My landlord gave me a 45% rent increase effective mid-August so I decided last month to try to buy a home. I found out there's a down payment assistance program for the disabled so I took the homeowner education class and got qualified for that. I also applied for a mortgage... here's the problem.
I am approved for a mortgage BUT my credit score is 20 points too low to be able to use gift or grant funds for the down payment. I live primarily on SSDI so there's no way I can save for a down payment myself, and certainly not by mid-August. I've been working on my credit for a month now and it's improved dramatically, but this big bump is what's leaving me 20 points shy of what I need (it was even lower before I started!).
I don't have any big, obvious ways to improve my credit score. I was abruptly unemployed for health reasons in 2011 and entirely without income until SSDI was approved in 2014. I had a car repo'd and a bunch of late student loan payments (I thought they were in forebearance but apparently not for one chunk of time that accrued a whopping 20+ lates). Oh, and a paid tax lien. I already got all of the completely weird stuff off my report, like my ex's defaulted credit cards, so there's no more errors. Just old late payments and financial problems that were very much tied to past circumstances.
After all that mess, I stopped using credit entirely. I bought my car cash. I didn't have a single credit card. I've opened two now and I keep one at zero and one at 6-8%. I'm an AU on two of my dad's CCs with positive pay history. I don't think there's anything that's going to miraculously give me that 20 points.
So I'm wondering if anyone has any creative ideas for coming up with a down payment? Are there loans that will allow you to use down payment assistance or gift funds with a 600 credit score? I have been paying my rent perfectly for the past 2 years in this home and I can afford the upkeep of a home... what I CAN'T afford is Seattle's ever-rising rental rates. I need a home with a fixed payment fast. Really running out of options here. Thanks for any suggestions you might have.
