30Dec

(Recruitment) Creative Ideas in Financing

No comments

By Haywood Dickerson

  With today’s rising prices it’s all most people can do to stay afloat financially. So how does a young couple save enough money to break into the housing market? Sometimes you have to think outside of the box and come up with creative financing options. One such example is Lease-to-Own, or Rent-to-Own house purchases.

Basically, in this scenario, the landlord and the tenant come up with an agreement to purchase the house within a designated period of time (usually 3 years or less), for a specific price. An option fee of 1 to 5% of the price is credited to the purchase price and a premium is added to the rent payment to accumulate a deposit. If the buyer backs out of the purchase agreement they lose both the option fee and the rent premium.

Typical Rent-to-Own Contract Features

The rent and home price are usually established and documented based on market value plus any negotiation between the buyer and seller.

A rent-to-own contract will have an option period where the borrower can build equity while living in the home. Once the option period expires, the borrower is counting on successfully qualifying for a mortgage to purchase the home. It is imperative that the borrower has a good idea of their ability to assume a mortgage; speak to a lender before entering on a rent-to-own agreement to have your financial situation examined. You may only have to improve your credit rating, and this can be accomplished by making timely minimum payments any loans or credit cards each month.

Often a lender will want to see that an amount above the market rent price has been set aside. This ensures that the seller is not providing the borrower with a kickback by artificially inflating the selling price. Usually the bank will also request an appraisal for this reason.

If at the end of the option period, the buyer discovers problems with the home, it may be cheaper to walk away from the deal than purchase a house which may develop into a money pit.

The selling price of the home is agreed upon at the beginning of the option period. This means that after a 3 year option period if houses prices drop the borrower may request a down payment based on the new value. For instance, a 5% down payment on a $225,000 home would be $11,250. If the home drops 3% in value, or to $218,250, the 5% down payment from this would be $10,912 - bringing the maximum loan amount to 207,338. You need $225,000, now you have to make up the difference.

However, the price may indeed go up 3% in price and the seller is out the amount of the increase. It is for this reason that some contracts are drawn up with no final price quoted, just specifying the house will be sold at fair market value at the end of the option period.

There are shady sellers out there who will create a contract with an easy escape clause, such as the right to evict a tenant with only 3 days notice. It is in the buyer’s best interests to have their contract reviewed by a lawyer before entering into a binding agreement. Also, pay your rent on time and do not give the seller any opportunity to renege on the agreement.

Information on wisteria care, pruning wisteria , wisteria pictures can be found at the Gardening Central site.


Donating Your Car to Charity

By Haywood Dickerson

  You can donate your car to a wide range of charity organizations, but picking the most representative ones requires getting some previous information. So before actually donating your car, make sure you get some relevant info about the charity organization, its purposes, projects and usage of your car. You might find out that there are various organizations that have different goals and you will probably find, among them, a great cause and possibility to donate your car to something meaningful. Even more, make sure that your car is going to go to an eligible organization that is serious in its acts and has valid previous work. In order to be sure, speaking directly with the charity agents is the safest way to go. In fact, the IRS requests that the donors are aware of the type of the fundraiser society they choose. When talking to the charity representatives, the most important information regards the exact usage of your car, if it will be sold, fixed up, offered to the less fortunate people and so on. Besides these, you should check up if the charity organization is qualified and in order to know that for sure, you can review the organization’s state registrations and financial situations, administrative costs and charitable programs.

Charitable donations and car evaluations

Another important thing before donating your car is evaluating it in a correct way. There are various guides on the market that offer elaborate instructions, in order to establish the valid value of your car, depending on its general condition, accessories, age and mileage. After making sure that you selected the correct charitable organization and the optimum evaluation, you should be aware of the fact that you are required to complete and attach an IRS form to your tax return, in case you are claiming a car donation that values 500 $ or above. Donating a used car to charity is a great solution if you are planning to purchase a new car or if you are simply willing to contribute to a charitable activity. Knowing and following some steps before the actual car donation avoids further worries, as it makes the process a safe and fulfilling one.

Are there any hidden facts about used car donation that I should be aware of?

First of all, not every used car donation programs are functioning legally. Before you make your used car donation, you should check with the IRS if the charity is a non-profit organization listed under paragraph 501 (c) (3) in the IRS Publication 78.

Secondly, check out if the used car donation program is run in-house by the charity itself or by a third party. If a third party is operating the used car donation program, you should ask what percent of the profit made by selling the donated cars actually goes to the charity. Often, third-party operated used car donation programs produce small amounts of money for the charity. Smaller charities do not afford the costs of transportation and storage for the donated cars, not to mention the costs involved in charity auctions. This is the main reason why charities accept to have their used car donation programs run buy third-party brokers.

Visit the Gardening Central website to learn about grass seed facts, grass seed advice, grass seed germination, caring for roses, how to dry roses , types of roses and other information.

job search

Share and Enjoy: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
  • Digg
  • Bumpzee
  • del.icio.us
  • Facebook
  • Furl
  • Mixx
  • NewsVine
  • Reddit
  • StumbleUpon
  • YahooMyWeb
  • Google
Categories: employment

Wednesday, December 30th, 2009 at 12:20 pm and is filed under employment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Leave a reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.