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A Home Loan Modification can help you stop foreclosure and stay in your home. But if you’re like most homeowners, you’re probably wondering how it will affect your credit, and whether in a good or bad way. Unfortunately, there’s no single answer—it all depends on how far behind you are and the kind of mortgage loan modification you’ll be granted.

Best-case scenarios

Technically, since you’re not borrowing any money, a home loan modification won’t hurt your credit score. If you’re paying less in interest, you have a smaller debt burden. And since most lenders prefer an interest rate reduction, there’s a pretty good chance that a Home loan modification will improve your credit score.

The implications are even better if your lender forgives part of the principal, although this is less common. If they write off $50,000 from your loan amount, it will show up on your report as a smaller loan, which can increase your credit score.

The lender factor

Unfortunately, it doesn’t always happen that way. It also depends on how your lender reports the home loan modification to the credit bureaus. Many of them will consider it paid for less than the original amount owed, which will count against your score. If you’re already in foreclosure, the impact on your credit can be substantial. Of course, compared to a short sale or a foreclosure, a Mortgage Loan Modification is still the best way to maintain your credit standing.

Tax implications

One of the early problems with Loan modification is that the amount forgiven is usually taxable. That means if your debt is reduced by $50,000, the IRS views it as income and imposes the corresponding tax. This can catch homeowners off guard during tax season, as many of them don’t know the tax implications at the time of the modification.

To avoid such incidents, the IRS announced in 2007 that Loan modification would no longer be classified as “prohibited transactions.” This applied to all loans originated from January 2004 to July 2007, the peak of the sub-prime boom, and those due to adjust from January 2009 to July 2012. If your mortgage falls under these categories, you won’t have to file a 1099 declaring the change as taxable.

A loan modification is much like going to court: you can save your money and get a court-appointed lawyer, or you can invest in professional representation and get the best mortgage assistance. Your loss mitigation won’t happen overnight, but if with a capable Loan Modification Attorney, you can be sure you’re in good hands.

Most people know about credit score or ratings but not so many know about Insurance score which is also a very important parameter that really does affect you at least as far as the rates you pay is concerned.

What is Insurance? To use the default definition, it said to be a numerical ranking based on a person’s credit history. This definition arises from the findings that there is a definite relationship between how a person manages their finance to their likelihood of making claims on their insurance policies.

The result of this findings show that persons with bad credit are the more likely to file claims than persons with good credit. So a person with good credit has a higher insurance score therefore is less likely to make a claim and so would pay lower rates. While a person with bad credit has lower insurance rates because they are more likely to make claims therefore they pay higher rates.

I do not know of another factor considered in the calculation of a persons insurance rates apart from their credit history. It therefore true to say that to have a good insurance score, one needs to make efforts to get their credit back in the good.

Lots of Insurers determine the rates you pay by checking your insurance score (other factors come to play in this as well) but there would of course be certain differences. It is then really necessary to take time to get the insurer that best suits your needs.

There are lots of different things to note when choosing an insurer and this could take up much of your time which is why quote sites have come up to help you. All you need do is go online, fill a form which would require certain information. After that, you would receive suu7gestions on the insurers that best suit you based on the information you filled.

Taking the time to visit reputable quote sites is a very valuable tool. You may want to check out some of our recommendations.

FHA Loan Florida

Why choose an FHA home loan for your Next Florida home?

There are lots of good reasons Florida homebuyers choose an FHA mortgage loan over conventional home loans, especially if one or more of the following apply to you

You’re a first-time Florida homebuyer. You have less than perfect credit. You don’t have a lot of money to put down on your next Florida home. You want to keep your Florida mortgage payments as low as possible. You’re worried about your Florida mortgage payments going up. You’re worried about qualifying for a Florida home loan.

 If any of these things describe you, then an FHA loan is right for you. Why? Because FHA-insured mortgages protect private Florida FHA approved lenders against loss. Because Florida mortgage lenders are insured against loss they off you’re a better deal.  

For the Florida home buyer the FHA program can simplify the purchase of a home, making financing easier and less expensive than a conventional mortgage loan product. Some highlights of the Florida FHA loan program include:

Minimal Down Payment and Closing costs.

Down payment less than 3% of Sales Price Gifts are allowed Seller can credit up to 6% of sales price towards closing and prepaid costs. 100% Financing available No reserves required. FHA regulated closing costs.

