More loan help for first-time buyers

Qualified first-time home buyers seeking down-payment assistance will be able to tap into an additional $100 million made available to the California Housing Finance Agency, or CalHFA, which provides financing to buyers who fall within specific income ranges.

The new funds for CalHFA’s California Homebuyer’s Downpayment Assistance Program come from Proposition 1C, approved by the state’s voters last year. Proposition 46, passed in 2002, has funded more than $145 million in down-payment assistance loans and helped 18,000 families purchase their first homes.

So far, 434 buyers have used about $4 million of the Proposition 1C funding. Payments on the loans are deferred; borrowers repay the loans when the home is finally sold, refinanced or paid in full.

CalHFA has six additional down-payment assistance programs and provides first mortgages to qualified borrowers, who must satisfy strict income requirements and caps on the sales price.

For information about Cal-HFA’s homeownership, multifamily and mortgage-insurance programs, go to www.calhfa.ca.gov or call (877) 922-5432.

-- Diane Wedner