Here’s a new video we just did explaining Balloon mortgages. Give it a quick view, it’s very short and informative! If you prefer to read a more detailed version, you can find that at Balloon Mortgage Explained.

The Truth In Lending Act requires a bank to disclose the interest rate on your mortgage, but it must also give you another piece of information:  the APR, or Annual Percentage Rate, which is always different.  So, how is this different from the actual rate the bank is charging you?  And why? The interest rate [...]

If you’re buying a house, especially for the first time, the mortgage process can seem confusing.  How is the payment calculated?  What is escrow?  What is PMI?  Here’s a quick guide to help you understand. Of course, your payment has two components:  principal, or the original amount that you borrowed, and interest.  If it’s a [...]

Closing on a home, especially the first time, can be intimidating.  You’ll feel like everyone is taking money out of your pocket.  But being informed can take much of the fear out of the process.  Here is a list of the most common mortgage fees you’ll see – and what you can do about them. Application [...]

The refinance boom of the early 2000′s saw the rise of a number of non-conventional mortgage options for homeowners. For most borrowers these mortgages are not the best option. However, depending on your situation, you may benefit from one of these non-conventional loans. One of the simplest, but most often misunderstood is the balloon mortgage.

Most Americans have a strong desire to pay off their homes. In a country wallowing in debt up to its eyeballs, getting the biggest debt you’ll likely ever take on paid off can be a pretty exciting idea. Believe it or not, people haven’t always been so eager to pay off their mortgages; it’s certainly [...]

With all the turmoil in the mortgage industry these days, a number of our readers have been wondering what happens if their mortgage lenders go belly up. Will the terms of your loan change? Will you have to renegotiate the loan with another lender? Well, most of what goes on in the secondary mortgage market [...]

The rent vs buy decision for a home is ultimately your own, however, if you feel like the time is right, you should take a step back and really examine whether home ownership is something that is right for you. When you do decide that it may be the right time to buy a house, [...]

If you caught our last article about Mortgage Documentation Types, you know a bit more about the more common mortgage doc types and their requirements. Although most homeowners will refinance many times throughout their lives, they may never hear about the other, less common doc types. In this article we’re going to dive into NINA, [...]

If you’ve read our last article, Examining the Option ARM and its Bad Press, you should have a basic understanding of how Option ARM mortgages function and an idea of why they’ve been receiving so much bad press lately. Perhaps the main reason nobody has anything good to say about these loans nowadays is because [...]

If you’ve been following the news at all lately you’ve no doubt heard about the poor state of the real estate and mortgage markets these days. Even though the press tends to exaggerate, both markets are in tough shape right now. Much of what the press is focusing on is the Option ARM Mortgage – [...]

You may have heard the term “Full Doc Loan” before, in this article we examine the different mortgage income and asset documentation types and their specific requirements.

Ok, so it may not be the sky, but the dollar has been losing ground against just about every currency out there. You may have heard something about this or maybe not, either way, you should know how it affects you. I remember going on my 6th grade class trip to Canada and being amazed [...]

I’ve done a lot of reading over the past several days about the Fed rate cut, if you’ve been following this at all, you’ve probably heard about 10 different opinions on the topic. Trust me, I know the feeling. Before I got into the mortgage industry I was so confused by financial commentary that I [...]

The Fed decided to lower its target for the Fed Funds rate by 50 basis points on Tuesday, the Dow Jones rallied immediately, posting the largest one day gains it’s seen since 2003. So what does all this mean for you? Well, the Fed Funds rate doesn’t directly affect mortgage rates, but mortgage rates are [...]

Here’s a great video that I found over at Dan Green’s blog about subprime loans and why the subprime mortgage market is taking a bit of a beating right now.

Well, the short answer is that the Fed doesn’t have much to do with long-term Mortgage interest rates. The Fed controls only one interest rate, the Fed Funds Rate; however, several other interest rates are based on the Fed Funds Rate, so, indirectly, the Fed controls these as well. The most important of these to consumers is the Prime Rate.