patrick.net

NuttBoxer NuttBoxer says

... So we’ll be making a downpayment of most likely $40K, and monthly payments of $1,800. I figured under current rates for a 30 year fixed, that qualifies us for a loan of up to $350K. Does this sound right?

Not even close. 350k mortgage, at 4% interest for 30 years comes out to $1,670.95, that leaves you $129 a month to cover PMI, Home owners insurance, property taxes and the HOA fee if there is one. I highly recommend you recheck you figures. I say your looking at more like a 260k mortgage amount, this gives you a $1,250 mortgage payment, and something like $550 left over to cover PMI, Home owners and Property taxes. It's also highly dependent of what property taxes would be. Don't guess look them up for the area your planning to buy in and figure out what your tax bill will be.

PT's are around 1% thanks to Prop 13. Now the MCC will reduce the federal tax owed by up to 20% of the mortgage interest yearly. Taking that into consideration you still say $500 in addition to mortgage payment?

Just to be clear, the $35,000 is part of another FHA loan program called DCCA, not money we have saved up. This program allows us to contribute as little as 1% of the purchase price, hence $5,000 of our own money for a total of $40K. After everything we've seen in the last two years, is anyone really surprised these kinds of programs exist?

Appreciate the feedback on the numbers. As far as financial risk, there's little to none other than repairs, since the program ensures we pay the same monthly amount we would pay renting. If I were to get laid off, etc, the program maintains our payment at 30% of our income, so the amount of federal money going into the mortgage would just go up.

The rep for the program can't wait to get us buying either. The central government wants people buying houses, especially if their dependent on big brother to keep them in their home.

If you're talking about getting an FHA loan, they will crawl so far up your Economic Butt, you'll have to carry the "ONE" every time you take a crap.

If you're talking about a "CO-Signer" then you're 100R% out of luck.

You'll need a W2 from the same company for more than two years, with no lapse in employment.
Even if you left a company to go to another company that pays more money and you didn't miss a day of employment in the process. You're back at square one with the new employer. Meaning they'll view it as you having only less than one year at the job.

Successfully self employed people are having the hardest time, to qualify for FHA loans.

The most qualified are the Latin lady that Cleans "Crazzy Eddie's" car lot office, which she has done for the last five years. She has a better chance of getting an FHA loan than Crazy Eddie.

Now that's not to say Crazy Eddie, can't get prime financing else where if his Credit is willing.
But he wont get an FHA loan.

Sure FHA loans can go as high as 700K or something crazy like that, but the truth is, it's the people eying the 200K and less properties that are getting these loans.

Like who makes the kind of money for 300K-700K houses on a W2?

Does it sound to good to be true? Run Nuttboxer Run! you are being scamed!

NuttBoxer says

PT’s are around 1% thanks to Prop 13. Now the MCC will reduce the federal tax owed by up to 20% of the mortgage interest yearly. Taking that into consideration you still say $500 in addition to mortgage payment?

1% of what? The purchase price? If you brought a 400k house, the taxes would be 1% of that, or $4,000, that equals $333 a month, PMI is based upon what you put down in 5% increments. So if you put down 4%, it's counted as 0% down, if you put down 9% its counted as 5%, 14% down is counted as 10% when they are setting your PMI rates. PMI generally ranges from .05% to 1% of the mortgage amount, so a 350k mortgage could be any where from $1,750 to $3,500 a year, that works out to $145 to $291 a month in PMI, Home Owners insurance (fire protection) is generally around $800 to $1,000 a year, that's another $100 a month, total expenses over and above the mortgage payment, $725. If you have a HOA, that ranges anywhere from $50 to $400 a month depending on the development.

In short i say YES, at least $500 in addition to the mortgage amount. And while you make get back 20% of your mortgage yearly interest, it's is generally a tax write off not cash into your pocket, you have to have the cash upfront before you get anything back. Let just say hypothetically the government give you back a nice fat check every year for your "20% of your mortgage yearly interest" thingy, the first you you would have paid $17,382 in interest on your 350k mortgage at 4% interest, that's only $3,476, that's not going to go far when you have to cough up an extra $725 a month in extra non mortgage expenses, your money is only going to last you 4.8 months.

