LIVE LIKE YOU OWN THE HOUSE BEFORE YOU BUYING Think about the above statement for a moment and ask yourself how that may have changed your past or current budget before buying your home. You may find that had you created a test budget before that purchase you may have noticed that you shouldn’t have spent so much. Typically you wouldn’t hear me say anything about using a test budget because a budget is a budget, however there are times when pretending to budget comes in handy. Forget about the word pretend for a moment and consider the reasons why you would want to prepare a test budget and how it would benefit you as a potential homeowner. Can I afford the house Can I afford the house Can I afford the house Start Young Finish Free I often like to believe that anyone who starts learning about finance from a young age will have basic knowledge to make financial decisions that may not impact their lives the way someone who did not. This is why I urge parents to teach themselves about finance FIRST and pass that knowledge on to their kids. Even then there are […]
How To Test Budget A Mortgage Before Buying A Home : The Saturday Weekend Review #250
Everything You Need To Know About Porting A Mortgage In Canada: The Saturday Weekend Review #241
IT’S WORTH KNOWING THE INS AND OUTS OF YOUR MORTGAGE It’s true and certainly something to always be mindful of, “It’s not about how much money you make, it’s how you save it.” When it comes to porting a mortgage in Canada, there are some things like interest rates that you need to factor into the equation, and we will cover these in detail in this article. Homeowners in Canada, and potential homeowners are faced with many important questions when it comes to mortgages. We are living through interesting times with respect to interest rates. The Fed is expected to raise rates further before the end of 2017, the Bank of England is clearly on a similar trajectory, and in time the European Central Bank will move away from quantitative easing towards quantitative tightening. What does this mean for mortgage holders around the world? The Canadian Economic Scene In Canada, the current bank rate is 1%. The BOC (Bank of Canada) decided to maintain the overnight rates when it met on Wednesday, 21 October 2017. The Bank of Canada forecasts that inflation will hit 2% by Q2 2018, later than economists projected. In 2017, real GDP grew […]
5 Point Checklist For Hosting A Successful Moving Sale : The Saturday Weekend Review #233
NOT ALL SALES ARE EQUAL ESPECIALLY WHEN SELLING YOUR BELONGINGS. Whether you’ve lived in a house for one year or 25 years you will accumulate stuff that gets shoved away in a dark corner and collects dust. We all do it unless you’re an extreme minimalist which wouldn’t be so bad for some people who can’t stop shopping for stuff to fill up their home. It’s after you are ready to move house and de-clutter for your first moving sale that memories and things start popping up. Then you have to make decisions about these items and sometimes selling or donating memories can be the hardest thing to do. Two questions pop into my head when I find stuff I haven’t used, we haven’t used or won’t use; Did we spend our money to buy it? Should we sell it or donate it? If it wasn’t our money then we don’t have to worry about a loss because we didn’t fork out the cash for it. Do you sell the stuff or do you take it with you? This is a question you need to ask yourself or sit as a family and discuss before even beginning to think […]
A Guide To Help You Negotiate A Rent Increase (Sample Letter)
YOU CAN NEGOTIATE ANYTHING AS LONG AS YOU KNOW HOW TO MAKE ALL THE RIGHT MOVES. Dealing with a rent increase is one of those difficult negotiation situations that needs to be backed by top-notch negotiation skills. Whether you’re a new tenant, on the cusp of renewing your rental lease or you’ve been handed a yearly rent increase the ball is now in your negotiation court. The art of negotiation can be used in just about any situation even when someone says the price is firm. Even then if you have the right backing power you might be able to squeeze in a discount or in this case negotiating a rent increase that doesn’t fit with your current budget expenses. Rental prices in our area have gone through the roof in the last couple of years. If you are a family with 2 children and need to rent a 2 or 3 bedroom apartment you’ll be looking at near $1200-$2000 a month whether it be in a basement apartment, one level of a house or apartment complex. An apartment complex is typically run by a property management team and basement apartments and house rentals have landlords who own the […]
Should We Bother Renovating Before Selling Our Home?
