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It appears that lower mortgage rates come with a price. Closing costs rising in most states. Look zero-cost instead.
As the Refi Boom continue, not all rates are falling equally. Adjustable-rate mortgages are leading the charge.
After you've paid cash for a home, you *can* get your cash back. It's called the Delayed Financing Rule and it's new from Fannie Mae.
There are just some things you should never do while your home loan is "in-process." Here are the five most-common mistakes.
Purchase price has less to do with home affordability than you think. The real key is mortgage rates. For every 0.125% increase in mortgage rates, a buyer's maximum purchase price falls by 1.35 percent.
Learn how to use mortgage rate locks for gain. Choose a better rate lock, get a better mortgage rate.
Zero-cost mortgages are terrific in a falling interest rate environment, like the one we're in now. They eliminate sunk costs completely and offer an immediate refinance payback.
Mortgage rates across the state are near year-to-date lows, but locking them in this week may be difficult. Memorial Day can mess with mortgage markets.
Today's blog content is posted at Keith Gumbinger's HSH.com. HSH is a regular gig for me; an opportunity to write for a second, mortgage-hungry audience. This week's article is titled "Mortgage rates matter more than home prices"
Refinancing to lower rates doesn't mean you have to reset your loan to another 30 years. Use this math and you'll pay down your loan more quickly than if you had done nothing.
It's an excellent time to lock a 15-year fixed rate mortgage. Versus comparable 30-year loans, conforming 15-year mortgage rates are "on sale" -- and cheap.
The 5-year ARM is the cheapest it's been in history relative to the 30-year fixed. If you're selling within the next 5 years, you'll save lots of money -- safely -- with an ARM.
"Should I refinance?". It seems like a basic question -- when benefits outweigh costs, say "yes". But, what about those two big assumptions you have to make?
Overwhelmingly, refinancing homeowners are choosing fixed rate mortgages over adjustable ones. But is it logical? Go deep on the numbers and see for yourself.
As compared to the day *after* the expiration of the $8,000 home buyer tax credit, today's cost of carrying a 30-year fixed rate mortgage to term is lower by $51,000. Mortgage rates are on a 6-month rally.
Since February, the 12-month LIBOR is up 68 percent. That's bad news for homeowners with pending ARM adjustments. It's now cheaper to refi into a new loan than to let your mortgage rate adjust.
Buying a home with a boyfriend, girlfriend or partner is different from buying with a spouse. This is because, with respect to Estate Planning, married homeowners typically get federal and state level-protection from which non-married homeowners are exempt.
Home buyers would be silly to not at least consider the 5-year ARM right now. As compared to the 30-year fixed, the 5-year ARM is an absolute steal.
If your pre-qualification and/or pre-approval letter is more than 8 weeks old, get yourself "re-pre-approved". Mortgage guidelines have been in flux and your original lender letter may now be invalid.
There's a reason why everyone from first-time home buyers to bona fide investors hate the mortgage process -- the media tells them one thing about mortgage rates, and in-the-game loan officers tell them something else.
Aside from mortgage rates, there's other factors that account for your final mortgage approval and none of them are within your control. Rates may fall back to 4.500 percent at some point in the future, but when they do, you might not be able to take advantage. Here's 9 things that can go wrong.
Planning to move in the next few years? Get smart about it. Swap out the high-rate, 30-year fixed you're carrying and convert it to something more appropriate. Refinancing to today's rate might save you 40 percent on your monthly payments.
Shopping for a mortgage rate and a mortgage product at the same time is like multi-variate calculus. Except harder. Consider the 15-year fixed rate mortgage as compared to its 30-year cousin. At the beginning of the year, the interest rate differential was negligible. Now, it's pronounced.
Planning to move in the next few years? Here's a simple way to save some money. Convert your 30-year fixed rate mortgage to a 5-year ARM. It's playing the mortgage system to your advantage.
Teaching you how to calculate your mortgage payment using Microsoft Excel, Numbers for Macintosh, or Google Docs -- complete with formulas and graphics. (1) How to calculate the monthly mortgage payment on a Principal + Interest loan, (2) How to calculate the monthly mortgage payment on an Interest Only loan, (3) How to calculate the principal paid to the mortgage in a given month, and (4) How to calculate the principal paid to the mortgage in a given year.
The 30-year fixed rate mortgage isn't such the no-brainer anymore. After thoroughly thumping the interest rates on an equivalent 5-year ARM since December, the 30-year fixed has reclaimed its honor as "Most Expensive Mortgage Product". The chart shows the difference as a half-percent, but real-life pricing puts it closer to 1.000%. Right now, adjustable rate mortgages are very attractive to the right type of homeowner
What's the difference between a good mortgage rate and a great mortgage rate? Timing.
There's an old adage: Mortgage rates take the elevator on the way up, but take the stairs on the way down. Lately, we've even seen this IRL. There have been days where rate are up by as much as half-percent as investor flee from the bond market, but when rates recover lower, they seem to be dropping just an eighth of a percent at a time. Floating your mortgage rate is fine, but given the current market conditions, you may be playing with house money right now and this is as good a time as any to cash in your chips.
ARM-holding homeowners often assume that when their mortgage is about to adjust, it's time to refinance it -- no matter what. The math, however, says otherwise. If your adjustable rate mortgage is due to reset in 2009 and 2010, the smart play may be to let it change
In late-November, as mortgage rates fell into the fives, homeowners helped to start a mini-Refi Boom. This week, however, self-doubt crept in. Rest easy, friends. You're not missing out. See, it's well-known that 0-point mortgage rates touched 4.500 percent Wednesday. But it's a little less well-known that those 4-and-a-half percent...
Four times annually, the Federal Reserve surveys 84 banks around the country regarding their general lending standards. One of the survey questions asks about current mortgage lending standards and whether it's getting harder, or easier, to get approved for a home loan. In the most recent survey, 75 percent of...
People often assume that because adjustable-rate mortgages
How do you avoid paying jumbo mortgage rates on a jumbo-sized mortgage? You go off the beaten path to find a lender, that's how. It's pretty simple when we break it down. The word
An adjustable-rate mortgage is a mortgage for which the interest rate remains fixed for some period of time, after which it can change based on some pre-determined rules. A shared rule among adjustable rate mortgages is the formula by which they adjust. Expressed as a formula, it reads: (Adjusted Rate)...
Today's lesson from the Washington Mutual's seizure comes in the form of a haiku: Mortgage guys "retire" and never tell their clients, who then miss rate dips. Story goes like this, folks. Mortgage guys are leaving the business in droves. Some leave because their company failed, but many more leave...
Here's a secret about rate shopping: all loan officers worth their salt give "great rates" because, otherwise, we'd be out of business. Most mortgage rates are a commodity, after all, so their levels are set by the market -- not by the lender. This is why home buyers would be...
Let's Start With The Conclusion If you plan to buy a new home in 2008 or 2009, give a lot of thought to moving up your timeframe. Mortgage approvals are about to get more scarce and more expensive for everyone. The Supporting Evidence From The News FHA is increasing its...
Since the Fed made its emergency rate cut in January 2008, we've talked a lot of mortgage rate volatility. Some days up, some days down, most days all over the place. This pie chart should help put it in perspective. Over the last 60 days, mortgage rates changed twice daily...
There are a lot of mortgage myths that Americans confuse for truth. One of them is that adjustable-rate mortgages always carry lower rates than fixed-rate mortgages. As the chart shows us, that's false. But even when ARMs are lower than fixed-rate, that doesn't mean they're the better "low payment" option....
