me and my fiance are getting married in four months and were told by a bank that we would be unable to get a home loan bc of our credit scores. Mine is 540 and his is 550. His was great up until a couple months ago-he went through a divorce, and mine has ever been good bc of bad checks that i wrote out. In about two weeks I will finally have the finances to pay off everything that is negative on my credit report, FINALLY. We found a wonderful home that was appraised at $80,000 and is being sold for $40,000 (we live in a small rural town) but the bank said we couldnt get approved unless one of us has a credit score of at least 640. We could come up with about $3,000 for a down payment. I would be a first time home buyer and he has owned two homes prior. Together our monthly income will be roughly $2,600. Is there anywhere else that we could get a home loan, or does anyone have some advice on where to go next…

Honestly, because of the mortgage crisis, it is going to be hard getting approved. You may have to wait and increase your credit scores by paying off your debts and not applying for any new credit. If you are able to get approved, you will probably pay a much higher rate than the average person. It is probably worth saving your money for a year and getting those credit scores up.
You probably won’t find a bank or broker that will give you a loan with scores that low. If the property is individually owned you might be able to see if the owner will finance you.
That sounds about right. Banks don’t like to do home loans for people with credit scores below 640. The best way to do it is through one of the larger lenders like Homebanc or Countrywide. Somebody that specializes in mortgages. If you apply jointly they will look at both credit scores and will use the lower one. I went through the same thing when I was buying a house. It is possible to bring your credit score up rather quickly though. I brought mine up from about a 550 to almost 700 in about 2 months. I checked online at Transunion. You can get a three credit agency report that shows what all the credit agencies are reporting on you and then contact those people showing as bad credit and try to get them to update your report. Its worth a shot and it worked for me. Good Luck!!!
Go down to the neighborhood and talk to a buddy of mine. His name is Fat Tony.
He will loan you whatever money you need. Just be sure to never miss a payment with him – as he isn’t too forgiving………….