Rising mortgage rates, The dream of Home-ownerships & Being an informed Consumer

Many opine about purchasing a home, mortgages, the type of consumer that Buys a home ... and what oh, what went wrong with our housing market these past few years.

Idealism and reality are two different things.

While some may argue that buying  Home is a risky investment, I would argue that home-owner­ship is probably one of the best investment­s a person can make -- if purchased under the right circumstan­ces. (i.e. good debt to income ratios, good down payment, stable mortgage, etc.)

Compared to folks who lost all their money in the Madoff scandal or the stock market, owning a home out-right is far better than owning a piece of paper that says you own "stock".

Also - there's the psychologi­cal impact of home-ownership (i.e. feeling grounded, a sense of ownership, stability, etc.)

While i agree that a 15 yr mortgage would be idea, it is not the reality for many borrowers (i.e. State or Govt employees who have job stability .. but lower wages compared to their private counterpar­ts).

I believe people who are on 30-year term mortgages should make one extra payment towards the mortgage or any additional payment whenever they have extra money.   For many - who may not have enough to make one extra mortgage payment at once ... they ought to take one payment, divide it by twelve and send in an extra mortgage payment.   I'd take it a step further and write a separate check (when sending in the normal monthly mortgage payment) but specify in the memo section that this payment should be applied to principal.  This way, someone gets to take advantage of a more affordable mortgage payment while still paying off the mortgage faster.

As a rule of thumb, the more you pay towards the principal, the faster you pay off your mortgage payment.

Home-owner­ship is still one of the best investment­s Americans can make.  Unfortunat­ely, we have mis-informa­tion, a real lack of education for first-time home buyers, a lack of financial IQ and economic maturity, slick salesmansh­ip, a lack of real oversight and consumer protection ... and a myriad of other factors that influence that stir the pot, that got us to where we were starting about 3.5 yrs ago.

Read the Article at HuffingtonPost