I closed on a house in Duncanville TX on 26th February. Instead of buying a "project" I went for a house in excellent shape, in line with my approach to eliminating sources of anxiety in my life.
While ferreting out information about mortgages, during a rather silly spat with my mortgage lender over provision of financial information (they seemingly wanted to know almost the entire inner workings of my UK finances, which I considered to be intrusive), I came across "The Compleat Ubernerd" by the late Doris "Tanta" Dungey. A great source of everything you ever wanted to know about the mortgage market, and in line with the old saying that you really don't want to know what goes into politics or sausage, there is a lot there you may wish you had not found out about...