Refinance vs Home Equity Loan
By Ray Vinson | February 29, 2008
Author: J Suffie
If you find yourself in need of a large sum of money for some reason, you may be considering using the equity in your home by either doing a cash-out refinance or getting a home equity loan in order to gain access to the money you need.
With the federal government beginning to slowly lower interest rates, you may be wondering if you should do a cash-out refinance in order to get that lower interest rate as well as gain access to the money you have in equity. This may be a tempting situation, but a lower interest rate is only one of the things that you should take into consideration.
When you refinance your home, you are taking out an entirely new mortgage. You use this new mortgage in order to pay off your original mortgage. In the case of a cash-out refinance, you borrow more on your home than the original mortgage balance, using your equity as collateral. You can then use the money left over after the refinance is completed to do anything you’d like. You can pay off credit cards, take a vacation, make home improvements, etc.
There are drawbacks to cash-out refinancing. First of all, your mortgage balance will be bigger and will most likely be extending your loan term. Mortgages are written with either 15 year or 30 year terms. If you only have 8 years before you pay off your mortgage, refinancing to even a 15 year mortgage is nearly doubling your loan term.
There are also considerable fees involved when you refinance. It would be worth your time, and sometimes a great deal of money, to find the best deal on fees that you can find.
With a home equity loan you are using the equity in your home as collateral on a loan. Home equity loans can be for a set amount or you can get a home equity line of credit, which is an open-ended loan that can be used just as you would use a credit card, keeping in mind that when you use that line of credit, you are using the equity in your home.
Home equity loans are easier to get than a refinance, especially if you have bad credit. The interest rate is also usually lower than a refinance, and the payments sometimes qualify as being tax deductible.
No matter whether you choose a cash-out refinance or a home equity loan, be sure to do some research on the companies you are considering working with. The best way to choose a good company to work with is to ask your friends, family and coworkers for recommendations. Ask not only about the process itself, but about how they were treated by the people they were working with. Were they rushed into decisions, or did they feel that they were given good information so that they could make the final decisions themselves? Remember that you are the customer, and when you are taking a large amount of money out against your home, you shouldn’t be rushed into anything.
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The Best Mortgage Lead by Vinson Mortgage Group
By Ray Vinson | August 24, 2007
Author: Mark Carey
Whether you are selling used automobiles, water purification tablets, encyclopedias door to door or mortgages, a sales person’s next client always begins life in the sales cycle as a sales lead. Wikipedia summarizes a sales lead simply and effectively. “A sales lead is the identity of a person or entity potentially interested in purchasing a product or service, and represents the first stage of a sales process.” Mortgage brokers and lenders are constantly on the look out for the best mortgage lead, which is often perceived to be a mortgage lead most likely to convert into a mortgage customer. The best mortgage leads often come from marketing lead generation processes such as mortgage lead purchases, direct marketing, advertising, Internet marketing or from sales person prospecting activities such as cold calling. In Glengarry Glen Ross, the 1992 film written by David Mamet and directed by James Foley, Alec Baldwin’s character Blake presents his sales personnel with the Glengarry leads, referred to as gold due to their high conversion rate. Solid leads of this nature are highly desired, the first significant step in a sales cycle that will end with a sale and satisfied client. Just as Blake’s staff are hungry for the best leads, mortgage brokers and lenders are eager for the best mortgage leads. As the first stage of the sales process, a solid mortgage lead is a highly treasured commodity. You may be wondering what constitutes the best mortgage lead. The best mortgage lead, of course, is your most recent mortgage lead. There’s no mortgage lead like it.
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Home Mortgage Makes Dreams Come True.
By Ray Vinson | August 24, 2007
Author: smgenie
Getting a house of your own is a lifetime achievement and home mortgage helps you in achieving this milestone much earlier than it would otherwise have been possible. In fact, the first home mortgage is also filled with a lot of emotion. Home mortgage is really something that makes dreams come true. So let’s start with understanding what a home mortgage actually is? Home mortgage is something that allows you to buy a house even if you don’t have enough money to pay for it right away. This is made possible by borrowing money from someone and paying it back in monthly installments. The person who lends you money is called the home mortgage lender. The home mortgage lender lends you money for a specific period of time (up to 30 years) during which you are expected to pay back the money in monthly installments. There are certain terms and conditions associated with the home mortgage agreement and these terms and conditions govern the home mortgage throughout its tenure. Among others, the most important thing is the interest rate that the home mortgage lender charges you. Interest charges are the means through which the mortgage lenders earns on this financial transaction called home mortgage. Most home mortgage lenders offer various home mortgage schemes/options. The most important variation in these schemes is in terms of the interest rate and the calculations related to it. In fact, most home mortgage options are named after the type of interest rate used for that option. Broadly speaking, there are 2 types of home mortgage interest rates - FRM (fixed rate mortgage) and ARM (adjustable rate mortgage). For FRM, the interest rate is fixed for the entire tenure of the home mortgage loan. For ARM, as the name suggests, the home mortgage rate changes or adjusts throughout the tenure of the home mortgage. This change or adjustment of mortgage rates is based on a pre-selected financial index like treasury security (and also on the terms and conditions agreed between you and the mortgage lender). That is how mortgage works. No matter what type of home mortgage you go for, you always need to pay back the entire home mortgage loan (with interest) to the mortgage lender, failing which the mortgage lender can stake claim to your home and even auction it off to recover the dues. So, home mortgage is a wonderful means of getting into your dream home much earlier in your life. Without this concept, you would have to wait for a long time for getting into that dream home. Really, home mortgage is one of the best concepts from the world of finance.
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Topics: Ray Vinson, Vinson Mortgage Group, Home Mortgage | No Comments »