Tag: Sellers

Posted in Buyers, Homeowners, Sellers

MORTGAGE POINTS TO REDUCE YOUR MONTHLY PAYMENT

Posted on by Liz Walker

Sellers, if you are waiting to make a move because your current mortgage is locked in at a very low interest rate and the current rates scare you, here’s an option to help. Lenders offer you a way to “buy” a lower interest rate. This is called mortgage or discount points. In the simplest description, you pay interest upfront to lower the interest rate on your loan.

This option works best for sellers who have built up equity in their home. Those would be people who have owned their home for at least the last 5 years or longer. Home prices have increased greatly since 2019 so even if you haven’t paid much off on your home the market has helped to increase your equity. Another ideal seller to take advantage of this is one looking to downsize from a more expensive home to a smaller one. Using the net profit from the sale of your home, you can purchase points to lower your interest rate.

1 point = 1% of the mortgage amount which lowers your interest rate by .25%

This amount is prepaid interest, so it is tax deductible.

If you are interested in this, first contact me to give you an idea of the current value of your home. Then reach out to your lender for details on the mortgage aspect to see if it could work for you.

Posted in Remodeling

Loving Luxury Vinyl Plank Flooring!

Posted on by Liz Walker

Pet Owners – Luxury Vinyl Planks is the perfect flooring for your home! It’s waterproof, resistant to surface damage and it’s easy to clean. I have 2 dogs that love to go swimming in the creek on our property and then roll around the yard. When they come in they leave puddles of water and sand.

All but 2 rooms in our home have the original, wide plank, pine floors. This soft wood has been easy to clean but easy to dent and scratch. I’ve been looking for a plank finish that would match the knotty, yellow, pine floors, honey oak trim and the weathered, grey, barn board siding throughout our home. Not easy to blend all theses colors thanks to the strong “gray” palette trends the last few years. I finally found a style that combines all three of the colors.

If you own a decent table saw, you can easily install this flooring yourself. The planks have a tongue and groove like system that clicks into place. If your floors aren’t even or perfectly flat there will be some challenges but it still works. The planks also come with the underlayer built in so it installs on top of the subfloor or over old, vinyl flooring without additional steps. There is no adhesive required either. After it is all laid out with a 1/4″ space around the edge of the room, you will need to install some molding strips to keep it secure.