At home.loans, we’re all about educating home buyers and homeowners, so we rounded up the most frequently asked mortgage-related questions that people are asking, and answered them all!
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Both the FHA 203(K) loan and the Fannie Mae HomeStyle Renovation loan are top contenders for being the best possible loans for getting work done on a home without having to take out a second mortgage.
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Winterizing your home is an important step in protecting your investment and your financial health, and fortunately, it doesn’t have to be complicated.
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If you’re like the team here at home.loans, you don’t want to spend a boatload of hard-earned money on decorations that you’ll only use once a year.
Don’t get us wrong -- we love the holidays. And decorating for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and beyond is a great way to get the kids away from their screens, enjoy a change of pace, and even alleviate the winter blues (science has shown us that putting up holiday decorations early has incredible mood-boosting powers).
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A big home improvement project can have an equally big impact on your life and the value of your home. But there’s always the money hurdle: funding a renovation (especially a big one, like a new roof, a landscaping makeover, or a new kitchen) can feel close to impossible, especially if you’re a new homeowner.
Here are seven options you may not have considered for funding your next home improvement project, so you can get past your budgetary challenges and start getting your hands dirty.
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By the time this blog publishes, Hurricane Florence will have already come and gone, but for the people who were in her wake, the real struggle has only just begun. Even a Category 1 hurricane can make a huge mess, dump buckets and buckets of water on soil that’s already saturated (a huge problem for a building's foundation) and destroy the morale of an entire state.
But it’s not really the hurricane that’s the worst part of it. It’s the after days. It’s figuring out how to move forward when your life is flipped completely upside down.
As I listen to the news on my Echo (hey, toys are fun and Alexa is a handy pal) each morning, I can’t help but feel incredible sorrow for the people who are being evacuated from their homes because of wildfires. Everyone says, “Oh, don’t worry, they had INSURANCE.”
This is the beauty of not having had to experience a house fire.
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Did you know that a HELOC can also be a great way to fund home improvements that could actually increase your home equity in the long run? And if you increase your home equity, down the line, you can get a credit line increase as well?
Maybe this has happened to you: you’re enjoying the benefits of home ownership, planning your next renovation or color scheme for the living room, when -- bam! -- you get hit with a property tax bill you totally didn’t expect.
Is there anything you can do when your property taxes go up?
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At least once a year, without fail, I’m asked to write a piece about whether or not it’s the right time to buy a home, get a mortgage or sell a home. This is life in the fast lane when you’re a writer with a lending and real estate background. Everybody wants an answer to THE burning question--it appears in search constantly. Site owners want to be able to give readers something that can help them figure out their current financial picture (while encouraging them to click on said site link)
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A home equity line of credit, or HELOC, is a revolving line of credit that’s secured by the equity in your home. Think of it as a secured credit card, with your home acting as collateral.
Just like with a credit card, you’ll have a limit. This limit represents the equity in your home. You can tap it as frequently as you want, provided you have the available balance. When you pay down your balance, that amount of money is credited to your HELOC and you can spend it again later.
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Whether you’re looking at a Fannie Mae HomeStyle loan, an FHA 203k, or a good old home equity loan -- borrowing to make home improvements isn’t a decision to take lightly.
For any of these types of loans, the most important question any home buyer can ask is “What sort of house improvement can I buy with this loan?” The reason: it’s all too easy for a buyer to jump into a renovation loan in order to buy an extreme fixer-upper, without realizing that the house may be a total disaster.
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If you’ve recently gotten a windfall -- say, a big work bonus, or an inheritance from a long-lost uncle -- you might be wondering whether to pay off your mortgage, or invest the extra cash in order to make more money in the future.
When it comes to deciding the best way to spend your extra money, there are several factors to take into account. This includes the type of mortgage you currently have, your personal appetite for risk, and how much you expect to get from your potential investment. We’ll help you make the call.
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Maybe you’re having trouble making your mortgage payments. Maybe you just want to downsize. Or maybe you simply want to escape your everyday routine and travel the world for a year. Regardless of your circumstance, renting out your home to pay your mortgage has never been a more popular option. But before you rush to list your house on Zillow and Trulia, know that renting your home could actually land you in trouble -- if you don’t take the right precautions first.