This is one of the reasons the home bubble was formed, people fail to take into account all of the expenses related to owning a property. These are just the absolute basics. How is the house heated, how much is that going to cost, generally larger houses cost more to heat and cool. How old is the roof? How old is the HVAC system, will you have the 10k available to fix / replace when the system craps out if you buy an older house?

Tenouncetrout says

If you’re talking about getting an FHA loan, they will crawl so far up your Economic Butt, you’ll have to carry the “ONE” every time you take a crap.
If you’re talking about a “CO-Signer” then you’re 100R% out of luck.
You’ll need a W2 from the same company for more than two years, with no lapse in employment.

Even if you left a company to go to another company that pays more money and you didn’t miss a day of employment in the process. You’re back at square one with the new employer. Meaning they’ll view it as you having only less than one year at the job.
Successfully self employed people are having the hardest time, to qualify for FHA loans.
The most qualified are the Latin lady that Cleans “Crazzy Eddie’s” car lot office, which she has done for the last five years. She has a better chance of getting an FHA loan than Crazy Eddie.
Now that’s not to say Crazy Eddie, can’t get prime financing else where if his Credit is willing.

But he wont get an FHA loan.
Sure FHA loans can go as high as 700K or something crazy like that, but the truth is, it’s the people eying the 200K and less properties that are getting these loans.
Like who makes the kind of money for 300K-700K houses on a W2?

This is under the FHA and HUD(Section 8), but it's not FHA loan. Section 8 Homeownership is basically Section 8 Rental Assistance, but they're helping you buy a house instead of rent it.

RUN don't walk RUN!

Well...I will concede it is wiser for the government to support home ownership than rentals. It's the price tag of this assistance that I can't get over.

Pottersville?

It's Christmas time Katy....go rent It's a Wonderful Life. Great movie!

TechGromit says

NuttBoxer says

PT’s are around 1% thanks to Prop 13. Now the MCC will reduce the federal tax owed by up to 20% of the mortgage interest yearly. Taking that into consideration you still say $500 in addition to mortgage payment?

1% of what? The purchase price? If you brought a 400k house, the taxes would be 1% of that, or $4,000, that equals $333 a month, PMI is based upon what you put down in 5% increments. So if you put down 4%, it’s counted as 0% down, if you put down 9% its counted as 5%, 14% down is counted as 10% when they are setting your PMI rates. PMI generally ranges from .05% to 1% of the mortgage amount, so a 350k mortgage could be any where from $1,750 to $3,500 a year, that works out to $145 to $291 a month in PMI, Home Owners insurance (fire protection) is generally around $800 to $1,000 a yea, that’s another $100 a month, total expenses over and above the mortgage payment, $725. If you have a HOA, that ranges anywhere from $50 to $400 a month depending on the development.
in short i say YES, at least $500 in addition to the mortgage amount. any while you make get back 20% of your mortgage yearly interest, it’s is generally a tax write off not cash into your pocket, you have to have the cash upfront before you get anything back. Let just say hypothetically the government give you back a nice fat check every year for your “20% of your mortgage yearly interest” thingy, the first you you would have paid $17,382 in interest on your 350k mortgage at 4% interest, that’s only $3,476, that’s not going to go far when you have to cough up an extra $725 a month in extra non mortgage expenses, your money is only going to last you 4.8 months.
This is one of the reasons the home bubble was formed, people fail to take into account all of the expenses related to owning a property. These are just the absolute basics. How if the house heat, how much is that going to cost, generally larger houses cost more to heat and cool. How old is the roof? How old if the HVAC system, will you have the 10k available to fix / replace when the system craps out if you buy an older house?

Using this calculator I'm at $325K

http://www.mortgagecalculator.org/

Is this not a realistic calculator to use?

NuttBoxer says

This is under the FHA and HUD(Section 8), but it’s not FHA loan. Section 8 Homeownership is basically Section 8 Rental Assistance, but they’re helping you buy a house instead of rent it.

