How long? How long should you finance your home for?Should you worry about amortizing (systemically paying off the principal) your mortgage?A few days ago my friend Rich Kruse commenting onHow Much Should I Put Down / Equity Is No Protection / Liquidly Is Wrote: "I'd like to hear a post about int
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02/22/2008
If you were sitting across from me and said "I don't have a down payment," I'd have flippantly said "So What! What kind of a house do you need?" Thanks to the TV Real Estate Gurus, we all know everyone can buy with "no down payment!"What those TV pitchmen say is almost true. Many people can buy w
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02/20/2008
I recently tried to displace the myth that real estate and mortgage professionals could determine what you can afford. See: How Much Can I Afford / A Stupid Question, for most of you what you can afford is going to be less, sometimes considerably less than you can qualify for.Now that you've dete
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02/17/2008
You've reached that point in your life, somewhere between 18 and death, that you want a home of your own. You locate a REALTOR® or better yet a Loan Originator and make your first mistake. You ask "how much can I afford?"This is possibly the second most asked question in real estate, the first is
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02/16/2008
Surely, the press must have ergonomic keyboards! I can't believe what I hear in the news in speech and writing! They couldn't utter it with a straight face and I'm sure they couldn't type it with a straight keyboard!To believe what we hear and read? First we'd "require the willing suspension of d
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02/15/2008
I just read Lenn Hardly's blog: WHAT ARE THE BUZZ WORDS? TRANSPARENCY? CONSUMER'S RIGHT TO KNOW? NONSENSE! People have a major misunderstanding of what they can except purchasing a short sale. Just what sort of discount will a bank to accept?If you're hoping for a number, you can stop reading. If
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02/09/2008
I just watched Hillary explain to David Letterman that pre-payment penalties meant that "if the home owner gets a little money ahead and wants to put it on his mortgage, the pre-payment means that for the rest of the mortgage his payment goes up." This would be funny if she wasn't "the smartest w
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02/04/2008