The Rhode Island Housing and Mortgage Finance Corporation announced that it has raised the income and purchase price limits for its low interest loan program to their highest points ever.
First-time home buyers hoping to take advantage of the agency’s special financing now can spend as much as $198,500 for a home.
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“We are playing catch-up with a real estate market where double-digit price appreciation has become the norm.,” said Chris Barnett a spokesman of the RIHMFC.
For the first time, Rhode Island will have two sets of purchase price limits based on geography.
For most of Rhode Island, the new purchase price limits jumped by an average of 12 percent. The new ceilings range from $150,000 for existing single family homes and condos to $198,000 for four-family properties.
In Newport, Middletown, and Portsmouth the new limit is $198,000 for everything from single family homes to four-family properties. That’s a 48.5 percent increase over the current limit for existing single family homes, for example.
There were 584 single-family homes on the market under the old limits. With the new limits, that number has jumped 39 percent to 812 listings statewide.
“The change gives realtors another tool,” Barnett said. “They can show borrowers a lot more homes now and they can give homeowners who have been sitting on the fence another reason to put their property on the market.”
Newly built homes have their own purchase price ceiling. For most of Rhode Island, borrowers now can pay as much as $189,500 for newly built single family home and condos. In Newport, Middletown, and Portsmouth the figure is $198,500.
“Before, very little new construction qualified for our program. Now for the first time there are new home developments in Cranston, Westerly, Charlestown, and other communities that we can do business in,” Barnett said.
At the same time the first-time home buyers hoping to take advantage of the agency’s special financing can now earn as much as $61,180.
Borrowers will now qualify for Rhode Island Housing’s low interest loans if their home does not exceed $53,200 for a one- or two-person household or $61,180 for a household of three or more. Those figures represent a 6.8 percent increase over the old limits.