When you rent and your Heat system stops working the the dead of winter, its the landlord that footing the bill to get it fixed. maybe this is a bad example here since your in San Diego, but the principals the same weather its the A/C or the pipes or the roof leaking. You need to have enough extra cash to take care of these emergencies.

oh! OK! duh Thanks. don't we all wish it still worked like that? i do. they need a remake of the classic using todays financing.

artistsoul says

Well…I will concede it is wiser for the government to support home ownership than rentals

Neither is wise.

NuttBoxer says

Using this calculator I’m at $325K
http://www.mortgagecalculator.org/
Is this not a realistic calculator to use?

Let look at your figures:

Home Value: $325000
Credit profile: Good
Loan amount: $325000
Loan Purpose: new Purchase
Interest rate: 4%
Loan term: 30 years
Start date: Tommorrow
Property tax: 1%
PMI: 0.5%

These are the defaults, I adjust the property taxes from 1.25% to 1%, First off I think the PMI is too low, you putting almost nothing down, that spells major risk to any mortgage loaner, your PMI is going to be at least 1%. The calculator also fails to take into account home owners insurance and finally, this is assuming you will get the 4% interest rate, I say with a Section 8 mortgage this is a big IF, I would predict the rate will be higher, but I'll give the benefit of the doubt. so lets put in the numbers, I get $1,822 a month, not including Homeowners insurance and possibly condo fees.

"The DCCA gives us a loan up to 1/3 the property value or $35K"

Also this loan has to be paid back eventually too, what is the repayment structure look like? 5 year? 15? 30? whats the interest rate?

TechGromit says

NuttBoxer says

Using this calculator I’m at $325K

http://www.mortgagecalculator.org/

Is this not a realistic calculator to use?

Let look at your figures:
Home Value: $325000

Credit profile: Good

Loan amount: $325000

Loan Purpose: new Purchase

Interest rate: 4%

Loan term: 30 years

Start date: Tommorrow

Property tax: 1%

PMI: 0.5%
These are the defaults, I adjust the property taxes from 1.25% to 1%, First off I think the PMI is too low, you putting almost nothing down, that spells major risk to any mortgage loaner, your PMI is going to be at least 1%. The calculator also fails to take into account home owners insurance and finally, this is assuming you will get the 4% interest rate, I say with a Section 8 mortgage this is a big IF, I would predict the rate will be higher, but I’ll give the benefit of the doubt. so lets put in the numbers, I get $1,822 a month, not including Homeowners insurance and possibly condo fees.

Ok. The loan amount is $285,000 though assuming the full DCCA loan is approved($35,000), plus $5,000 of our own. There's actually two loans, one for the house, a 2nd for the down/closing. Assuming 4.75 interest(that's what my bank quotes for the 30year fixed), and .75PMI, it's at $1,757, plus insurance, maybe $1,825? Sounds like $300-$325K is not out of the question then.

DCCA is 3% simple interest, no payments until house is refied, or sold, and payable in one lump sum at that time.

Run!

I don't have time to run more numbers I'll look at it again tomorrow.

Are you people kidding? This is NO BRAINER this guy should BUY for sure. If prices go down he can walk away and buyer another one with sec-8 even cheaper. (I bet this program takes credit challenged people )

The feds are paying his DP + a major part of his mortgage (sec-8).

If he cant make the whole payment the feds make the whole mortgage payment (possibly he would have to 'lose hours' at work for this to happen? maybe not)

Then if the stops making payments, how long until the feds stoping paying the whole 1800? Then how long after that until the bank-i mean fannie/freddie- forecloses (2 years probably).

Its zero risk and free money.

For some reason I never knew you could BUY A HOUSE with sec-8 vouchers. I'm way past anger (mostly) and now I simply try to figure out how to get in on the action. Buy homes for cash at auction then flip to clueless sec-8/fha buyers is one way.

Read It And Weep and/or rejoice depending on if you are tax payer or eater:

http://www.hud.gov/offices/pih/programs/hcv/homeownership/

TechGromit says

I don’t have time to run more numbers I’ll look at it again tomorrow.

