Contact

One inbox, read by a person. Corrections to a state listing are dealt with first; everything else is answered in turn, normally within two business days.

Reporting an error on a state page

This is the message we most want. Fifty state listings drift as agencies change income limits, pause funding or rename programs, and readers notice before we do. To make a correction fast to act on, include:

• The state page in question.
• What is wrong — the program name, the amount, the structure, or a dead agency link.
• Where you saw the correct version, ideally the agency's own page.

Every correction is checked against the administering agency's page before anything on the site changes. If it holds up, the listing is updated; if it does not, you get a reply explaining what we found.

Other things worth writing about

• A state we have listed the wrong way round — for example, a statewide program you believe should replace the city or nonprofit program currently shown for your state.
• The estimator — how a figure was produced, what an input means, or a result that looks wrong. Include the inputs you used; without them a result cannot be reproduced.
• Adding your state to the estimator — the estimator's dropdown covers fewer states than the directory does, and requests move states up the queue.
• A paid guide — delivery problems, access, or a refund.
• Embedding or licensing the estimator, and press enquiries.

What email cannot get you

• An eligibility decision. Only the administering agency can tell you whether you qualify for its program, and only a lender can approve a loan. Nothing sent from this inbox carries any weight with either.
• Personal advice. No mortgage, tax, legal or investment advice is given by email, and general answers should not be treated as advice about your situation.
• Anything about your application. There is no access to, or visibility of, any file you hold with an agency, a lender or a housing counsellor.
• Program applications. Applications are made through the agency or an approved lender, never here. If a message asks you to apply through this site, it did not come from us.

Who you are writing to

DPA Estimator is an independently published reference for state down payment assistance programs. It is not a lender, a mortgage broker, a real-estate agent or a government agency, and it is not affiliated with HUD or with any state housing finance agency. How programs are selected and reviewed is set out on the About page.

What happens to what you send

An email address that arrives in this inbox is used to reply to you and for nothing else — it is not added to a mailing list, not passed to a lender, and not sold. The optional report-by-email form on the calculator is separate and opt-in, and it is the only place the site collects an address. The estimator calculates in your browser, and your income, debts, savings and target price never reach us. It is not silent, though: each time it calculates it sends one Google Analytics event carrying the state you selected and the rounded affordability figure it produced — a figure derived from your income, debts and interest rate. Nothing else about your inputs is transmitted. The full detail is in the privacy policy.