Frequently asked questions

To state it simply, Tomo puts you in control. We’ve rebuilt the mortgage process from the ground up to offer a streamlined digital experience that saves you time, effort, and money. And that’s how it should be, because homebuyers deserve better.

Email, text, or call us any day of the week (mortgageteam@hellotomo.com, 737-510-2523). Our weekday hours are from 8AM-8PM CST, Saturdays from 9AM-3PM CST, and Sundays from 11AM-5PM CST. We are closed on New Year’s Day, Martin Luther King Jr Day, Memorial Day, Juneteenth, Independence Day, Labor Day, Veteran’s Day, Thanksgiving Day, and Christmas Day. If you need us on Halloween, we’ll be there, likely wearing a costume.

Tomo currently operates in:

• California
• Colorado
• Connecticut
• District of Columbia
• Florida
• Georgia
• Idaho
• Illinois
• Maryland
• Michigan
• Minnesota
• New Jersey
• North Carolina
• Ohio
• Oregon
• Pennsylvania
• South Carolina
• Tennessee
• Texas
• Virginia
• Washington
• Wisconsin

Tomo offers the following types of mortgages:

• Conventional, Jumbo, FHA, and VA
• 15- and 30-year fixed rate loans and 5-, 7-, and 10-year ARMs
• Loans starting at $75,000
• Loans for single family houses, townhomes, condos, and 2-4 unit buildings
• Loans for primary residences, second homes, and investment properties

We don’t currently offer loans for mobile homes, land-only, construction-only, or co-ops loans, but we’re always looking to expand our horizons.

Lots of kinds. We mainly need you to be a US citizen or resident (permanent or non-permanent) and have a credit score above 580. Great singing voice is always a bonus.

Our minimum down payment varies by loan type (e.g., conventional, FHA, VA), property type (e.g., single family), planned property use (e.g., primary residence, vacation home), and credit score. Check around, and you’ll see that’s really low. For example, our VA loans start at 0% down payment, our conventional loan start at 3% down payment, and our FHA loans start at 3.5% down payment.

Before you sell off your vintage spoon collection, know that you can use many different types of assets to fund your down payment, including:

• Savings, checking, or CD accounts
• Stocks and bonds
• Money from the sale of your current home
• Crypto, assuming it can be converted to US dollars prior to close
• Retirement accounts, including 401k and loans against them
• Gifts from relatives (thanks, Aunt Sue!)

Have another type of asset you’re looking to use? We're happy to discuss.

Not at present, although we are excited to in the future!

No, afraid not. Our sole focus is on home buyers, so we only do purchase loans. It’s this singleminded focus that makes us so good.

Rates are definitely not one size fits all. We work with you to understand your goals and help you find a rate that suits. The rates available to you will vary based on:

• Loan product (e.g., conventional, FHA)
• Credit score and credit history
• Geography
• Loan amount
• Down payment
• Property use (e.g., primary residence)
• Property type (e.g., single family)
• Time - rates change every day and sometimes multiple times a day!

Once we know what rates you’re eligible for, we’ll help you navigate the tradeoffs between a par rate and rates that include points or credits. For more on that topic skip down a few questions!

Yep. We have your back. As soon as you’re under contract, a Loan Advisor will talk to you about locking your rate in to protect yourself from rate increases.

We want to protect you from high rates, not hold you back from a better deal. If rates go up after you’ve locked, it doesn’t affect you at all! If rates go down, your Loan Advisor can work with you to ensure your rate is as competitive as possible. It's the best of both worlds.

We can help you to do that! We want you to feel confident in how much you can afford, so we introduced Tomo Lock & Shop. Lock & Shop lets you lock a rate now—without a property address—so it’s available when future you does finally find that perfect home. If rates go up during that time, no problem, yours is protected. If they happen to fall, you’re still good, there’s a one-time rate adjustment option once you have an accepted offer on a home. See our full terms and conditions here.

Points and credits are like knobs you can adjust to change your rate and closing costs. Say you want to lower your interest rate, you can pay more upfront in the form of points. If you want to lower your closing costs, you can pay a higher interest rate later in the form of credits. The longer you plan to stay in your home, the more likely it is that points, as opposed to credits, make sense for you. But the math is different on every loan, and we’re happy to help crunch the numbers for you.

Absolutely. We offer mortgages with points, mortgages with credits, and par mortgages (which have neither points nor credits). We're always up front about which is which, and we help you find what’s right in your situation.

Put simply, it’s our commitment to getting you a great rate. If you find a better deal, we’ll match it, guaranteed. We call it Price Match, but you can call it “money in my pocket.”

Give us a valid, comparable Loan Estimate doc, dated within one business day of submission to Tomo, with the lender info. That’s it. Price Match can be used once per loan and can be used on primary residences only. See our full terms and conditions here.

It’s first-of-its-kind coverage that gives you certainty that you won’t be scrambling to bring more cash to the closing even if the appraisal falls short.

Get pre-approved and then work with a Tomo partner agent who will verify your property address before you make an offer. You’ll also need a 10% or higher down payment. For full terms and conditions see here.

Not to worry. Tomo Appraisal Coverage protects you from having to bring more cash to the close if that happens. Same APR, cash-to-close, and monthly payment - guaranteed.

Whether to waive the appraisal contingency is an important decision your real estate agent can help you make. Even with Appraisal Coverage, there are still good reasons to consider keeping your appraisal contingency. For instance if the appraisal comes back too low, you might not want to go through with the deal. Or maybe you would want to bargain for a price reduction. The appraisal contingency would give you those options. And it’s always good to have options.