Appreciate the input!

You should really setup a spreadsheet to go over the numbers in detail.

Here is an example I setup (it's a google doc template anyone can use)
https://docs.google.com/previewtemplate?id=0AiAvJJV-QcyXcGVfeGRXaVVUSnF5V093MU1tQmMyQlE&mode=public

Note: This was/is a work in progress. I've had very little time to work on it.

PockyClipsNow says

Are you people kidding? This is NO BRAINER this guy should BUY for sure. If prices go down he can walk away and buyer another one with sec-8 even cheaper. (I bet this program takes credit challenged people )

I never said he shouldn't buy, it just that the numbers he was throwing up didn't add up. First it was 350k, then 325k, 285k looks more doable.

I'm passivly familar with section 8 for rentals... never heard of it for homeownerhsip.

Granted San Diego is a high cost area (in some cases, even higher than the neighborhoods I've lived in along the East Coast)

If you don't mind me being intrusive. How much do you earn "on the books" and how much do you bring in "off the record". It seems to me that if you are in the unfortunate position to be of meager enough means to qualify for financial assistance than 1) I am surprised that you have such a large amount of $$$ saved up and 2) that you can afford (on paper anyway) anything close to the going price for a small SFH in the San Diego area.

The idea of social assistance and home-ownership are mutually exclusive on the metro areas of both coasts. If you earn enough to buy something, you earn to much to qualify for section 8 or similar assistance.

With respect to how much you would qualify for (in terms of loan amount) talk with a few banks. These programs you cite are a wrinkle that negates standard income:purchase price ratios. FWIW - banks are (selectively) risk adverse.

NuttBoxer, I am with TechG so far. I understand that you want a home and you think government help is up there for you, but you shouldn't be overly excited about it, because the responsibility is real thing you're going to face. You want to make sure you can afford it, right?

For now, just set FHA or any government help aside for a while and do your own math as if you're a regular home buyer buying regular home w/o help for math perpose. Then add the effect of government help to it later to see what difference it can make.

All things are boiling down to one simple thing. Your ability to pay. You buy stuff when you can pay, don't if you can't. Your loan eligibility up to whatever number is not important when your actual ability to pay is less than that. So, you need to figure out your "real honest, no hopeful thinking, no freakin finance BS involved" monthly net disposable income after all the costs, small or large, you can possibly imagine. It should be at least few hundreds bucks more than your monthly payment. Otherwise, you will find yourself in trouble soon. That's the bottom line. You find yours yourself.

My question here is,
why you're in section-8 if you're able to buy 350K home?

EastCoastBubbleBoy says

I’m passivly familar with section 8 for rentals… never heard of it for homeownerhsip.
Granted San Diego is a high cost area (in some cases, even higher than the neighborhoods I’ve lived in along the East Coast)
If you don’t mind me being intrusive. How much do you earn “on the books” and how much do you bring in “off the record”. It seems to me that if you are in the unfortunate position to be of meager enough means to qualify for financial assistance than 1) I am surprised that you have such a large amount of $$$ saved up and 2) that you can afford (on paper anyway) anything close to the going price for a small SFH in the San Diego area.
The idea of social assistance and home-ownership are mutually exclusive on the metro areas of both coasts. If you earn enough to buy something, you earn to much to qualify for section 8 or similar assistance.
With respect to how much you would qualify for (in terms of loan amount) talk with a few banks. These programs you cite are a wrinkle that negates standard income:purchase price ratios. FWIW - banks are (selectively) risk adverse.

I like my privacy, so I won't get into personal financial details. I'll just say my wife qualified for the program before we met, and we only have one income(she's a stay at home Mom). What use to be the norm, now means we're poor(especially in California).

Not sure how much the Section 8 program will play into the amount we'll qualify for. We're thinking of having a family member co-sign to boost our chances/approval amount. We can have them just co-sign the mortgage without being on the deed right?