Easier Credit Qualifying Guidelines such as:

  No minimum FICO score or credit score requirements. FHA will allow a home purchase 2 year after a Bankruptcy. FHA will allow a home purchase 3 years after a Foreclosure.

Other Benefits include:

 Low costs: FHA loans have low interest rates because they are insured by the  federal government

 Lower down payment:  FHA Loans have a low 3.5% down payment requirement, and the money can come from a family member, employer or grant.

 Easier approval: Because FHA insures your lFlorida mortgage lender against loss, private Florida FHA approved mortgage lenders are willing to give you mortgage terms that make it easier for you to qualify.

 No MIN FICO SCORE : You don’t have to have perfect credit to get an FHA insured mortgage. In fact, FHA loans have no minimum credit score requirements, even if you have had credit problems, such as a bankruptcy, it’s easier for you to qualify for an FHA-insured loan than a conventional loan. Bankruptcy Chapter 13 requires 12 months from filing date, and chapter 7 bankruptcy requires you to wait 24 months from discharged unless you can document death of a wage earner or extreme medial condition.

 More protection to keep your home: The FHA loan has been helping people since 1934. Should you encounter hard times after buying your home, the FHA has many options to keep you in your home and avoid foreclosure. FHA insures loans for Florida lenders against default. FHA   does not lend money or set interest rates. For the best interest rate and terms on a mortgage visit www.FHAMortgageprograms.com , for a free quote on a Florida FHA loan.

You may use an FHA-insured mortgage to purchase or refinance a new or existing 1- to 4-unit home, a condominium or a manufactured or mobile home (provided it is on a permanent foundation.

 What kinds of insured loans does FHA offer?

Fixed-rate loans – Most FHA-insured loans are fixed-rate mortgages (loans). The advantage of a fixed-rate Florida mortgage is that your interest rate stays the same during the loan period, so you know exactly how much your monthly payment will be.

 Adjustable rate loans – Most Florida first-time homebuyers are a little stretched financially. With FHA’s adjustable rate mortgage (ARM), the initial interest rate and monthly payments are low, but these may change during the life of the loan. FHA uses the 1-Year Constant Maturity Treasury Index (CMT) to calculate the changes in interest rates. An index is a measure of interest rate changes that determine how much the interest rate on an ARM will change over time.

The maximum amount that the interest rate on your loan may increase or decrease in any one year is 1 or 2 percentage points, depending upon the type of ARM you choose. Over the life of the loan, the maximum interest rate change is 5 or 6 percentage points from the initial rate. The advantage of selecting an ARM is that you may be able to expand your house-hunting value range because your initial interest rate will be low, as will your payment.

 Florida Purchase/Florida rehabilitation loans – Sometimes you might see a home you’d like to buy, but it needs a lot of work. FHA has a loan for rehabilitating and repairing single-family properties called the SF Rehabilitation Loan program (203k). You can get one loan which combines the mortgage and the cost of repairs. The mortgage amount is based on the projected value of the property with the work completed. The advantage of this loan is that you can buy a home that needs a lot of work, but have only one mortgage payment, and you can complete the repairs after buying the home.

How do Floirda FHA-insured loans compare to subprime loans?
Subprime loans are loans designed for homebuyers who don’t have a strong credit history or can’t qualify for a regular or prime loan. Lenders charge a high interest rate on subprime loans because the risk that a homebuyer may not make their payments is high. Because FHA insures the lender against this risk, the interest rates on FHA-insured loans are generally among the lowest in the market. Most subprime loans carry interest rates at least 3 percentage points higher than an FHA-insured loan. On a $100,000 mortgage, the monthly payment for a subprime loan would be over $200 a month higher than an FHA-insured loan.

 The majority of subprime loans are also ARMs, where the interest rate can change a lot and greatly increase your monthly payments. Most FHA-insured loans are fixed-rate loans where the mortgage payment always stays the same. If you have an FHA-insured ARM loan, the rate can’t go up by more than one or two points in a year. The fees that lenders charge their borrowers for processing a subprime loan are also generally higher than on an FHA-insured loan.

Most subprime loans carry a heavy prepayment penalty that you must pay if you want to refinance your loan to a lower interest rate. These penalties can cost you hundreds or even thousands of dollars. There is never a prepayment penalty on an FHA-insured loan. You can refinance at any time and not worry about paying any penalties.

