Layout:
Home > Archive: December, 2008

Archive for December, 2008

house follow up....

December 12th, 2008 at 02:55 am

The house is just over a thousand feet. I think this is size for a single gal.

Still no other offers. I do know it was a short sale on the market for 276 days before they foreclosed on the house. Now what do I do?

Ugh...house buying questions...

December 11th, 2008 at 07:46 pm

MM-Congratulations!

I am looking for advice now…I live in California, near Sacramento, an area that has been hit with this whole mortgage thing and will continue to be affected because of the bad loans made into 2006.
I walked through the house I want to buy last Friday night. It is perfect and everything I said I wanted 5 years ago when I was dreaming (2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 2 car garage, gas range to cook on, no large yard to upkeep (preferred a town house like patio with greenery)) just everything perfect. It is in a gated community (although the gate has been open each time I drove by.) The house even has an east facing master bedroom like I wanted. HOA is $115 a month.

Please do not tell me to keep the emotion out of it, there is no emotion as my line of thinking is either I get it or I don’t. This is the house plan I want but if it is not this house—that is ok.

The bank (it is a foreclosure) is asking 250k. Out of my price range but as they foreclosed on the house for 195k, what is a reasonable offer to make? They have dropped the price 10k since it went on the market Sept. 25th. I really didn’t want to go over 200 but might have to to buy this house. It is in a good neighborhood, nice homes less than 8 years old, they are zero lot lines homes so no large yard to up keep just a stamped concrete patio type with plant containers and a small tree and green zone. What sounds like a good offer? Other properties in the area that are the same floor plan as the one I like are asking around 270k.

(270K for a 2/2/2 with no yard? Are you kidding me??)

Anyway I was approved for a mortgage at 5.3% (and am hoping the rates continue to drop-4.5% would be fantastic!)

I also have to wait and see what happens with the state as I work for them and they are seriously in trouble financially. The latest is up to a 10% reduction in workforce (13k positions gone or open positions not getting filled) AND having state employees take somewhere between 5% and 10% reduction in salary. If they did that, there goes my house dreams.

What I cannot figure out is where the withholding should be to equal out at the end of the year. The whole deduction of mortgage interest thing confuses me. Based upon my current withholdings, what does it mean if you paid 10k in federal taxes in 2008 and paid 12k in home mortgage interest? How much would you get to deduct from your federal taxes, a one for one exchange or a percentage of what you paid interest wise on a mortgage? I know you can write off property taxes too, anything else?

MM-do you do any personal counseling? Since your in the area can I hire your company for my taxes this year? Smile

I bake a good chocolate chip cookie if that helps…