I know you’ve heard of the phrase “which came first, the chicken or the egg?”. It kind of makes you think of what happens when you consider selling your home. Which should you do first – purchase your new home, or sell your current abode? What’s the better option? Some don’t have a choice – […]
When it comes to selling your home, trial and error can sometimes (if not many times) be a factor. When a home sale is most successful, the process maximizes the seller’s proceeds in the shortest amount of time possible with the least amount of inconveniences. And, as all of us know, inconveniences happen. So, here […]
Homeownership is a cycle – think of it almost like a circle. All around the circle are items such as an apartment building, finances, things that are simply helping you work towards that goal of homeownership. Then, the middle of the circle is a larger home – the goal if you will. You may want […]
Here’s the question … are you better off, from a financial standpoint, renting or owning your home? Normally, renting a home does have some advantages. It’s a short-term commitment, and your landlord is responsible for all repairs. In most cases nowadays, owning a home can actually mean that your monthly payment would be lower than […]
A variable that helps a lender determine the likelihood of a loan being repaid on a timely basis is your credit score. This plays a large role. Credit bureaus will evaluate your creditworthiness using a FICO score. The higher the FICO score the better the borrower’s credit. A borrower gets charged a mortgage rate based […]
REALTORS® have a prayer: “Dear Lord, if I can’t be someone’s first love or second wife, let me be their third REALTOR®.” When there is a normal real estate market with a balanced supply of buyers and sellers, this describes the preference that it is better to be the third listing agent to help a […]
In our current market, there are at least 40 percent fewer homes on the market than a year ago. Buyers who are serious have probably already experienced the disappointment of losing a home due to increased competition. Today, buyers are looking for ways to improve their chances of having the best contract without using the […]
Consider, before paying cash for a home, if at some time in the future you would want to add a mortgage on the home and want to deduct that mortgage interest on your federal tax return. The current federal tax law allows homeowners to deduct the interest on up to $750,000 in acquisition debt that […]
There has been this stigma about new families or first-time home buyers getting their first “starter” home. For generations, people have looked for that home as a jump into homeownership. Logic suggests that starting with a smaller home, you can learn how to take care of it, learn what it costs to maintain a home, […]
Tax filing season is upon us again. A silver lining to completing that return is getting good news about a refund. This extra money could literally open the door to a new home. If you happen to be one of the fortunate, then your next decision is what to do with the refund. The average […]
