again eliminating the mortgage insurance requirement.

A variation on this technique is called 80-15-5 and could be obtained by borrowers who only have enough money for a 5% down payment.