NEW YORK, Aug. 05, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Jake Kalmin, a Southern California mortgage loan officer is sounding the alarm that widespread VA loan misconceptions and rushed advice are costing San Diego’s military families thousands of dollars they never recover.
San Diego County is home to one of the largest concentrations of active duty service members, veterans, and military families in the United States. Camp Pendleton, Naval Base San Diego, the Marine Corps Recruit Depot, and several other major installations anchor a regional economy in which a substantial share of working-age adults have served or are currently serving. For many of those families, the VA loan is the single most valuable financial benefit they will earn through that service. It is also, says Jake Kalmin, one of the most consistently misused.
Kalmin, an elite mortgage loan officer based in Southern California who served as an Executive Loan Officer at loanDepot in 2020 and 2021, has worked with military families across his career and has watched the same patterns repeat.
Borrowers who qualify for the strongest mortgage product available in the United States are routinely steered into transactions that cost them more than the product was designed to deliver.
“The VA loan is the most generous mortgage benefit in the country. No down payment. No mortgage insurance. Often a lower interest rate than what is available on the conventional market. And eligibility tied to service, not just to financial position,” Kalmin said. “The problem is not the product. The problem is that a lot of military borrowers are working with loan officers who have never actually run more than a handful of these. The expertise gap costs the borrower money they will never see again.”
The mistakes Kalmin sees most often fall into a few clear categories. Borrowers with service-connected disability ratings are sometimes never told they qualify for a funding fee exemption, which can save them several thousand dollars at closing. Borrowers are sometimes pushed into conventional loans with private mortgage insurance when their VA entitlement would have produced a meaningfully better outcome. Borrowers refinance under the VA Interest Rate Reduction Refinance Loan, or IRRRL, program before the math actually supports the move and end up extending their loan term in a way that costs them more in total interest than the rate reduction saves.
“I have sat with active duty Marines who refinanced their home twice in eighteen months at the urging of a loan officer who was paid each time,” Kalmin said. “Each refinance reset the clock on the loan. Each refinance carried closing costs. Each refinance shaved a fraction off the monthly payment. The total economic impact on the family over thirty years was significantly negative. None of that math was on the page when they signed.”
The VA loan also carries specific rules around occupancy, property condition, and seller concessions that experienced VA lenders understand intuitively and that less experienced lenders sometimes get wrong. Sellers in VA-financed transactions can pay up to 4 percent of the loan amount in concessions toward the buyer’s closing costs, a meaningful number that often goes unused because nobody walks the buyer through how to negotiate for it. Property condition standards under VA appraisal can derail transactions that conventional appraisals would have approved, which means VA buyers need a loan officer and a real estate agent who understand the standards from the start.
“When the system works, a VA buyer ends up with the lowest carrying cost on their largest financial commitment, structured around a benefit they earned through service. When the system does not work, that same buyer ends up paying conventional pricing for a product the conventional market does not even offer,” Kalmin said. “The gap between those two outcomes is the gap between working with someone who has actually run hundreds of these transactions and working with someone who has not.”
Kalmin’s practice begins every military family conversation with a no-cost, no-obligation mortgage analysis. The analysis covers eligibility verification, funding fee determination, available VA loan structures including purchase, IRRRL, and VA cash-out, and the realistic comparison against conventional alternatives where applicable. For families weighing whether to use their entitlement on a current purchase or preserve it for future use, the analysis covers that decision explicitly.
His framework rests on four principles he applies to every engagement. Education comes before recommendation. Analysis is offered at no cost. Transparency runs from rate quotes through long-term interest impact. And the standard does not bend.
“Military families have earned the strongest mortgage benefit in the country. They deserve a loan officer who treats that benefit with the care it took to earn it,” Kalmin said. “Anything less is a failure of the people standing on the financing side of the transaction. Not a failure of the program.”
About Jake Kalmin
Jake Kalmin is a Southern California mortgage loan officer specializing in the purchase and refinancing of 1 to 4 unit properties. A former Executive Loan Officer at loanDepot, Kalmin has guided thousands of American homeowners through mortgage decisions across his career. His practice is built on a commitment to transparency, education, and no-cost client analysis. He lives and works in Southern California with his family.
Learn more at jakekalmin.com.
