Help

Hello, we are in a bit of a crossroads, could really use some advice. My husband and I bring in about 115k a year, we will be getting about $45K by the end of November (I received a huge bonus). We are planning on paying off all of our credit card debt (combined about 10k) and setting the rest aside for a down payment/closing costs. We both have decent credit, mine is about 720 and his is 820, we only have one car note and student loans that we will not be touching come November. We have talked to a few lenders and they are all saying that we should start the pre-approval process now. I can't help but distrust their eagerness, as I feel like waiting to pay off our consumer debt will help us get better rates. But they are saying we can get conditionally approved with promise of a down payment. Anyway my biggest hesitation is running our credit and then getting crappy rates which is why I am leaning towards waiting until our debt gets paid off and our credit goes up. What would you all do? Thanks in advance.