Remodel Your Bathroom This Spring
| More so than with any other room, remodeling a bathroom can increase your home’s resale value. In fact, a moderate-sized bathroom remodel, which costs about $10,499, brings a 102 percent return on your investment, according to the 2005 Cost vs. Value Report published by the National Associa-tion of Realtors in REALTOR Magazine and by Hanley-Wood in Remodeling magazine. |  |
search for : remodeling a bathroom, home’s resale value, bathroom remodel
Finding a stellar real-estate agent is your challenge
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The woods are full of agents these days, and many are beginners. Here are the eight questions you can ask to separate the average agents from the experienced heavy hitters. Whether you’re buying or selling, the difference between having an average real-estate agent or a superstar can mean thousands of dollars in your pocket. It can mean selling your home for top dollar (stellar) or losing the house of your dreams to a more organized buyer (decidedly not stellar). |
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Homeowners Seduced By Easy Money Loans Hit Hard Times
| One out of every three low-income borrower falls behind on bill payments in a typical year, one out of every four now pays more than 40 percent of their income on debt payments and the total debt held by low-income households has soared by 308 percent during the last 15 years. A recent National Foundation for Credit Counseling (NFCC) survey found consumers universally ignore the fundamentals of sound financial management, such as budgeting and tracking expenses, ordering free credit reports, and managing debt. In another study by Bankrate, Inc. researchers found 34 percent of home owners do not know what type of mortgage they own. The study also said 34 percent of homeowners with adjustable rate mortgages (ARMs) do not know what they will do when their loan readjusts. |  |
Inflated home appraisals one cause of foreclosures
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The whole sorry mess of high-interest-rate mortgages and excessive foreclosures among buyers of low-cost starter homes is too big and complex to pin on mortgage brokers alone. Months of investigating and numerous stories by Observer reporters have uncovered instances of inflated home appraisals, erroneous financial information on mortgage papers, and high-pressure sales tactics, as well as a lack of resources for counseling to avert foreclosures. The result: Foreclosures in this region are at record levels. In some neighborhoods excessive foreclosures are lowering property values. It’s all part of a national wave of foreclosures so big it’s chilling the whole lending industry. |
search for : high-interest-rate mortgage, foreclosures, low-cost starter home
Saving for retirement while affording a home?
| The question is, can you really afford to pay for a house and still save for retirement. Will you have sufficient income to pay the mortgage, insurance, real estate taxes, utilities and maintenance costs and still sock away enough in 401(k)s and other retirement plans so you’ll have an adequate nest egg when you retire? That can be a tough call. For one thing, you’ve got to have a sense of how much of your annual income you should be saving for retirement. You’ve also got to factor in future earnings prospects. After all, things could be tight now and for the next couple of years. But if your salary is likely to rise significantly in the not too distant future, then you’ll probably have a lot more wiggle room after housing costs, allowing you to ramp up your retirement savings effort. |  |
search for : mortgage, insurance, real estate taxes, retirement savings
You May Enjoy Restoring an Old House
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Many North Carolinians enjoy buying, restoring and occupying older homes. Today’s NYTimes home section contains an interesting story about Bob Weinstein, a happy homeowner in Sag Harbor, in the little gray house on Suffolk Street he had owned for a decade. It was a quiet second home on a lot thick with old-growth trees, away from the busiest parts of the roughly 260-year-old former whaling village on the South Fork of Long Island, but a short walk from a downtown lined with restaurants and small shops. |
The Availability of Tax Relief for Hurricane, Tornado Victims
| The first place to go to after a natural disaster is to the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s online listing of Federal Disaster Areas to see if your area has been declared as a disaster area. This announcement is what gets the ball rolling on whether you can declare deductions on your taxes from loss of uninsured property and for losses not covered by your homeowner’s policy. There have already been 26 Presidentially-declared disaster areas in 2007. These are locales where damage to property and life exceeded the normal damage from natural disasters. |  |
search for : Federal Emergency Management, uninsured property, homeowner’s policy