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We’re going to tell you where you totally can’t afford to buy a house--or if you do, it’s going to cost you a premium. Since the real estate market has been plagued by housing inventory shortages, many areas are experiencing run-away housing costs simply due to too many buyers and too few homes.
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DIY projects are all about becoming a more creative and inventive version of your regular desk mounted self. Oh, sure, during the week you’re Bob from Accounting, but on the weekend? That’s when you transform into Bob the Resourceful DIY Guy. This article is for all the Bobs (and Bobbies) out there.
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There’s an epic battle raging in the mortgage world between two fierce and unyielding opponents: PMI and MIP. Both do essentially the same thing, but they aren’t the same. Let’s take a walk through both camps to get a better understanding of these much-maligned mortgage insurances.
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With housing costs across America on the rise, especially in big cities, many people are turning toward tiny homes to make life simpler, less expensive, and a lot more fun. While there are a lot of tiny home concepts and categories out there, these are some of the ones that really caught our eye.
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Right now, shipping container homes have never been hotter. With the average price of owning a home in the U.S. sitting around $257,000, and the price of buying a brand new home sitting at $407,000, it’s only natural that people are flocking to a more cost-friendly alternative. Shipping containers, by contrast, may cost as little as $1,400 each, and you might not even need that many to make a beautiful and spacious home.
It started with a nail, then one hammer strike and then another. Before you knew it, you had a headache bigger than Texas and it’s all because your roof needed to be replaced. This article is for you, because Tylenol isn’t going to touch the migraine you’ll have if you’re not prepared.
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Falling in love with a house, especially when you're a first-time home buyer, is a bit like falling in love with a person. It's easy to idealize your future home and completely overlook its flaws. Here are the top things you're most likely to come to regret if you're a first-time homebuyer.
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June first is the official start of the 2018 hurricane season for coastal dwellers across America. Although the sky is clear for the time being, this is the perfect opportunity to review your hurricane safety plan and get your home ready to survive the next big storm.
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Imagine you’re in your eighties. You’ve taken out a reverse mortgage in order to stay in your home and use its equity for your living expenses. You do this for several years, but once these funds are depleted, the bank owns your home, and you also owe thousands in property taxes. You have no money or no job, and you’re about to be homeless.
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If you're a new homeowner, home maintenance may be a totally foreign concept to you. No longer will a landlord be checking on your furnace filters or coming into replace appliances when they go out. So, what's essential, and what's not?
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Building your own home gives you the incredible opportunity to customize the space exactly to your specifications from day one. You can add real value to your home and improve your quality of life when you think about installing useful technology during the construction process.
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PACE loans are meant to be home equity types of loan products used to cover energy-efficiency upgrades to homes, so they’re primarily utilized for big-budget items like solar panels, tankless water heaters, HVAC upgrades, and new window and door installation. Sounds pretty awesome, right?
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When the time comes for a major home improvement project like a landscaping project or new roof, you can keep your liquid money in savings and tap your house-sized piggy bank instead. Home Equity Lines of Credit are flexible, affordable and attainable sources of funding for home improvements like landscaping or a new roof.
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How much are closing costs, really? When it comes to nearly anything else in life that you buy, you know the price up front. You buy a bag of bananas, it’s 49 cents a pound. You order a new laser printer, it’s a couple hundred bucks. You know what it’s going to cost, to the penny, before you agree to buy the thing.
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When you’re staring down yet another $400 utility bill in the dead of winter, the idea of an energy-efficient house might start to seem really appealing. An energy-efficient home loan is one approach to funding home improvements, however it can also lead to higher periodic mortgage payments. Energy-efficient mortgages are most of the times accompanied by potential challenges.
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You may think you can't buy a home if your credit is poor, but we have some good news: even if your credit score is lurking somewhere in the depths of the Atlantic Ocean, you can still own your dream home—and without a down payment of 20%.
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