Why you may not need a full 20% down payment before buying a home, especially if it means draining your savings. Q: I’m looking to buy a home where the typical property sells for about $200,000. I have saved up about $25,000. Should I wait until I have $40,000 to buy the home or try [...]
How to find proof of your cancelled mortgage if your lender didn’t send you a cancelled note. Q: How you can figure out if a cancelled mortgage is cancelled by the county? A: In a recent column, we discussed how a lender should and generally does send the cancelled note and mortgage back to the [...]
Buying your first home: How to find the right mortgage lender that will have your best interests at heart. Hint: It may not be who your real estate agent suggests. Q: I recently saw you on the news and I wanted to reach out to ask you a few questions. I wanted to take the [...]
Do you get the deed after your final mortgage payment? After making your final mortgage payment, there are many documents you should receive, but is the home deed one of them? Q: My husband and I paid off our home in 1999, 10 years early. We never received a deed. The loan company said that [...]
Home buyers are out in force. Sellers are scarce. The number of homes for sale on the market is as low as it was more than twenty years ago. As a result of supply and demand, half of all housing markets are overvalued in terms of price. The median home price in San Francisco is [...]
What might be hiding in the fine print of your mortgage documents? In this reader’s case, a prepayment penalty that they may not be able to get out of. Q: I recently took out a mortgage to purchase my first home. It’s a condo. I went with a non-traditional lender that offered a loan about [...]
Parents, children, estates and house titles: how does property title pass after death. What happens when a parent adds you to the title for estate planning. Q: My dad died quite some time ago and I have three siblings. We all get along but we all have different ideas on how to handle money. When [...]
There are a few reasons mortgage lenders are loosening regulations, one of which is a spike in late payments, but these roll backs won't be the cause of the next recession. I was asked on the radio last week if I thought mortgage lenders were loosening regulations too much. Steve Cochran, who hosts morning drive on [...]
When you get a low appraisal in a hot real real estate market, it could kill your deal. But there are a few things you can do before having to lower the list price or kill the deal. Q: I heard Ilyce recently on WBEZ radio. I'm moving to Chicago from Minnesota and was blown [...]
Real estate is always on my mind and in this article, I take a look at the current state of the US real estate market and what factors may be contributing to odd selling behaviors in certain markets. As we drove around the North Shore of Chicago this weekend, home to some of the most [...]
