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I'm in the processing of looking to buy my first home. I'm in the early stages and I'm trying to learn and prepare as much as I can before the process begins to overwhelm me (which I'm sure it will at some point).
One of the things I've learned is that lenders usually require copies of your W-2 forms from the past 2-3 years. My employer never mails W-2s out; instead they provide electronic copies that are perpetually saved online in a system we use at work. Additionally, I've e-filed the past few years and as such there was no need for me to print out my W-2s: They aren't needed for e-filing, and if I ever needed to print them out, I knew I could go into the system at any time and they'd be there.
Then I made a weird discovery.
The other day I logged in to download my W-2s and save them as PDFs to a flash drive where I'm saving other mortgage application-related documentation (like bank statements, etc). That's when I discovered that ALL of my W-2s from the past 7 years have my current address listed on them. The problem is that since I started working here in August 2006, I've lived at 3 different addresses (including 2 in the past 2 years).
All the other information on the W-2s -- my name, SSN, income, taxes, etc -- is correct. Only the addresses are incorrect. I contacted Payroll and got the following response: "The address shown on a W-2 is captured from the date the W-2 form is printed. If you ever reprinted any of your past W-2 forms, the address as of today would be printed."
WTF? So basically they're saying that the only way I could have a W-2 with the correct address on it is if I'd printed a copy of it AT THE TIME I LIVED THERE and saved it. But again, I never did that because it never occurred to me that the system would ever CHANGE my information, plus the W-2s weren't needed for e-filing.
Is this going to be a problem? Since the W-2s come from my employer, I don't have any other way to obtain copies with my correct addresses on them. I suppose I could try doing some text-editing magic in Adobe Acrobat, but that seems deceptive somehow, even though I'd only be correcting my address, not falsifying any of my income/tax data.
I just worry that the information's not going to match what's on my credit reports, and I don't want to get turned down or have some lengthy application review because of something so idiotic and insignificant.
Your thoughts?
One of the things I've learned is that lenders usually require copies of your W-2 forms from the past 2-3 years. My employer never mails W-2s out; instead they provide electronic copies that are perpetually saved online in a system we use at work. Additionally, I've e-filed the past few years and as such there was no need for me to print out my W-2s: They aren't needed for e-filing, and if I ever needed to print them out, I knew I could go into the system at any time and they'd be there.
Then I made a weird discovery.
The other day I logged in to download my W-2s and save them as PDFs to a flash drive where I'm saving other mortgage application-related documentation (like bank statements, etc). That's when I discovered that ALL of my W-2s from the past 7 years have my current address listed on them. The problem is that since I started working here in August 2006, I've lived at 3 different addresses (including 2 in the past 2 years).
All the other information on the W-2s -- my name, SSN, income, taxes, etc -- is correct. Only the addresses are incorrect. I contacted Payroll and got the following response: "The address shown on a W-2 is captured from the date the W-2 form is printed. If you ever reprinted any of your past W-2 forms, the address as of today would be printed."
WTF? So basically they're saying that the only way I could have a W-2 with the correct address on it is if I'd printed a copy of it AT THE TIME I LIVED THERE and saved it. But again, I never did that because it never occurred to me that the system would ever CHANGE my information, plus the W-2s weren't needed for e-filing.
Is this going to be a problem? Since the W-2s come from my employer, I don't have any other way to obtain copies with my correct addresses on them. I suppose I could try doing some text-editing magic in Adobe Acrobat, but that seems deceptive somehow, even though I'd only be correcting my address, not falsifying any of my income/tax data.
I just worry that the information's not going to match what's on my credit reports, and I don't want to get turned down or have some lengthy application review because of something so idiotic and insignificant.
Your thoughts?
I've gone to the IRS website and ordered tax transcripts for the past 3 years; that should do it.
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