OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Ho » Thu Feb 12, 2015 2:14 pm

DyKnow is my side hustle. I'm a full-time Ho.
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Merk » Thu Feb 12, 2015 2:29 pm

I think I am break-even at best in my sports betting.

I think I'd like to get into consulting and work under MonMotha someday
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Amp Divorax » Thu Feb 12, 2015 4:47 pm

I know DR88 knows how to make it make money, but I don't believe he is anywhere near that level.

I will confirm though that since 2012 I have worked steadily on several after hours projects. (I will be reducing my general workload though as I wish to start working out more again and spend a bit more time with my significant other.)
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Merk » Thu Feb 12, 2015 4:49 pm

AMP HOW MUCH MONEY DO YOU MAKE?
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Amp Divorax » Fri Feb 13, 2015 8:09 am

Merk wrote:AMP HOW MUCH MONEY DO YOU MAKE?
So excited to ask that you used all caps eh? I prefer not to discuss numbers on a public forum but I will state that I make what I consider great money as I came from an irresponsible blue-collar family and was practically impoverished when I was serving. (I consider my time in the Marine Corps Reserve to be a massive failure.) At the same time several websites say that I'm only pulling the average for an entry-level with regards to the work I do so it is a 'your mileage may vary' thing.
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Merk » Fri Feb 13, 2015 8:41 am

It's okay, no one goes to this forum so we can talk about how much money we make and all the weird perverted shit we're into.
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Fluffyumpkins » Fri Feb 13, 2015 10:16 am

None of us will ever be able to run for political office.

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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Amp Divorax » Fri Feb 13, 2015 2:54 pm

Fluffyumpkins wrote:None of us will ever be able to run for political office.
This may be true for anybody and everybody under 30 thanks to social media. In our case though I think at the worst our involvement with the group would be considered a minor eccentricity when compared to the fact that allegedly the Mayor of Toronto smoked crack. (Not even Ultimate Muscle Roller Legend is enough to change that simple fact.)
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Ho » Fri Feb 13, 2015 5:21 pm

FUCK YOU! I'M THE GODDAMN MAYOR OF AWESOMETOWN!
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Amp Divorax » Mon Feb 16, 2015 3:16 pm

Ho wrote:FUCK YOU! I'M THE GODDAMN MAYOR OF AWESOMETOWN!
ROTFLOL! Instead of site admin, "Goddamn mayor of Awesometown" should be your banner!
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Merk » Tue Feb 17, 2015 10:13 am

Let's talk about home buying. Assuming the stock market doesn't take an absolute shit on itself in the next 10 months then I'll have saved up enough money to put a solid down payment on a middle-class white guy home. I'd like to hear about some of your experiences in home buying!

* How much money percentage-wise did you put down on your house? My goal is 20% so I can avoid PMI but I'm willing to do more if people have had good experiences doing so.
* How much time/money did you spend on all the realtor / inspector stuff? I don't know shit about homes so ideally I'd hire an inspector on any house I'm interested in. What were your inspector experiences? How much of a dick was your realtor?
* Closing costs, as a buyer do I have to worry about them?
* How easy is it to pay your mortgage? Can you do this shit on-line or am I writing physical checks and mailing them every month?
* How awful is your Home-Owners Association?
* Home insurance? I pay about $900 a year on my car insurance, is home insurance comparable to that or should I expect to pay significantly more per year?
* Property taxes? Am I writing the government a check every year when I pay my taxes or are my property taxes wrapped up in my mortgage?
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Fluffyumpkins » Tue Feb 17, 2015 12:12 pm

* How much money percentage-wise did you put down on your house? My goal is 20% so I can avoid PMI but I'm willing to do more if people have had good experiences doing so.
This is a tough one. There are obvious benefits to avoiding PMI, and you'll have to pay interest on money you don't put down. 20% seems to be the magic number for a lot of people.

* How much time/money did you spend on all the realtor / inspector stuff? I don't know shit about homes so ideally I'd hire an inspector on any house I'm interested in. What were your inspector experiences? How much of a dick was your realtor?
A home inspection is practically mandatory. I spent practically no time on the inspector. They came over, did their thing, and gave me a packet with the results. You can usually pay more for things like more advanced mold detection, and radon testing. The home inspection takes place after an offer has been placed and accepted, but if they find something significant, you can bail on the deal. I had the benefit of Jess's dad being a contractor, and he came out to check the place prior to an inspection. Danielle and Brandon would be pretty good resources if you're looking at foreclosed homes since they can identify what fixes are pretty simple and cheap, and what fixes take significant time and money.

I didn't spend a lot of time hunting for a realtor either, but I suppose I could've. She wasn't a dick, and was very patient with my noob-dumdum questions of which I had many. I'd say check out a few homes with a realtor, and see how the two of you click. If they're a pain to work with, find someone else. I spent a solid 5 months looking at houses with a realtor before locking anything in. As far as costs, I think there is a flat percentage of the home's sale price that goes to the realtor that listed it, and the realtor that bought it. Here's a cute chart.

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* Closing costs, as a buyer do I have to worry about them?
Yes, but this is commonly used in negations when buying a home. You can always request the seller cover these costs.

* How easy is it to pay your mortgage? Can you do this shit on-line or am I writing physical checks and mailing them every month?
Super easy. I have an auto-draft from my bank account, just like with any other bill. You may also pay via check each month if you're not into giving a lender direct access to your account.