In regards to Seaside's comment, since we'll be paying less than what we currently pay in rent, we will definitely have at least a couple hundred extra a month, since that's what we have now with a higher monthly payment. Figuring out what we can afford means staying under our voucher limit since anything over that amount($1,800) would come out of our pocket.

i make a good salary but my girlfriend doesn't.

i'm going to tell her to buy one of those $350k section 8 houses so we can live there.

Nuttboxer you probably should only have been married in the church only. That way your wife is still legally single and your income wouldnt be in question and you would probably get the whole 1800 a month paid by the feds.

But if most/all of your income is 'off the books' it doesnt matter. Liberals assume 'everyone reports all income' (or they assume everyone has a government or W2 job like they do).

The fact is most people partaking of the freebies are not 100% honest with reporting income. I would certainly hide any I had if I could. Now a days (especially in CA) the prices of rents, homes, food, and school are all horribly beyond belief distorted by guv meddling. If you were a construction guy who actually reported all his income and legally married his stay at home wife(which disqualifies her from free rent,food stamps, school lunch, free child care, and later free college for kids). HOW THE HELL could anyone afford to live and raise a family with a stay at home wife if they are honest and report all income? They mostly cant so we have the two income trap.....

Anyway good luck. We didn't design this insanity but we all have to live here in it.

(and consider a divorce so you can really rake in the cheese! Shacking up and having wife on welfare is what the smart money would do? Am i wrong?).

Section 8 is a creation only in the US. In the rest of the world, subsidized housing is restricted to what is commonly known as "projects" or government housing. Of course, there's no putting that genie in the bottle too.

Here's how it usually works, you inventory every family member, dependent, pool them togeher and apply to maximize the outcome. In one case, a 200K lawyer bought a two bedroom condo in SOMA via schemes like this. Terrible policy

Yes the schemes taking advantage of the corrupt welfare state are never ending.

I like the common andecdote of the 'doctor/rich guy with a $500 a month rent controlled beach apartment' (where market rent is 10 times higher). This is 'legit' I suppose since there is no income limit for rent control. Hilarious.

I suppose if someone is on rent control AND sec-8 the taypayers are saving money. At last a silver lining in communism!

There will always be someone taking advantage of these systems. It's not very different than someone abusing a tax loophole that is obviously not designed for their circumstances. It will always be there, whatever you put in place will be abused by someone somewhere regardless of the intentions. Whether it's a social program or a tax system. Whatever will minimize someones costs, they will use. These programs don't have to be "helpful" in nature at all either, they can be simply we're taxing this business at this rate and allowing these deductions. Someone from a different business comes along and realizes if they shoehorn their business into that model, they'll save a few bucks and they'll do it.

While some lawyer walked away with one instance here, there are probably a lot of people who genuinely are benefited from this program. The best program I've seen for getting people out of generational disparity was a program designed to mix them into better neighborhoods. While the parents didn't benefit, the kids did. This program probably helps a lot of families out as well as being abused by some.

I agree 'people benefit from free money'.

Everyone should always take all free money offered which is why I say to Nutter to BUY BUY BUY (with OPM of course).

And lets not forget CA is a non recourse state. Anytime he wants he can walk away and apply the s-8 voucher to any old rental. Its win win (unless he pours his own cash into it).

I would recommend to Nutter to try and put as little $ as possible into this deal and part of that is make sure to avoid a fixer and buy a newer/remodled home to minmize the maintenance bite.

If we were interested in a "fixer" there's a loan for that too.

http://www.co.san-diego.ca.us/sdhcd/homeowners/repair_loan.html

Having an inside look at these welfare programs for the past couple years I'll say one thing. They are NOT designed to help people better their situation. They are designed to keep people dependent on the government.

After marriage my wife lost alot of the programs she was on. At the time she told me we might still qualify for Medi-Cal, but I would need to attend a meeting with her from like 9am-1pm on Thursday. I told her there's no way I'm taking off in the middle of the week for something we might not even get. What kind of program forces people trying to better their situation to take time off work to stay on/qualify for it? I've had to remind my wife frequently over the past couple years that making more money is a good thing, because she had been made to believe that she needed the government aid to make it.

