Uncategorized

Those in the military get housing benefits, but four more states just got military-friendly loans: Georgia, Florida, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania.

The Georgia Dream program provides assistance to first-time buyers, those that haven’t owned a house in three or more years, and those who live in designated areas. The Florida Housing Finance Corporation gives a Florida Military Heroes loan to former military members who want to live in affordable housing. North Carolina’s NC Foreclosure Prevention Fund gives zero-interest loans to help veterans keep their homes. The Keystone Home Loan Program in Pennsylvania offers low-interest loans to veterans.

Continue to original source.

Image via Military.com.

Alaskan utility customers may soon find a pleasant surprise in the form of loans. For energy efficient upgrades and adding renewable energy systems, they will be paid back through their monthly bills.

Known as “on-bill financing,” this is already done throughout the country.

Gov. Bill Walker signed a bill into law to suspend service to customers if they don’t pay back their loans. According to president and CEO of Golden Valley Electric Association Cory Borgeson says the company has to set up a bank business before the program can begin.

Continue to original source.

Image via TreeHugger.

No one wants to deal with taking out a mortgage loan and having it denied. Recently the Urban Institute calculated real denial rates to determine which mortgage loans are denied most often.

Government-backed loans get denied less than conventional loans. Forbes reported that “conventional loan applications are denied almost 50% of the time, versus just over 20% for government loans.”

Small balanced loans usually below $70,000 or lower see higher denial rates. Forbes said, “Applications for loans under the $70,000 mark had a 52% denial rate, while those for over $150,000 were denied just 29% of the time.”

Continue to original source.

Image via NerdWallet.

For those who built a home rather than bought an existing one, you might notice that traditional mortgages aren’t applied. Instead, you’ll likely have to get a construction loan.

But what is a construction loan, you may be wondering?

They’re high-interest, short-term loans that cover the costs of building or rehabilitating a home. They’re based on the projected value of the home once the construction is complete, rather than the home’s condition in comparison to other recent sales.

Continue to original source.

Image via Rhumbix.

Let’s start with this…it’s the LAW! Most states require drivers to carry some type of car insurance to prove that you can pay for potential accident expenses.

Even if your state does not require you have to car insurance, here are some other reasons why you should:

1. It’s risky – Accident costs are expensive, even if you’re a professional race car driver there’s a very good possibility you’ll be involved in an accident at some point.

2. Car insurance can help with health insurance – If you have insufficient health insurance there are some car insurances that help cover accident related injuries.

3. Saves time and isn’t as much of an inconvenience – Insurers have legitimate expertise on how to complete the post-accident process as quickly as possible. No one wants to do all this by themselves.

Image via Cheap Car Insurance.

Life insurance is important to have because it protects your loved ones from financial burden in the event of your death. But, you may be wondering how much life insurance you need.

Frankly, insurance can get expensive, so you don’t want to be paying for more than you need. The best way to figure out how much you need is to determine what all you want covered in the event of your death. For some people, they only want funeral expenses covered. For others, they want to leave their family a financial cushion to replace the lost income.

If you’ve been in a car accident, you might be wondering how it could affect your credit score. Car accidents can cost up to $44 billion in medical care and lost work, but that doesn’t include property damage, injuries, and other more permanent side effects.

While car accidents don’t directly affect your credit score since they aren’t reported to any credit bureaus, you can still see a dip in your score if you incur massive debts from your accident that you’re having trouble paying off. You would need to keep paying any minimum payments toward your debts, as you do with credit cards and loans, so as not to see a drop in your score. Other than that, though, it won’t directly impact your score.

Continue to original source.

If you’re considering making a big purchase, you might be thinking of putting it on your credit card. But is this the best move for you financially?

It’s easy to keep up with small purchases that you can easily pay off, but the large purchases are the ones that add up after a while and start to snowball into larger credit card debt.

Here are reasons why you’d be OK putting these big purchases on a credit card:

• If you pay your credit card bill on time every month
• You can avoid the allure of shiny new tech and other material possessions
• If your interest rate isn’t too high
• If you don’t have many recurring payments happening on your card

Continue to original source.

Good drivers, rejoice: It’s likely easier for you to find a cheaper auto insurance premium!

Insurance companies want to work with good drivers and promote safety on the road, so it only makes sense that they’ll want to partner with people don’t have any marks on their driving records.

These are the different types of insurance you can purchase:

• Uninsured/underinsured coverage.
• Minimum required insurance within your state.
• Usage-based insurance programs.

Continue to original source.

Have you ever looked at your credit card and wondered what the interest rates were and what they meant for your card and debt? When you’re signing up for a new credit card, you don’t want to overlook the APR information, especially if you plan to have a balance on your card.

APR stands for annual percentage rate and indicates the interest you’ll pay on any outstanding balance you have on your card. Depending on the card that you have, the interest usually kicks in after a grace period has passed.

Continue to original source.