My brother called earlier to tell me he was preapproved for a home loan of $141K. (I know that loan officers say preapproved and pre-something that I can’t remember – my brother may have said the other.) We talked for a bit about finding a good realtor and what size of house they were interested [...]
I have not used Prosper.com myself, but I am interested in becoming a lender probably next year. Prosper is a place where you can hook up with someone and work directly with them to loan (or borrow) money. You can get better interest rates then with the bank as a borrower and lenders can make [...]
Since it’s the end of January, it’s the perfect time to remind you to fill out your FAFSA! I always fill mine out the week or so after I’ve completed my taxes. I remember years ago when I would have to wait for myMom to do her taxes and that always annoyed me. The FAFSA [...]
I love, love, love finding a good deal. This past weekend my Aunt called asking me to run a search for cheap flights for her. Her best friend “back east” (if Ohio can be considered back east – of course from South Dakota, I suppose so) is retiring this year after working her job for [...]
Over at Get Rich Slowly, a great article about DIY related to your home has been posted. He has the 15 tools every homeowner should own. I’m happy to say that we own all but two of them. I actually have doubles of a few of them – and I think even three circular saws. [...]
The beginning of the year is one when we spend time getting our paperwork in order. It just happened that our car insurance, vehicle registration and both house insurance policies are up for renewal in either December or January. This month it’s the registration and one house policy. I’ve already paid for the registration but [...]
Ever since the military W-2′s became available, I’ve been working on our tax return. I’m doing it in shifts just because I’m annoyed that the website feels so slow. I did our income the first day and then just now finished up all the deductions. I still need a few more pieces of information before [...]
I very rarely check our credit card accounts online. I typically check each one twice a month – on paydays when I am making a payment. I don’t track the finance charges though I do keep track of the interest rates. And for whatever reason today, I checked both of them. I found a huge [...]
I’m still waiting for paperwork to come in so we can finish our taxes. I just got our home equity statement in yesterday and am amazed at the amount of interest we pay. We have a great rate, but still end up paying most of the payment toward interest, typical for a relatively new loan. [...]
If you are active duty military, your W2 is now available on the MyPay website. I want to encourage you to take advantage of your local VITA office or taxfreedom.com. VITA offers free tax preparation for military members and their families. We took advantage of this service the first few years we were married. The [...]