I am paying more for rent then I would pay for a mortgage. My equifax is 684 but because my middle number is not 620 I can not qualify for an FHA loan. Ive never owned a home and I do not have bad debt..so is the only way to obtain a loan is a co-signer? Anyone have any suggestions on how to get approved for a loan in California?
by Steve Rhodes
If you don’t mind my asking, I’m trying to figure out what a reasonable percent of my income is to be going towards a mortgage payment. My partner and I make around $ 6500 gross monthly, and I’m wondering what percent of that we could reasonably spend on a mortgage without getting in over our heads. We have no other debt, but have normal bills like utilities and car insurance. If you don’t mind could you please give me an idea of what you earn and what you put towards your mortgage? Or what percent of your gross income goes towards your mortgage payments?
Thanks so much!
Mortgages For Dummies, 3rd Edition
Need a mortgage but worried about the market? In Mortgages For Dummies, 3rd Edition, bestselling authors Eric Tyson and Ray Brown give you proven solutions for obtaining a mortgage, whether you want to buy your first home, refinance, or tap into your equity. You get the latest on sub-prime and adjustable-rate mortgages, finding the best lender, avoiding fiscal pitfalls and foreclosure, and much, much, more!This easy-to-understand, objective, and jargon-free guide helps you fine-tune your finance
The rule of thumb is 30% of your take home, or 40% of your gross. Remember that the interest and proprty taxes (most of your payment in the first years) is tax deductible.
The 30% should include mortgage, taxes, fees, insurance, and maintenance of the property. Utilities do not count as part of the 30%.
we are at a little less than 1/3.
Just what the doctor ordered,
Excellent, plain English explanation of the various mortgages and how to choose one that best fits your situation. Also details how to shop and negotiate the best deal…with all the hype about shopping on the internet, that excellent chapter alone is worth the price of the book. I learned a lot about “creative financing” techniques like 80-10-10 loans that I knew nothing about before picking up a book. I’ve tried other mortgage books and found them to be dull and not to the point. This book was a joy to read and left me thinking clearly!
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|very helpful, if not extremely polished,
You will definitely find out just about anything you wanted to know about mortgages: fixed and ARM (all the others are variations on these themes). My only small complaint is the same as the reviewer’s below: several times the authors refer to appendices that are not there! There are also some typos (“suprised”) some in prominent places — it just gave me the feeling that the book was rushed. One piece of information I felt they could have spent more time on was the mechanical side of paying down a 30 mortgage faster. For example, how many years does it take off your loan to put in one extra payment a year, or $100 per month, etc…. Home buyers often pick a 30 year mortgage because of the low monthly payment, but can strive to put in an extra payment a year to save tens of thousands of dollars of interest. This information would have given more details to the types of mortgages most people get. The authors spent a bit too much time by comparison on some relatively rare loans (reverse mortgages) although no one will put a gun to your head and make you read those parts. Overall, it was easy to follow and the best of the books on understanding how mortgages work and how to compare them.
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|Very useful for first time home buyer,
I’ve found this book the most useful of the dozens I scanned through at the bookstore. The numbers used in the examples better represented the real-world of 1999 than the others. The authors do a good job of explaining the steps one should take to obtaining a mortgage and the many terms that are thrown about the mortgage industry. I didn’t come away from the book with a definitive answer to “which mortgage is right for me?” but I certainly understood what the trade-offs were between the different ones.
One problem I did have with the book is the many references to the graphs in “Appendix C” of how the ARM indices have behaved over time. The copy of the book I have has no such information in appendix C or any other appendix.
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