Once your reverse mortgage is in place, you still have some responsibilities to keep everything in good standing and ensure your reverse mortgage remains a tool throughout your retirement.
Timely Payment of Your Property Taxes
Whether you have a regular mortgage, a reverse mortgage, or no mortgage at all, you are responsible for paying property taxes on your home. Unlike a regular mortgage, typically, a reverse mortgage will not have an escrow account for the payment of property taxes. Therefore, you will want to plan ahead for how you will be paying your property taxes. Whether it is setting aside money each month or paying it each year from your reverse mortgage proceeds, don't forget to pay them.
Maintain Homeowners Insurance
Having insurance on your home is nothing new or unique to a reverse mortgage. Keeping proper coverage on your home, not being late in paying premiums, and not allowing coverage to lapse are all common requirements when you have a mortgage on your home, including a reverse mortgage. As mentioned before, there will not likely be an escrow account on your reverse mortgage, therefore you will want to ensure funds are set aside to pay your premiums and the payment arrangements are made directly with your insurance company.
Maintain The Condition of The Home
When you close on your reverse mortgage, it would have been determined at that time your property met minimum health, safety, and condition guidelines set forth by FHA to qualify you for the reverse mortgage and FHA insurability. It is expected that the homeowner maintains the property in a manner that will keep the home in similar condition and quality as it was when the reverse mortgage was initially established. As with any homeowner, we naturally want to maintain the condition of our home, and take care of repairs and upkeep. As with the previous requirements, this is true whether you have a regular mortgage or no mortgage at all.
In Conclusion
We've touched on the main requirements once your reverse mortgage is in place and as you can see they really aren't any different from any other mortgage programs. While we haven't provided an exhaustive overview, all of the expectations are thoroughly outlined in the disclosures you will receive at the time of your initial reverse mortgage application.
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