EMOTIONALLY INVESTING IN YOUR HOME RENOVATIONS IF YOU PLAN TO MOVE WILL COST YOU MORE THAN YOU NEED TO SPEND. Lately I’ve been quite impressed with the house prices in our area but at the same time know that if we sell the cost to renovate and buy weigh heavily on our minds. Not only that but the real estate market in Canada might be hot right now but if you have renovating to complete that might set you back with missed money opportunities. The top 3 questions next to time-frame that you need to answer before putting your house up for sale are; Should we renovate our home to get better return? How much will our renovation budget be? Do we want to upgrade or downsize buying a new house? On our street for 2017 we’ve had 5 houses up for sale all of which sold in and around a week or less. That might sound impressive and it is because houses don’t last long living in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA). With no more than 100 houses on our street that’s a huge number of nosey neighbour radars going off. That’s us ^^^^, we admit it. Who […]
9 Inspiring Property Search Options When Moving To A New City
DON’T GET LOST IN THE FRUSTRATIONS OF LOOKING FOR A NEW PLACE TO CALL HOME Whether you’ve just landed a new job or you’re moving for school or personal reasons it’s important to know where to begin your property search. One of the hardest things about moving to a new city is not knowing the area which can be a struggle when your main goal is to find somewhere to live. I was the person who was frustrated even though I was already living in Canada and the city in which we currently reside. Thankfully I had Mrs. CBB to guide me but that still didn’t ease the stress of making the biggest purchase of our life. Although we weren’t sure if we were going to rent an apartment after moving out from our hole in the ground (the cave) after research and running numbers a property search for a house was our best option. You may be looking to rent a room, apartment, condo or buy a house in a new city so I’ve put together a few inspiring search options to get you started. First and foremost visiting the area you are hoping to move to will […]
Costly New Home Ownership Mistakes You Don’t Want To Make: The Saturday Weekend Review #210
BEFORE YOU SIGN ON THE DOTTED LINE CONSIDER THE FOLLOWING TIPS FROM SOMEONE WHO HAS ALREADY MADE THE MISTAKES. Let’s just say we know someone who took on home ownership without much exploration but wishes he had done so to avoid the mistakes he made. Mr. Mistake has a child who stays with his mother alternate days through the week so the house is pretty quiet on the off days. At first we thought he would invest in buying a smaller house for the two of them to live in but that didn’t happen. The house he purchased was a 3000 sq ft. two-story home finished top to bottom however it wasn’t to his liking so he took on huge renovation projects. With the help of friends and hired help from Kijiji he got to work. He met lots of characters along the way responding to his Help Wanted ad online but hired very few. Saving money was the idea although not always the smartest when hiring people you don’t know. Even today he will tell you not to bother hiring online even if they come with a resume in hand. If the job goes wrong good luck trying […]
How To Protect Your Property From Open House Theft: The Saturday Weekend Review #197
YOUR OPEN HOUSE IS A CANDY STORE FOR POTENTIAL OPEN HOUSE THIEVES. Open house signs seem to be flooding the real estate market these days especially during the Spring, Summer and Fall months when the weather is nice in our neighbourhood. A successful open house means that you’ve had potential buyers come through, nothing was broken, nobody was injured and you didn’t get robbed due to open house theft. Open houses today are met with homeowners and real estate agents being more cautious than they once were because open house theft continues to happen every single day. Do you really need an open house? You don’t need to have an open house but if you want one it’s important to know what you’re getting involved in especially security risks. What is an open house listing? Once you’ve established that you want to sell your house and you’ve signed all the papers and met up with your agent at their real estate office you may consider an open house. The same rules apply if you are a for sale by owner representing yourself because now you’ve got to do the legwork to make sure you protect your investment. […]
