ING Direct Mortgage Review(s) and Rates

admin December 1, 2012 7 Comments »

The Dutch bank ING has been growing their presence quite aggressively here in the United States – so much so in fact that Capital One acquired their savings line for $9 billion in early 2012.

Their online division, ING Direct, has also grown quite well in the fertile US soil mainly due to the low APRs they are able to offer on their adjustable rate mortgage products.

ING Direct’s home loan and mortgage line is very narrowly focused and consists of just a 5/1 ARM and a 7/1 ARM. This narrow focus has allowed them to process significant volumes of applicants even in the midst of our flimsy US housing market.

With their 5/1 and 7/1 ARM’s your rate will remain fixed for either 5 or 7 years, depending on which loan you chose, with a sigle balloon payment due at the end of the loan’s life.

Sometimes (but not always) ING will allow you to opt for an additional term once your loan is up for the “cost” of a month’s worth of mortgage payments. The problem is that you will still have to pay the balloon payment which will set you up for a fairly heavy bill.

[5 must ask questions to ask you mortgage lender before taking out a loan]

We would suggest applying for one of these short term ARM mortgages only if you plan on selling your home sometime within the life of the loan (preferably right at the end). This will allow for you to reap the most in savings in terms of low APRs.

With the rates below you’ll get a lock period of 60 days on home loans and 45 days on refinances. The lock periods will start on the day you apply for the loan.

ING Direct ARM Mortgage Rates:

Product	Rate	APY	Projected Rate*
5/1 ARM	2.750%	3.176%	3.375%
7/1 ARM	3.000%	3.221%	3.375%

Terms and Conditions:

*The rates above are assuming loans of $250,000. The projected rate in the last column is the APR after the ballon payment has been taken into account.

[See how much equity is required to refinance an existing mortgage]

Compare with today’s lowest rates in your area below.

http://www.ingdirect.com Jane

Beware ING says they have no application fee. Here is my recent experience. What they do is just lead you along until the point where you have to accept the offer and the application fee is due. Then there is still another step in the process, the appraisal. Of course, their appraiser then says the house can’t be appraised for the amount of the loan. You paid the fee and get no mortgage.
Kurt

Dont get a mortgage through ING! They sometimes have ok rates, but customer service, application fees and headaches make it not worth it at all!!!
Amy

Don’t apply for a mortgage through ING. I spent so much money faxing them paperwork and then they kept asking for more. They wanted me to send them court documents from my divorce and even though I sent everything I had, they said it wasn’t enough. They wanted documentation that doesn’t exist! Then they tell me that since my child support will end in a few years, they can’t approve the mortgage and charged me $350. When I called to dispute this, I was told that it gets charged if the loan is disapproved for ANY reason! That means they are just offering mortgages to get this fee from everyone dumb enough to apply because they will always find a reason to not approve it! I am VERY disappointed with this experience. I have been a customer of theirs for 10 years but now I am ready to close all my accounts.
Neil

ING Customer Service

Although ING has very competitive rates, they should not be used for mortgages. They set a variety of tricks and traps for unwary consumers to capture bogus fees. Many comments on this website will attest to this problem, I will describe our issue.

We refinanced our home, starting in October 2010. It took nearly five months to complete the refinancing, which was irritating, but not the focus of this note. In May of 2011 we decided to move for reasons unrelated to the mortgage. I knew that we had agreed to a 1% pre-payment penalty, but asked, and was told, that this penalty would be waived if we financed the new purchase with ING.

We got contract on a new house prior to selling our first property. When we went to finance our new purchase with ING, we were rejected. The reason given was that we were attempting to hold two primary residences. ING insisted that this was our intention even though we had contracted with a realtor to list the home, and the homes were approximately five miles apart. ING would not accept that we were trying to sell the house. When we asked for a waiver of prepayment penalty, since we had attempted to purchase the new home from ING they refused, again claiming that we were trying to own two primary residences. When we pointed out that if we wanted to hold both homes, we wouldn’t care about prepayment they sent the following message:

Hi XXXX,

We will review the 1% penalty if/when you decide to sell your current home. If you have additional questions, please give us a call at 1-877-464-2151.

Thanks,

Justen

ING DIRECT USA
Member FDIC
Equal Housing Lender

Less than a month later, we received an offer on our existing home (the one financed by ING). At this time, we had already gone through financing with another institution, one that realized that we probably weren’t trying to own two primary residences in the same city.

However, when I called to check on the waiver of the prepayment penalty I was refused. Crystal (Employee number 701590) told me that regardless of what I had been told, or what had been written previously, they would not waive the prepayment penalty. She instructed me to apply again. When I told her that ING was not trustworthy enough for me to reapply, and that we had furthermore already paid some fees to arrange our new mortgage, she told me that ING would enforce the penalties. She did promise that Justen would get a slap on the wrist for what he had written us, I’m not sure how that will help me.

$1800 is certainly not enough for me to ever trust ING again. They are a very poorly run operation. Hold times for any discussion or decision are eternal. In our case, instead of financing our new purchase, they decided to grab our money and run with it. This bank neither wants nor deserves new customers. Do not be fooled by their rates. Do not finance your loan with ING. I have learned my lesson.
Neil

ING has resolved the above listed dispute to my satisfaction. If moderated, please remove my comment.
Neil

ING has resolved the issue listed above just because I publicized this issue. Is it worth going with ING?
BankVibe

Hey Neil, Yes, it is moderated but I’ll keep the comment for the record. I really appreciate you sharing. I had a friend do the exact same thing, he was unhappy with the (lack of) customer service at another major bank regarding his checking account, savings and credit card that he had with them. He was never able to get it resolved until he went social with his issue (twitter, facebook, and blog commenting). Once he made enough “noise” he was able to get everything resolved and even got a few additional bonuses from the bank.