A Tomo underwritten pre-approval gives everyone confidence in what you can afford. It’s a complete assessment of your ability to buy a home, including a review of your credit, assets, liabilities, income, and employment information. It’s not just a loan officer’s opinion of your eligibility; it’s underwriting’s signoff on your application. (Underwriting is the function that makes the final call on a loan application.) We make the process a snap by syncing accounts to instantly verify your information, letting us pre-approve you in a fraction of the time.

Other pre-approvals are generally too weak or too slow. If a lender issues you a pre-approval without verifying your information, your pre-approval is too weak, not even worth the paper it’s printed on. What does too slow look like? The traditional underwritten pre-approval process can take days if not weeks. But you want to know what you can afford before you go under contract, not after! When they get busy, lenders often stop offering underwritten pre-approvals altogether. By digitizing the application process, we’ve made it so easy that we can give you a firm answer in hours. That’s strong meets fast.

We mean you can skip the time and hassle of tracking down and uploading bank account statements, pay stubs, W2s, and mortgage statements. We let you do this by syncing your bank accounts via Finicity, looking up your income in payroll provider databases, pulling your credit and existing debt information from the credit bureaus, and even grabbing all of the details about the property you already own. Close the filing cabinet, we’ve got you covered!

Indeed! That’s one of the great things about our pre-approvals. We make it easy for you to edit your pre-approval application any time, day or night, so that you can explore what would happen if you, for example, increased your down payment or held onto your existing property and rented it out. Ready to make an offer? You can reduce the amount on your pre-approval letter to match your offer to avoid showing your hand to the seller. Just log in and click “Adjust home price.” Make that letter work for you.

A hard credit check is a critical part of getting a mortgage. It helps us confirm your eligibility and without it we can’t determine the type of mortgage product and interest rate you’ll qualify for. The impact of a mortgage hard credit check is low (typically 3-8 points points), is temporary (typically 12 months), and is usually the same no matter how many other mortgage hard credit checks you get in a 30 day period.

Pre-approval letters expire after 120 days. If your financial situation changes before then, you may also need an updated letter. The good news is that it’s easy to renew them, and we’re here to help you do so any time.

It depends. Mortgage rates change every day, and rates will most likely have changed by the time you go under contract. Here at Tomo, we're different because we give you the power to lock your rate and hang onto that number on your pre-approval letter. Talk to your loan advisor about our Lock & Shop option to make that happen!

Of course. We know one person can’t whistle a symphony. We’ll supply your Loan Advisor with your agent’s name and contact info early on so we can keep them updated as you progress with your application. We’re one team after all.

Nope. Nada. Tomo does not charge lender fees. No origination fees, processing fees, mystery fees, fee fees, or the like. No junk fees period. That means choosing Tomo saves you an average of $2,000 at closing.

Your closing costs reflect the full upfront cost of purchasing your home. You want this estimate to be as accurate as possible to make sure you have the right funds set aside to buy your house. We usually see closing costs that are around 3% of the loan but your exact closing costs will be based on your loan and your home. Standard closing costs include:

• Points or credits, if applicable, as determined when you select your rate
• Third-party costs (things we’re required to order on your behalf like title and appraisal)
• Pre-paid costs (interest and taxes for the remainder of your move-in month, before you make your first mortgage payment)
• Escrow payments, if applicable

We’re crystal clear about your rates and costs the entire way through so you’re always in the know.Once you find your home and submit your loan application, we’ll give you a Loan Estimate, a formal form that outlines all your closing costs. If anything changes, we’ll update you. We’ll also send you a closing disclosure 3 days before your closing date with an itemized breakdown so you know exactly where every penny is going.

Loan estimates are standard forms lenders use to tell you the cost of a mortgage loan, including rates and closing costs. They also happen to be great tools to use in comparing costs across lenders. The trick is to know what to look for. We’ve prepared a guide to help you on this front, explaining what costs vary by lender, what costs vary based on your choice of other service providers, and what costs don’t vary at all. Armed with this information, you’ll be able to choose the lender that offers you the best overall value.

It’s savings in your pocket. Really. When you work with a Tomo Brokerage Partner Agent and close your loan with Tomo, we’ll take $750 off your closing costs. Savings for you, and you get to work with a great agent!

When you use Tomo Mortgage and a Tomo Brokerage Partner Agent to buy your next home, you qualify. Boom. Savings! You just need to make sure your Tomo Brokerage Partner Agent is listed as your agent on your purchase and sale agreement.

Yep. You certainly can. Connecting early with a Tomo Brokerage Partner Agent can help you prepare and when you’re ready, Tomo Perks will be right there waiting for you.

Nope. You can work with any real estate agent you want. However, Tomo Perks is only available if you work with a Tomo Brokerage Partner Agent.

Tomo Brokerage Partner Agents are the best of the best when it comes to helping you find your next home. Tomo Brokerage only works with Partner Agents that meet our high standards of customer-centric service and specialize in the areas where you want to live. These experts help you hone in your search criteria, find great homes, negotiate a great deal, and navigate the entire process. They can also help you identify qualified professionals to put finishing touches on your new home.

After you tell us where you’re looking to purchase, Tomo Brokerage will share profiles for agent(s) who know that area well. Once you decide if you’d like to connect with an agent, we’ll introduce you.

Yep. Please reach out to your Tomo Brokerage Home Search Advisor, and they can introduce you to a different Partner Agent. We’ll work with both agents to make sure it’s a seamless transition.