These programs create a class of state servants. They may help some, but the majority fall into dependence. I will be the first one in line the minute someone moves to end them, but until then I'll take whatever tax dollars back from the government I can.

TechGromit says

PockyClipsNow says

Are you people kidding? This is NO BRAINER this guy should BUY for sure. If prices go down he can walk away and buyer another one with sec-8 even cheaper. (I bet this program takes credit challenged people )

I never said he shouldn’t buy, it just that the numbers he was throwing up didn’t add up. First it was 350k, then 325k, 285k looks more doable.

Again, appreciate the help on the numbers. I agree the 300K range looks more realistic. We'll see once we get lender approval.

"Does this sound like a realistic scenario in this market for those areas of San Diego? Appreciate any input."

Ah NO!

no it doesn't Fact is it would be cheaper on month to month costs to recieve section 8 rental help than any half wit brained up Idea I've heard here. you people are smoking the house crack.

this whole post is a pie in the face on what this blog stands for imo. and what has happened over the last five years.
nuttboxer your making this crap up IMO.

plus you're posting and talking about basicaly what amounts to Tax evasion as far as i can tell.
not too smart.

so if you don't have the cash rent. beause you'll be better off. The Va jay jay will not be happy and she'll keep telling you to get you shit together,....maybe you should

I'm all for helping but, REALLY?
REALLY? are you for F@%King real?

After you buy this house, after a few months, you should try to get a loan mod. They can reduce interest rate to 2% for 5 years (standard deal) and put part of principal on 'back of loan' which means the payment is not based on the full principal owed. They try to get your payment down to 31% if 'declared income' I think.

Serisouly you already are able to document low income to qualify for a s-8 vouchers. So after buying this house you should also qualfiy for a loan mod possibly. Tell them 'your expenses have gone up' for medical, insurance, food, whateva.

It seems crazy but why wouldnt this work? (Then when prices go up flip the house, buy gold bars, and bury them to hide the assets? im not sure how to cash in here and keep on welfare.)

This is fun thinking up ways to get free money. This article inspired me.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/entitlement-america-head-household-making-minimum-wage-has-more-disposable-income-family-mak

I can respect your right to privacy.

My point is that a program such as what you are describing has income restrictions.

My experience here on the east coast is that the restrictions are such that, if you can afford to buy a home, you make too much to qualify for the assistance.

I'm not trying to be critical. I'm just pointing out the inherit flaw in the system.

To be eligible for these programs, you need to be eligible for section 8 (which you already are)
section 8. Section 8 has a maximum income.

http://portal.hud.gov/portal/page/portal/HUD/topics/rental_assistance/phprog

Maximum income limit for a family of four in the San Diego area is $62800.
http://www.huduser.org/portal/datasets/il/il10/ca.pdf

I can see where the $1800 limit is coming from and the math works better than I thought.
($1800 x 12 / $62800) = 34%. Assuming no other monthly debt (no car payments, no student loans, etc.) this is on the upper end of the house payment / gross income ratio.

Previous posters have commented on "how much house" you can get for $1800/month.

I'd be interested to know how much of the $1800 is covered by this voucher?

The question you need to ask yourself.
1) How much can $1800 REALLY buy [See posts by others]
2) What happens if this program suddenly goes away? [no longer funded, expires, etc.]
Can you still make the projected payments?
3) what are the other costs that you may have overlooked and/or underestimated (utility, repairs and upkeep, furnishings, etc.)

whatever you decide, best of luck.

I wasn't assuming you were being critical, just try to keep as much of my life private as possible. I've got a better handle on what the $1,800 will cover(not a $350K loan). As far as our end I know what it would be based on current rental portion, but I've heard from the Sec 8 rep that it could be lower to help us save extra money to cover the common costs of home ownership(repairs, maintenance, etc).

As for the program going under, it's more likely we'll be out before that happens, since we'll no longer qualify for Section 8 when my wife goes back to work.

Thanks for the advice!

