If you are married and plan on buying a house where you are not on the note, just your spouse is – it is called a “non purchasing spouse”. Also sometimes called a non-borrowing spouse. And for the people who are in the situation where one married person is buying a home and is married and the spouse is not going on the note – there are rules that apply when trying to get an FHA loan (or any other type of loan really). For FHA loans, though here is how the rules generally work:

• A non purchasing spouse is defined as the spouse who is NOT on the mortgage loan.
• They may or may not be on the title to the property.
• In community property states, the non purchasing spouse may have a big impact on qualifying for a mortgage even though they are not on the loan because of something called “community property rules”.

Most of the time, if you live in a “community property state” (like Arizona for example) if you are a non purchasing spouse you will be required to sign a document that relinquishes your rights to the property being purchased and you are NOT required to sign the loan application or be a part of the loan application process. So that is the good news – that you don’t have to sign the note or the loan application.

In the event that you are in this situation, the bad news is that any of your debts that are not listed as debts of the borrowing spouse MUST be included in the borrower’s debt-to-income ratio and for many people here in Arizona, that puts them over the debt-to-income limits and as a result the borrower does not qualify.

So if you are in a situation where you have a non purchasing spouse, be sure to speak with your loan officer about what it means in your situation and if it is possible that you can still qualify. Get matched up with a loan officer who can help you get the rules sorted out and get into a FHA loan today – submit your information and start the process of getting qualified.

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