Monthly Archives: February 2008

When selling a home, understanding a little bit about home buyer psychology can help you move your home more quickly. After all, what people perceive helps define how they act. A recent article from RealEstateJournal.com listed several techniques that home … Continue reading →

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke testified to Congress Wednesday, alluded to further rate cuts to support an ailing U.S. economy. Already, the Federal Reserve has lowered the Fed Funds Rate by 2.250% since September 2007. The graph at right comes … Continue reading →

Yesterday, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight released its fourth-quarter housing data. The OFHEO report color-coded each state according to its annual price changes. The states shown in red lost value, and everyone else gained. Overall, the OFHEO measured … Continue reading →

When a buyer and seller reach agreement on a home sale, the buyer typically puts a small amount of money into a trust account. This up-front deposit is more commonly known as “earnest money”. A sales contract’s earnest money requirement … Continue reading →

In general, the farther a home is built from a metropolitan area, the more affordable that home is for a buyer. The desire for affordable housing helped fuel the real estate markets earlier this decade. It also helped to add … Continue reading →

The interest rate differential between a 30-year fixed rate mortgage and a 5-year adjustable-rate mortgage is growing. An economic recession is expected to damage the economy over the near-term and so mortgage rates tied to that same time frame are … Continue reading →

When buying a home, there are two stages in the home loan approval process. Stage 1 starts when a homebuyer submits a mortgage application to his loan officer for a pre-approval. A pre-approval is a “walk-through” mortgage approval that says … Continue reading →

For homebuyers and homeowners expecting low mortgage rates this week, Tuesday marked the unofficial end to basement 30-year fixed mortgage rates. According to the market analysts at BestInfo, Inc., the 30-year fixed rate measured its largest one-day movement in more … Continue reading →

For a lot of homebuyers, calculating a prospective mortgage payment is an online experience. For example, a search on Google for “mortgage calculator” returns 39 million options. Some people, however, prefer to plan on their local hard drive using spreadsheets. … Continue reading →

Your home’s heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) unit must be clean to run at peak efficiency. “Efficient” means “cost savings” so this is just one reason to change your system’s air filter regularly. Experts suggest changing your air filter … Continue reading →