Refinancing?

[mae0111]

I know everyone is just staying afloat with everything happening, but has anyone looked into refinancing?

We are in the process. We were able to get 2.75% for a 30 year fixed, no closing costs. And when I say no closing costs, I mean none. Our existing lender is actually eating the closing costs, so we are financing exactly what we owe with nothing due at closing.

We thought about going to a 15 year, but taxes are going to skyrocket here. We are anticipating 2 separate debt exclusions in the next 2 years for new schools. Our town has a large commercial base, and with the revenue lost from meal taxes, sales taxes, hotel taxes, etc, I know that our assessments and our taxes will go up over the next few years. But we are saving a few hundred a month.

Small wins!!

[phdmomma]

We are thinking about it as well, moving from our 30 year fixed to a 15 year fixed. DH is the one spearheading this. We also are hoping to get air conditioning (which is really expensive because we don't have any duct work in the house - we have a boiler and radiators) and roll that in.

[twinmomma]

Not refinancing, but totally shocked at the rates we could get when buying. I refinanced a year ago and dropped to 3.75 for a 20 year and thought that was great. Now I'm seeing 2.75 for new mortgages and I can't believe it.

[librarychica]

We actually refinanced in February. We had an ARM that was going to adjust in the next year so refinanced it to a 30 year fixed, less than 3% interest. We seriously considered a 15 year but decided against it for reasons I no longer recall. It seems so long ago!

[sdlaura]

I’m anti 15 year because I think if someone can give you money this cheap and there’s no penalty for prepayment, it makes sense to take a 30 year. Unless you use it as sort of a forced saving mechanism - which is what SIL is doing since her H is financially irresponsible. But DH and I invest for our jobs and expect to get a higher return then 2.75 long-term.

We’re in the process of a cash out refi. We’re taking $70k out and leaving it in cash/something insured in case DH loses his job or decides to go out on his own or something. Our mortgage will still only be about 50% of what our house would sell for and our monthly payment stays the same.

[k3am]

Holy crap that's a good rate.

We refinanced in November to 3.625%, and I just searched for what we'd get right now and it's only like 3.59% and includes paying points. I don't think it's enough of a difference to make the hassle worth it at this point. But man, if 2.75% were an option..

[sdlaura]

k3am the general rule I hear is that it’s worth refinancing if you can get a rate at least 0.75% lower.

[rere]

We are in a 15 year (hopefully about done) at 2.65% - we did that one of the last crises. It feels pretty good not to put a large chunk to interest every month. The first time (one of several), we did the same thing, just refinanced and dropped our payment over well over $100 a month. That was awesome.

[drjeep]

My best friend is currently going through the process to refinance at 2.75% for 30 years fixed. She said that she and her husband just wanted to get the good rate and that they will pay off an additional amount on the principal each month to pay it off faster. I thought I was doing great when I bought my house at 3.45% for 15 years fixed, so I was surprised to see the 2.75% that's available now!

[waverly]

We refinanced to a 14 year (not sure why it was 14 and not 15) a few years ago. I think we only have 11 years left which is awesome. But if/ when we add in the bathroom we have been talking about forever then that will knock out a lot of our progress womp womp. But we only have 1.5 bathrooms so we kind of need it.

[mustardseed2007]

It's so hard to think about doing this with the economy the way it is...but then again you're either employed or your not right?

[mae0111]

phdmomma - have you looked into mini splits for ac? Would that work for your space? No duct work needed.

My parents put them in and it was a fraction of the cost because they were able to get a ton back in rebates. We have central ac, but we installed one in my office because the zoning of the ac didn’t work well there. Most are also heaters as well.

[keh2oblue]

We just did a refi on our 2 year old home/mortgage from 3.75% to 3% for 30 year (closing costs included). We end up saving a little more than 20% on our monthly mortgage payment.

[erinshelley21]

We have talked about it. In 2 days it will be a year since we closed on our house so we will be able to soon. My credit score skyrocketed with paying off the camper so we are considering refinancing our mortgage and car loan.

We've also talked about doing a home equity loan so that we can build a garage. Our house should be worth quite a bit more than what we paid for it after the renovations, but we were thinking the garage wouldn't happen until next year at the earliest. Maybe we need to reconsider that.

[mellym]

We are in the middle of finishing our basement and just took out a home equity LOC to help finance it. I'm risk averse and didn't want to use our savings. Also, good idea to have the money available ahead of times like these. Banker said we want it in place prior to one of us losing our jobs as a safety net.

Our plan is to get the house appraised and look at refinancing once the basement is done. We are doing most of it ourselves so should have equity gains. Our next door neighbors house sold in two days for $75k more than they paid two years ago. It's crazy to me that houses in our neighborhood are still selling in less than a week. Most are going over list price too.

[callmekd]

We refinanced from a 30 year (we were in year 5) to a 15 year. Rate went from 3.9 to 2.9.

[phdmomma]

mae0111, We are looking at those, and probably need a couple. DH is pretty picky about these things, so I am letting him take the lead.

[madringal]

We just refinanced from a 30 yr (25 years left) of 4.05 to a 15 year at 2.625. Our payments have always been super cheap and even this $300 increase only take them to 15% of our take home pay. We expect to have it paid off in 10 years. Cost us about 4k in closing costs. Appraisal revealed that our home had increased 100k in value since we bought it. Just seems bananas to me. We couldn’t afford to buy our own home these days! Well, we could, but I wouldn’t pay that for this house!