In the home-buying process, the first question you must answer is “how much house can I afford?” And in an effort to determine that amount responsibly, you may have googled for a calculator like this one on CNNMoney.com, which will tell you that you can spend between 28% and 36% of your gross income on [...]
Last summer, we touched on whether refusing to pay your debt at some point becomes a moral issue. In this week’s New York Times, the topic proves timely still. The article follows the Pemberton family in St. Petersburg, Fla., who have stopped paying their mortgage so they can put their money to more fun use, such as trips [...]
You may have noticed that different kinds of loans tend to have very different interest rates. For example, a typical 30-year mortgage today has an annual rate of about 6% (which is very low by historical standards). That might not seem like much, but 30 years is a very long time. Imagine you’re buying a [...]
If you’re working on Capitol Hill, you may have joined us Tuesday for our webinar on credit markets and personal credit history. In line with that topic, there’s good news on the horizon for consumers concerned about the effect credit scores have on the terms they’re offered from a lender. Starting in January of 2011, [...]
Greetings and welcome to this week’s edition of our Tuesday Top 5, our weekly tips post to help you manage your money in five easy steps. The deadline for that juicy $8,000 new homebuyer’s credit is rapidly approaching, but how do you know if you’re ready to own a home? Ask yourself the following five questions [...]
Most people believe owning a home is the American dream, right? Not necessarily. The idea that you’re just throwing your money away by renting is no longer the rule — in fact, over the past few years, many more people have thrown their money away by buying. The government offers several financial incentives to homeownership. [...]
Megan McArdle at The Atlantic is currently working on a long feature piece about consumer borrowing. But since the article won’t be out until early 2010, she has given us a taste by sharing an interesting observation about people who walk away from secured debt. A secured loan, if you’re unfamiliar, is one backed by collateral, [...]
Today we hosted our first webinar: What is a Credit Default Swap Anyway? The Financial Crisis for Capitol Hill Staffers. We had a great group for the presentation (check out the presentation here). For those that were interested and unable to attend we will be hosting a make-up session on Tuesday, September 1, 2009 at [...]
Pro athletes often seem uniquely poised for epic declarations of bankruptcy, but baseball legend Lenny Dykstra is giving other sports figures a run for their money (so to speak). Former Mets and Phillies slugger Dykstra filed for bankruptcy last week with reported assets totaling $50,000, despite claiming in April that he was worth $60 million. According [...]
Savings.com compiled this list of 30 deal-hunting Twitterers who post useful advice about where to find good deals on household purchases. Econ4U wanted to go a step further, so we went exploring and found 12 of the most prolific personal finance gurus (both big and small) on the popular social networking website: OnTheMoney — from CNBC’s personal finance program of [...]
