Most people do not need to hire a credit repair service. Besides being expensive, credit repair firms are often frowned upon by banks and other lending institutions, who may be doubtful about how accurately your report depicts your credit worthiness after it has been fixed by a credit repair service. You should do credit repair yourself, and this quick guide will show you how it can be done in 3 or 4 steps.
The first step to doing credit repair is to obtain copies of your credit reports as compiled by the major credit reporting agencies Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion. There are several ways of doing this. You can simply purchase your reports from them, ordering from their websites. But you may be able to get your credit report for free. Under the law, you are entitled to a free copy of your report once every 12 months from each of the agencies. You can apply for your free report online at www.annualcreditreport.com. Don’t confuse it with websites that have similar names, as they may try to scam you into paying for some kind of membership program.
When you have your credit reports, the next step is to check them for disputable items. These include items that are out of date, incorrect, or incomplete.
Next, report the disputable items. Do this by calling the agency or sending it a letter of dispute. You can just fill up and send the request for investigation form that is included in many credit reports. Be careful in what you writing, however, as you do not want to make any inaccurate or false statements. It is best to simply list down the items you wish to dispute and state that you want them verified or else removed from your report. If you can, send copies of supporting documents with your letter, but be careful what you send. You may end up sending the agency documents that support negative information on your report.
If dealing with the agencies does not improve your score, there is one more step you can take. You can get in touch directly with your creditors and see if you can work out a settlement that will help you clear your information. You should deal with your original creditors and not collection agencies, as they will not negotiate with you.
Learn about how to protect yourself from credit repair scams. Get more information and tips at http://creditrepairinsider.info
Tuesday, March 6, 2007
Useful tips to buying a house
Buying a home can be a daunting experience. If you’ve never done it before, you’re left wide open to all sorts of dodgy things being done to you, by the seller, their estate agent, or even your own estate agent. However, as with many things in life, a little knowledge goes a long way. If you’re buying a home, here are some things you should know.
First and foremost, you won’t go far wrong if you set a budget and stick to it. Work out what you can afford, and then work backwards to include agents’ fees and other expenses (surveys, for example). Your budget minus the fees and expenses is the maximum price that you should pay for your house. If you go over, you’ll struggle and get yourself into all sorts of bad debt – and once you get into debt, it’s hard to get out.
The next important thing is to always have a proper survey done. They’re expensive, so it can be tempting to skip it or try to do it yourself from a checklist you found in a book, but it will be much more expensive for you if you buy the house only to find something that the survey would have. This is one reason why it isn’t a good idea to buy houses at house auctions – they will sometimes have drastic structural defects that a survey would have found, but you’ve just committed to buy the house without one.
The last piece of advice I have for you is to take your time. Once you’ve decided to move, it can be tempting to dive in and see as many houses as possible in a week, and then buy one of them. The people who find the best houses, though, take a year or even more, looking at only a few good houses each week, until they find one that really grabs them. If you do it this way, not only will you be less stressed, but you’ll also be much more likely to be happy with the result.
First and foremost, you won’t go far wrong if you set a budget and stick to it. Work out what you can afford, and then work backwards to include agents’ fees and other expenses (surveys, for example). Your budget minus the fees and expenses is the maximum price that you should pay for your house. If you go over, you’ll struggle and get yourself into all sorts of bad debt – and once you get into debt, it’s hard to get out.
The next important thing is to always have a proper survey done. They’re expensive, so it can be tempting to skip it or try to do it yourself from a checklist you found in a book, but it will be much more expensive for you if you buy the house only to find something that the survey would have. This is one reason why it isn’t a good idea to buy houses at house auctions – they will sometimes have drastic structural defects that a survey would have found, but you’ve just committed to buy the house without one.
The last piece of advice I have for you is to take your time. Once you’ve decided to move, it can be tempting to dive in and see as many houses as possible in a week, and then buy one of them. The people who find the best houses, though, take a year or even more, looking at only a few good houses each week, until they find one that really grabs them. If you do it this way, not only will you be less stressed, but you’ll also be much more likely to be happy with the result.
Your Mortgage Checking Account
How it works.
Bank your money in your mortgage. With the Home Ownership Accelerator, you deposit your entire paycheck into your mortgage, instead of your checking account. This immediately reduces your principal balance. Since interest is based on your daily balance, you start saving interest immediately compared to traditional loans!