Unfortunately, because they don’t know these facts, many homebuyers who could qualify to buy a home with a fixed-rate FHA-insured loan only apply for subprime loans. Check out an FHA-insured loan before settling for a subprime loan!

 How do FHA-insured loans compare to conventional loans?
Conventional loans usually require a larger downpayment than FHA and if you have less than perfect credit you may not qualify for an affordable mortgage with a low interest rate . The best thing to do is compare the cost of the conventional loan to an FHA-insured loan line-by-line. What are the fees for each? What is the interest rate? How much is the mortgage insurance? How much downpayment is required? For some borrowers, a conventional loan may be less expensive. For many others, getting an FHA-insured loan is the way to go.

Do you have to buy mortgage insurance on an FHA-insured loan?
Yes – as you will with most loans. There is an up front mortgage insurance premium equal to 1.5% of the loan amount that is paid at settlement. In most cases, this mortgage insurance premium is included in your loan amount, so you are really paying it over the life of the loan. In addition, on loans with a term of greater than 15 years and a loan-to-value ratio of 90% or greater (meaning you are borrowing more than 90% of the value of the home), you will pay an annual mortgage insurance premium of 0.5% of the loan amount in monthly installments.

 Example:
Up Front Mortgage Insurance Premium
Mortgage amount: $100,000 X 1.75% = $1,500 @ 6.5% for 30 years = $ 9.48 per month

Annual Mortgage Insurance Premium
Mortgage amount: $100,000 X 0.55% = $ 500/12 months = $45.83 per month

 Total Mortgage Insurance Premium
Most loans require mortgage insurance when your down payment is less than 20% of the sales price. On conventional and subprime loans, mortgage insurance is provided by private companies. Whether private mortgage insurance is less than, equal to, or more than an FHA-insured loan’s insurance will depend upon the loan program and your qualifications.

Compare the cost of FHA to subprime and conventional types of loans over the life of your loan . Then compare how much each costs monthly. With the protection and value you get from FHA – it’s a very good deal.

(copyrighted)

After twelve years of credit repair, credit score repair and writing credit repair letters to all sorts of creditors, collection agencies and credit bureaus, I realized that it was necessary to provide my services at a serious discount to consumers in need. I realized that not all consumers could afford my credit repair services. As a result, I created a hot line to answer credit repair and credit score questions. However, I noticed that it was becoming an overwhelming task for my staff and at much expense in order to provide the free credit repair services.

A little over two (2) years ago, a couple of my clients suggested I should write a booklet (20 pages) about credit score, how credit score is calculated, what to look for when calculating credit score, what is the best way to repair credit and some of the main topics of credit repair. They suggested I should provide this ebook for a price of $9.95. I thought about doing so for some time as I was thinking that 20 pages of credit repair ebook would not be enough to even touch the surface on so many subjects that needed to be covered. You see the entire idea of credit repair (credit score repair) or credit repair letter writing is not a simple task that even 50 pages would be enough. However, it was also bothering me to charge $9.95 for some limited number of pages.

Then I realized, I could sit and think and continue contemplating about writing a credit repair – fix credit summary pages until I turn blue, or if I truly want to help consumers with their credit repair and credit score issues, I must take a step and start now. That was two (2) years ago.

As I was writing, in August 2006, I realized, we’ll have a major problems with the mortgage loans being granted so easily due to the unethical practices of mortgage lenders, brokers and direct lenders. You must understand this point. For the past eleven (11) years, I was directly involved in assisting my clients get loans after their credit repair was reasonably completed and their credit score was around 740 or higher. Initially, I was just fixing credit and let them enjoy the luxury of such good credit score. However, after communicating with my clients a couple of months later, I noticed that they were getting rubbed by “mortgage brokers” and the so called “Direct Lenders” or even the loan servicing companies. It was unjust then and it continued to be unjust now. Since this is a separate issue of its own, that I must share it with you and teaches you what to watch-out for, I am going to create a separate article about Creditors, lenders, mortgage brokers and the “direct lenders.”

Let’s stick with issue regarding credit repair.

Most consumers fall in the trap of over extended credit when banks and credit cards companies offer one card or loan after another. The consumers think the best way to get-out-of debt is borrowing more. In other words, “steal from Pete to pay Paul.” This is one of the major misconception consumers have that puts them in a deeper debt and causes even more problems for them to the point that they have credit collapse (beyond credit crunch). They experience receiving a lot of called from collection agencies, having late payments, collections and charge off entries on their credit files (credit reports) and their credit score goes down to 400 or 500 level.

