by That One Caveman on January 19, 2009
Friday, my wife and I signed the paperwork for our mortgage refinance. We are consolidating our mortgage (originally at 6%) and our home equity loan (at 8.375%) into one 30-year fixed 4.875% mortgage. But since this wasn’t a “streamline refinance,” I was required to start the 30-year clock over again.
At first I was [...]
by That One Caveman on December 18, 2008
I love my credit union. Not only do I get higher interest rates on my savings than regular brick-and-mortar banks, it also is not being affected all that bad with the credit crunch.
So, today, I get a call from a friend in the mortgage loan department at the credit union where I hold my [...]
by That One Caveman on May 28, 2008
Yesterday, I mentioned that we hired an appraiser to come and give us a full appraisal of our house for property tax purposes. When the appraisal came in much higher than expected – $15,000 over our purchase price 2 years ago – I wondered if we could benefit from this dramatic change.
I remembered reading [...]
by That One Caveman on January 11, 2008
Wednesday morning, I went to the county courthouse to challenge my property tax assessment. (I talked more about receiving the notice from the county in a previous post.) When I arrived, 4 of my neighbors were already there! Apparently, they over-assessed our entire neighborhood. Hopefully that will give me some leverage [...]
by That One Caveman on December 15, 2007
Well, I just received the most enjoyable piece of mail today… My credit union sent out my new set of coupons for paying my mortgage for 2008 and, much to my bewilderment, the amount went up by almost $50 per month! That means my taxes for last year were more than $400 higher [...]