Access your funds just like you used to. You pay all of your expenses out of your mortgage, just like you would with a traditional bank account -- using the unlimited checks, free ATM/Debit card, and free online bill-pay that comes with the account. Until you need the money, though, it's in your mortgage in the form of a lower principal balance, saving you 5-6% in mortgage interest, instead of earning 1% in a bank account. Less interest means that more of your take-home pay goes towards principal, and you pay off sooner. With no change to spending habits!
How effective is it?
If you're an average borrower with good cash flow, you could pay off an average sized loan in as little as half the time – with no changes to spending habits.
Let's look at an example:
Imagine you have net pay of $100,000 annually, saving 15% of your net income after expenses, and you have a $400,000 30-year fixed-rate mortgage at 5.5%. And, let's even assume that mortgage interest rates are climbing on a "reverse course" that mirrors their recent decline (APR 8.19%)! A 'worst case' rate scenario!"
Saves interest, pays off sooner.
In this example, refinancing to the Home Ownership Accelerator roughly doubles your mortgage efficiency. You could pay off in as little as 17.3 years and save nearly $89,000 (21%) in interest, compared to the 30-year fixed rate loan at 5.5%. In fact, to save that much interest, you'd have to find a 30-year mortgage at 4.4%, which is very unlikely.
But what if rates go up even more?
In this example, the adjustable rate on the Home Ownership Accelerator would have to average 9.6% over the entire 17.3 years for the interest payments to equal that of the 30-year fixed rate mortgage at 5.5%. That's not likely to happen either.
Seeing is believing. Try it for yourself.
Still have questions?
Call me, Tyler, at (916) 673-3741
Specifications.
Loan type: Adjustable rate line of credit, based on 1-month LIBOR index.
Adjustment period: monthly
Term: 30 years
Lifetime cap: 5% over start rate
Minimum credit line: $100,000
Maximum credit line: $2,500,000
Minimum down payment: as low as 10%
Minimum credit scores : 680
Withdrawals: ATM/Visa P.O.S. card with 8 surcharge-free ATM transactions per month at any ATM, checks, bill-pay, ACH, EFT.
Payments: Direct payroll deposit, EFT, ACH,Bank by mail.
Statements: Monthly. Online account access.
Bank your money in your mortgage. With the Home Ownership Accelerator, you deposit your entire paycheck into your mortgage, instead of your checking account. This immediately reduces your principal balance. Since interest is based on your daily balance, you start saving interest immediately compared to traditional loans!
Access your funds just like you used to. You pay all of your expenses out of your mortgage, just like you would with a traditional bank account -- using the unlimited checks, free ATM/Debit card, and free online bill-pay that comes with the account. Until you need the money, though, it's in your mortgage in the form of a lower principal balance, saving you 5-6% in mortgage interest, instead of earning 1% in a bank account. Less interest means that more of your take-home pay goes towards principal, and you pay off sooner. With no change to spending habits!
How effective is it?
If you're an average borrower with good cash flow, you could pay off an average sized loan in as little as half the time – with no changes to spending habits.
Let's look at an example:
Imagine you have net pay of $100,000 annually, saving 15% of your net income after expenses, and you have a $400,000 30-year fixed-rate mortgage at 5.5%. And, let's even assume that mortgage interest rates are climbing on a "reverse course" that mirrors their recent decline (APR 8.19%)! A 'worst case' rate scenario!"
Saves interest, pays off sooner.
In this example, refinancing to the Home Ownership Accelerator roughly doubles your mortgage efficiency. You could pay off in as little as 17.3 years and save nearly $89,000 (21%) in interest, compared to the 30-year fixed rate loan at 5.5%. In fact, to save that much interest, you'd have to find a 30-year mortgage at 4.4%, which is very unlikely.
But what if rates go up even more?
In this example, the adjustable rate on the Home Ownership Accelerator would have to average 9.6% over the entire 17.3 years for the interest payments to equal that of the 30-year fixed rate mortgage at 5.5%. That's not likely to happen either.
Seeing is believing. Try it for yourself.
Still have questions?
Call me, Tyler, at (916) 673-3741
Specifications.
Loan type: Adjustable rate line of credit, based on 1-month LIBOR index.
Adjustment period: monthly
Term: 30 years
Lifetime cap: 5% over start rate
Minimum credit line: $100,000
Maximum credit line: $2,500,000
Minimum down payment: as low as 10%
Minimum credit scores : 680
Withdrawals: ATM/Visa P.O.S. card with 8 surcharge-free ATM transactions per month at any ATM, checks, bill-pay, ACH, EFT.
Payments: Direct payroll deposit, EFT, ACH,Bank by mail.
Statements: Monthly. Online account access.
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