I have been hearing alot about the Bank of America No Fee Mortgage. I went on their website to check it out and it sounds like a pretty good deal. I went through the demo and they allegedly do not increase the rate to compensate for the lack of fees. They offer:
No Fee Mortgage PLUS
$0 Application Fee
$0 Closing Fees
No Private Mortgage Insurance
Close-On-Time Guarantee
Best Value Guarantee
I am thinking about refinancing in about a year or two but I could not determine if they offer this for Refi's. Anyone else looked into this?
For my usual irregular expenses like car insurance, tag renewal and my condo policy, I usually just use a credit card to pay them and pay off the card over time. Beginning this year, I took the total of my irregular expenses plus a buffer and divided it by 12. I now put that amount out of each paycheck aside in my Etrade savings account (currently at 5.05%). To date, I have saved about $1100...enough for my next 6 month auto insurance policy (about $450), my condo policy ($375) and a small buffer for any other unexpected irregular expenses. Granted, I have about $38k in cash but that is reserved for paying off my credit card debt and paying off my car loan.
If you would like $25 just for opening a new checking or savings account with Bank of America, contact me @ wannabefree30@gmail.com with the subject heading of BOA referral.
We both will get a referral bonus of $25 within 90 days of opening the account if terms and conditions are met.
Check out the terms and conditions here.
As I indicated in the about me section, I admit I have made some mistakes and the past and I am working to correct those mistakes. I will share a few of the mistakes that led up to my debt situation.
- I put myself through college working 2 jobs and with the help of loans and scholarships. My best friend in college had very wealthy parents and was able to spend alot of money. My family had no money so I spent any extra money I had to try and keep up with him and opened multiple credit cards to make up the rest. Let me say I do not blame anyone besides myself for that. My friend never forced me to do anything I could not afford to do.
- Making minimum monthly payments on the above mentioned credit cards.
- Maxing out the above mentioned credit cards. If my limit was $2k, I spent $2k.
- I liked new cars. I bought my first new car just out of high school. Me being very naive, I paid whatever the sticker said w/o any negotiation. I had sucker written all over my forehead. Pretty much every 2 years after that, I continued to purchase new cars. I did learn to negotiate the price but I rolled me negative equity from the first car into each subsequent car "deal."
- I purchased a home in 2003 for about $122k. The home was worth $127k. The seller paid closing costs and I had a pretty good interest rate. I was looking to refinance about 1 year later and found something called a no equity 2nd mortgage. I knew this was the answer and rolled about $40k debt into my home loan. I now had a mortgage of $162500 on my home that was worth about $130k.
- I ran up an additional $29k in debt on my zero balance credit cards.
About 1 yr ago, I decided enough is enough. If I wanted to be able to retire early, I would need to get out from under my blanket of debt. I created a budget to know where my money was going and started paying off debt. To date, I have paid off about $10k. I created this blog not only to get inspiration to get rid of the debt monster, but to share my situation and maybe inspire someone else to start paying off debt.
Ok, so I admit it. I like to keep my house nice and cool because I am always hot. I can be outside for 2 minutes and I will start to sweat. Oh well, I still love living in the South. Anyway, I have been running the A/C at about 73 for the upstairs unit and 77 for the downstairs unit. I have a tri-level townhouse and the upper level is usually HOT and the first level is really cool. During the week while I am at work, I turn the upstairs unit up to 77 so it will not run all day. Apparently, this is not working as when I received my power bill today it was a shocking $165. Last month, it was only $85. I included about $120 (thinking this was plenty) in my July budget as I figured the bill would be a bit more than $85...I now need to rework my budget to account for the additional $45. First item that gets the cut.....the Entertainment fund.
Welcome to my blog. I intend to share my own personal finance experience and also add in a little fun with topics that do not involve finances. I read alot of personal finance blogs and most of them tend to be geared to much towards reporting news they have found across the Internet. Don't get me wrong, if I find something that I think will help anyone else, I will post it. Anyway, sit back, buckle your seatbelt and enjoy the ride.
Here are a number of tools to help you manage your financial life. These are affiliate links which means I earn a small referral fee if you sign up using one of these links. I greatly appreciate it and only recommend companies and products that I use, have used or trust highly.
Bank Accounts
ING Direct. Great rates, no fees, no minimum balance!
- Electric Orange Checking Account
- Orange Savings Account
WT Direct
- Savings Account
HSBC
- Online Savings Account
Credit Reporting & Scores
Equifax
- Credit Watch Gold 3-in-1 Credit Monitoring
- Score Watch
Truecredit
- Credit Monitoring 30 Day Free Trial
- Free Credit Score
Credit Report.com
- 7 Day Free Trial of 3 Bureau Credit Monitoring
Insurance (Here's where most of us can save money by shopping around!)
Insure Me
- Free Auto, Home and Life Insurance Quotes (No obligation)
Allstate Insurance
- Free Insurance Quote (Save up to $400 and get $100 off your deductible)
21st Century Insurance
- Free Auto Insurance Quote
Credit Cards
Discover Card
- Student Card
- Discover More
- Teen Prepaid Debit Card
Credit Cards.com
- Best Credit Card Deals
Financial Management
Quickbooks
- Small Business Software
Quicken
- Quicken Online (see all of your accounts in one place)
- Rental Property Management Software
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