As they began planning their future together, Ashley Brown and her fiance, Aaron Shuman, concluded that they could no longer remain in Los Angeles because it was getting much too expensive. “Our rent in L.A. was $1,500 for a tiny, 650-square-foot apartment with no amenities,” says Brown, 29, a native New Yorker, actress and New […]
Category Archives: Investment Tips
Renting vs. buying a home in Tampa. Here’s the lowdown on when you break even.
Buying versus renting a home is a conundrum many of us have faced. Do you want to spend your weekends fixing stuff and sweating about whether the insurance is paid up or would you rather leave that to a landlord? On the flip side, owning means not getting booted when the lease runs out. The […]
Wall Street and single-family rental homes
Jennifer Paul St. Denis thought she had found the perfect landlord. A mother of two from Marietta, Georgia, St. Denis had been looking for a new home last summer after separating from her husband. Her search didn’t take her far. After spotting an ad from a company called Waypoint, she discovered they had a “super-cute” […]
Tech startup is making waves in housing market
Bouts of brutally cold weather have not kept Alison Benoit, a real estate agent in the Pepper Pike office of Keller Williams, from writing six accepted offers on homes last month. That figure is as much as the 20-year veteran of the residential market says is typical for hot sales months in summer.”For me it’s […]
Tom Kelly: Second home? How to determine what you really can afford
Thinking about buying that cabin in the woods your family enjoyed over the weekend?There are two ways for determining how much cash you can afford to put toward a second residence solely for your personal use or part-time rental.The first is the asset method. Start by taking stock of your present wealth. Create a balance […]
The Mortgage Professor: Does it make sense to take a reverse mortgage on a $1M home?
If you own a home worth $1 million, would it ever make sense to take out a reverse mortgage?The question arises because the maximum amounts that can be drawn on a home equity conversion mortgage – the type of reverse mortgage program available through the federal government – are based on the lower of appraised […]