As I was typing my so-called ebook (according to push my clients given), I noticed that the summary book was expanding to over one hundred pages and I was not even touching half the issues. Then I decided to continue and make the book a “credit repair” book called “Your Credit = Your Life, Fix It Now!” Since August 2006 realization that we will have mortgage problems, my only option was to inform as many people as I could either by emailing or calling, I was not able to reach all consumers. However, “Your Credit = Your Life…” book addressed all issues.

Other misconceptions consumers have, is the fact that some of them think, a credit repair is a quick fix. They think, they can just wave a magic wand and their credit score will go up from 495 to 720 or more. That’s not how it works. A true credit repair or improvement in credit score takes time (several months to a couple of years). Don’t be fooled by what you hear as quick “credit repair fix.”

In order for you to do self credit repair which is the best method, your must follow several steps. Those steps are lengthy and require patience. It requires dedication, willpower and application of your own gradual experiences. For the past several years, I have a sign on my office door so that everyone can clearly see. I also have the quote on my business cards, letterhead, books I wrote and talk about it repeatedly. It says, “more is lost by indecision than by bad decision.”

Think about it for a couple of second and then relate these words to what has transpired in your life thus far. Just as I was contemplating to write 20 pages for an ebook and sell it for $9.95, I was thinking of two things:

a. It is not possible to write just 20 pages,

b. I wouldn’t have the heart to sell a summary book for $9.95.

I lost the track of my own quote. “More was being lost be my indecision…” I wanted to help teach others how to fix credit; I hired a staff teaching them the credit repair concepts, but wasn’t grabbing my keyboard to type what was in my heart and mind. As my clients were pushing me, I was lost in my indecision.

Most consumers do exactly the same as I did for a couple of months. Think with yourself. How many times were you planning to do something and you kept contemplating if you should do what was in your mind or suggested to you? I bet you did that a few times. I bet part of your problem was the same as mine. Where do I start? How do I approach it? What would be my next step? And, a long list of other questions. You know something. Unless you take the first step, you wouldn’t know what the next step is. Unless you set your goal, mind and heart to take an action, it will never happen. You will contemplate and continue in your indecision yet time passes you by and all you do get deeper and deeper in debt, pay more for simple loans, get drowned in debt to a point that you will take your credit or financial anger on your loved ones. ALL BECAUSE YOU DID NOT MAKE YOUR DECISION IN DOING SOMETHING TO TURN YOUR LIFE AROUND.

My dear friend, stop feeling sorry. Here, I am pushing you to do something. Make a decision and do something about it NOW. It is never a bad idea to have a better credit so that you could have a better life and save more money. It took me several months to prepare the book that offers all you need to know about your credit. Believe me, I have seen so many credit reports that yours would not be half as bad as what I’ve seen. There is hope for everyone, especially you. You only become hopeless when you don’t get up, shack off feeling sorry and do something to turn your credit life around.

Please let it be now. Here are a few steps in what you can do.

1. Get copies of your credit reports. You must obtain recent copies for all three (3) credit bureaus. One credit report won’t do. Why? Different creditors and collection agencies report to different credit bureaus. See the book.

2. Compare each entry shown on your credit reports with the account statements you have. Whether it is an open account, closed account, a collection, a charge off or late payment account. You don’t know how many times, I seen credit reports where the consumer did not have any such account and it was creditor or credit bureaus mistakes. Read the book.

3. When you notice inconsistencies (whether it is an account you don’t recognize or misinformation about an account), call creditors and credit bureaus. Discuss, dispute and be persistent.

4. Ask for a conclusion, removal or correction letter.

5. Do NOT settle with collection agencies. If you do or have no other choice, you must do two things, settle for less or don’t pay unless they agree to correct the entry by removing it.

6. Do not trust a collection agent. They do NOT mean well.

There are so many things to talk about and so many techniques to offer. It is impossible to discuss all in this article. So, I ask you to do something useful and quick to improve your credit score, which is as a result of your steps in your credit repair. You don’t know how good it will do for you.

For a complete details of the list above and other topics use the knowledge base provided at link and pick up a copy of the book “Your Credit = Your Life, Fix It now!”

Best wishes

Mike Samadi

Any questions?  Go to Q & A of www.MasterCreditRepair.net, read and post.  Go to the “Comment” page and post your story or comment.