PockyClipsNow says

After you buy this house, after a few months, you should try to get a loan mod. They can reduce interest rate to 2% for 5 years (standard deal) and put part of principal on ‘back of loan’ which means the payment is not based on the full principal owed. They try to get your payment down to 31% if ‘declared income’ I think.
Serisouly you already are able to document low income to qualify for a s-8 vouchers. So after buying this house you should also qualfiy for a loan mod possibly. Tell them ‘your expenses have gone up’ for medical, insurance, food, whateva.
It seems crazy but why wouldnt this work? (Then when prices go up flip the house, buy gold bars, and bury them to hide the assets? im not sure how to cash in here and keep on welfare.)
This is fun thinking up ways to get free money. This article inspired me.
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/entitlement-america-head-household-making-minimum-wage-has-more-disposable-income-family-mak

In Southern Cal think of an illegal who's wife/girlfriend is a resident with kids. $15 an hour in construction goes a long way when there's no taxes, and big brother is paying almost all your expenses.

NuttBoxer says

In Southern Cal think of an illegal who’s wife/girlfriend is a resident with kids. $15 an hour in construction goes a long way when there’s no taxes, and big brother is paying almost all your expenses.

Illegal haha! this is how legal residents have to get by in Cali bro, off the books for sure. this isn't even my take I've witnessed this.

you can't pay your first employee on the books in Cali in any buisness ,.. and make it.

The kid helping your "got to have my F##king granite counter" installer. or "i need a glass shower door to feel like I've made it in life" installer, or the" I just spent my kids college money on a red upright washer and dryer and my old one worked fine" installer. he is being paid $12-15 cash.

There are several different Section 8 programs with vastly different income/asset requirements - we don't have enough information to know which program Nuttboxer is on. Nor does it matter. So far as asking:

EastCoastBubbleBoy says

How much do you earn “on the books” and how much do you bring in “off the record”.

That's a fairly offensive question - it assumes that Nuttboxer is scamming the system. He is fortunate enough to qualify for this assistance, the theory of which really isn't much different than farm subsidies or corporate welfare, and he wants to purchase a home. Now he's attempting to educate himself on the process. Considering that the waiting list for Section 8 housing programs can be upwards of ten years, and that qualifying for the purchase programs isn't easy, Nuttboxer sounds like he's taking advantage of a program designed to help him rather than to scam the system.

NuttBoxer says

The way this program works, we pay the same whether we rent or buy, so besides the downpayment, we don’t put any more of our money in then we would anyway.

Don't forget upkeep and replacement of appliances, etc as they go bad. It's not necessarily that expensive on an ongoing basis, but if one thing goes wrong it can hit you hard.

NuttBoxer says

We’re thinking of having a family member co-sign to boost our chances/approval amount. We can have them just co-sign the mortgage without being on the deed right?...Also forgot to ask, if someone co-signs the loan with us, does that make them a part owner of the house?

From my experience (working in title company years ago), if you get someone to co-sign the mortgage company usually requires that they be included on the deed. Remember that you're asking someone to promise to pay the note IN FULL if you don't pay - they'd be crazy not to want to be on the deed too. It preserves their financial position somewhat.

Tenouncetrout says

You’ll need a W2 from the same company for more than two years, with no lapse in employment

Not really, because this is a government insured program. It's a bit different.

PockyClipsNow says

you should have married in name only (and consider a divorce so you can really rake in the cheese! Shacking up and having wife on welfare is what the smart money would do? Am i wrong?).

Perhaps I missed it, but I didn't see anywhere that Nuttboxer wished he wasn't responsible for paying anything. He did mention that, if he loses his job, the payment would still be made due to the S8 subsidy. In this economy, losing one's job is a valid concern. He has a backup plan - one that's not available to most of us. But he has one.

PockyClipsNow says

After you buy this house, after a few months, you should try to get a loan mod.

I doubt the S8 program would allow for this - nor would the mortgage company go for it. It sounds like he's trying to buy a house, not scam the system.

Nuttboxer, for the typical buyer many of us believe that now is a crappy time to buy. But in your case, it sounds like you'll do okay if you do your homework. Try not to take the comments personally - there are legal ways to do so without as much risk. If you feel good about it, do it. But IMHO it's not a "go" on the co-signer thing. Good luck.