Used to be the mortgage loan officer set people down and told them what they could afford using debt to income ratios and made people clean up debt to qualify for a loan.
I've been in mortgage for 10+ years. There are mortgage loan officers and then there were "used car salesmen turned subprime loan officers" Before the meltdown, these inexperienced guys would come to work, and seriously they had almost all been car salesmen, and they would put good borrowers in subprime loans, because that's all they were trained to do. Even people with high 700-800 scores and loads of money, who would qualify for a conventional loan in a heartbeat. Lie steal and cheat people is all they did, and I'm so glad I didn't partake in that! I don't know how they slept at night! Poor people would be clueless that they were starting out and 11-12% and then in a year it would jump 2%! And ohhh the prepayment penalties, just an all around mess, they were stuck with the mortgages! And the subprime guy would just grin and say, "well congratulations, you've just bought a home"