* How awful is your Home-Owners Association?
4/10. You've heard me complain I'm sure, but I've never been to a meeting to try to change anything. I guess I've never been that invested.

* Home insurance? I pay about $900 a year on my car insurance, is home insurance comparable to that or should I expect to pay significantly more per year?
According to the Federal Reserve Bureau, the average cost of an annual premium for homeowners insurance is between $300 and $1,000. For most homeowners, the annual costs for a homeowners insurance policy can be estimated by dividing the value of the home by 1,000, then multiplying the result by $3.50.
* Property taxes? Am I writing the government a check every year when I pay my taxes or are my property taxes wrapped up in my mortgage?
I'll let someone that understands it a bit better explain escrow.

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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Fluffyumpkins » Tue Feb 17, 2015 12:15 pm

You didn't ask, but I'll throw out a few good sites for house hunting.
http://www.talktotucker.com/idx/results/?searchtype=3
http://www.mibor.com/index.php?src=gend ... ouseSearch

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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by MonMotha » Tue Feb 17, 2015 1:32 pm

If you have a mortgage, your property taxes will be paid as part of your mortgage through escrow along with the homeowner's (fire) insurance and any other mandatory things like flood insurance (if required for the property for loan purposes). This is IN ADDITION to the P&I on the loan, so your actual payment will be higher than what you calculate using a straight mortgage calculator unless it's estimating the escrow, too.

Property taxes in the Indy area are basically all at the state max cap which is 1% of assessed value. Note that assessed value is sometimes wildly off from what you actually pay/could sell for.

Broker commissions are 6% total in almost all cases, sometimes 7%. This is split between the buyer's agent and listing agent. In some cases, the listing agent will give part of what is conventionally their portion of the commission to the buyer's agent in the hopes that the buyer's agent will steer the buyer toward that property since they get more out of the deal. Watch out for this. It's always disclosed on the listing (BAC - Buyer's Agent Commission). You can't get around this if you're buying something that's listed in the MLS, though some listing agents that do basically nothing but put it in the MLS will elect to take a smaller commission. It's all built into the pricing of the deal, though. The buyer pays nothing out of pocket. Instead, it all comes out of the seller's portion. Consider that this means that if you turn right around and sell it straight away after you buy it for exactly what you "paid", you're not only out any closing costs you paid on the loan or to the title company but also the 6% brokerage commissions. Fully private sales ("For Sale By Owner" with no buyer's agent) are not subject to this, but you won't have a buyer's agent to guide you through the process. You can retain one and pay them the 3% (or whatever you agree) yourself if you do decide to have them help you buy in what would otherwise be a private transaction. You could also retain a lawyer for this purpose. You'll actually probably get away paying less to the lawyer, believe it or not.

You're unlikely to get a seller to cover all your closing costs right now. The market isn't that damaged, any more. The current convention seems to be to either split them 50/50 or to take each cost and assign it to whoever is "naturally responsible" e.g. the seller is responsible for presenting marketable title to the property, while the buyer is responsible for securing financing.

As to homeowner's insurance costs, it varies a lot with property value and both property and individual risk profile. You can get some pretty impressive discounts for having long-term coverage (and renter's insurance often counts) as well as multi-line for having e.g. auto insurance with the same company. If you have a property in mind, just call up your preferred insurance agent (and maybe a couple others) and get quotes. They can do this with no obligations before you even own the property by just knowing you and some basic facts about the property such as value, construction type, and location.

As to paying your mortgage, this is one of those weird spaces where American banking's archaic nature rears its ugly head. You CAN pay it online in many ways. You can have your bank ACH funds or send a draft (a check). This is convenient, but there's almost no protections for you if it doesn't work. Many banks in fact explicitly disclaim responsibility for mortgage payments even if they normally accept it on other bills. Check with your bank. You can also have the mortgage servicer ACH the funds from your account, in most cases. This often has surprisingly few protections if it doesn't work for any reason, and you have almost no control over it once the process is started aside from canceling it entirely, often needing 30 days notice. You can of course write a check, but nobody will believe you if it gets "lost in the mail". In the end, I let my bank pay it through their online bill pay. It goes via ACH, so I can see if something went wrong very quickly. Just make sure to leave enough time in the grace period so that you can correct any problems that may happen on a month-to-month basis before being late. Some banks do offer a (very) slight interest rate reduction on your mortgage if you also have a checking account with them and let them auto-debit it for the amount of the mortgage.

Note that you CAN "overpay" your mortgage. You'll just chew right away at the principal and pay it off faster. It's very easy to pay off a 30yr loan in 20-25 years, for example, by just rounding your payment up to the next $100 or whatever. That's all just savings in interest, too. Of course, if you know you can cover the payment regularly, you can have them write the loan for the shorter term, and you'll get a small reduction in interest rate sometimes. Most banks these days will write loans for totally arbitrary lengths (however many months you want), but 360mo (30yr), 240mo (20yr), 180mo (15yr), 120mo (10yr), 84mo (7yr), and 60mo (5yr) are the most common and generally where the interest rate breaks are.
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Re: OH THOSE MORNING JITTERS

Post by Fluffyumpkins » Tue Feb 17, 2015 2:48 pm

I'm pretty into paying bi-weekly. By paying the same amount each month split into smaller, but more frequent, payments, you can actually pay off a 30 year mortgage 4 years early.

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