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How to Make a Refinance Appraisal Checklist

May 4, 2020 By MelissaB Leave a Comment

If you’re looking to refinance your home, you will likely need to have an appraisal as it’s the first step to putting an official price value on your home. You may not know where to start, but learning how to make a refinance appraisal checklist is the perfect place. Once you do this, you can work on improving your property for the appraisal.

How to Make a Refinance Appraisal Checklist

My husband and I recently called our real estate agent because we wanted to refinance our house. She gave us several pieces of advice to prepare for an appraisal.

Get Rid of the Clutter

How to Make a Refinance Appraisal Checklist — Photo by Minh Pham on Unsplash

Most Americans have at least some clutter. Your job is to get rid of the clutter in preparation for the appraisal, much the same way you would if you were preparing your home for sale. Our real estate agent specifically said, “Make your house show ready.” However, she also added that in general we didn’t have to make places like closets pristine for an appraisal.

Make a List of Improvements to the Home

Since you’ve lived in your home, what improvements have you made? Make sure you have a list of what you’ve done and when you did it. Since we moved in, we’ve replaced the water heater, the HVAC, and two bedrooms’ flooring. Big ticket items like replacing the HVAC system help the appraiser increase the value of your home.

Make Easy Cosmetic Fixes

When you’re in your house every day, you tend not to notice the little things like the paint that is chipped off your kitchen cabinets or the hole in the dry wall where your child’s bedroom door handle hit the wall. You might not notice dingy floorboards or dusty door hinges, but the appraiser will.

These items don’t cost much to fix, but they can increase the value of your home by creating the appearance that you care for your home and that it is well-maintained.

Look at the Curb Appeal

How does your house look on the outside? Is the paint fresh or the siding clean? Is the lawn mowed? Nicely landscaped? Or, do you have piles of clutter outside?

A tree fell in our backyard during a windstorm, and while we had taken care of most of it, the trunk of it still lay across our backyard. The real estate agent was adamant that we must take care of that before the appraiser came.

Get Comps for the Neighborhood

How much do comparable houses in your neighborhood sell for? Having this information gives you an idea of how much your house would likely sell for. Making this information easily accessible to the appraiser also gives him a starting point.

Our real estate agent offered to put together a list of comps for us. However, we didn’t need her to. When we put in our application for refinance, the comps in our area were high enough and our mortgage low enough, that the bank didn’t even require an appraisal.

Final Thoughts

Now is a good time to consider a refinance based on the market. If you’re wondering how to get started, hopefully this helps you learn how to make a refinance appraisal checklist.

Can You Benefit from a Meal Kit?

February 13, 2020 By MelissaB Leave a Comment

You’ve likely seen the advertisements for meal delivery kits and wondered, can you benefit from a meal kit? For a set amount, averaging about $7 to $12 per meal per person, the meal service company sends you a box with all the ingredients you need for three different meals with two or four servings, depending on what you choose, as well as the recipe for each meal.

There are so many kits to choose from: Green Chef, Hello Fresh, and Blue Apron, just to name a few. You can find meal kits that are offered for vegans, that have options for those who are gluten-free or nut-free, and those who prefer organic food only.

I’ve personally tried Green Chef, and my family and I loved the meals, but we didn’t love the price tag. However, while regularly subscribing to a meal kit isn’t good for us at this stage in our lives, there are plenty of times that buying a meal kit is a great financial choice:

When You Don’t Know How to Cook

Can You Benefit from a Meal Kit? — Photo by Le Creuset on Unsplash

Unfortunately, more and more kids are leaving the nest without knowing how to cook. If your cooking consists of boxed macaroni and cheese, grilled cheese, and eggs, a meal kit service might be perfect for you. Not only will you get to eat tasty, nutritious food, but using the kit week after week will slowly help you learn to cook. Eventually, you’ll be able to cook on your own, without the meal kit service. Knowing how to cook is a skill that is priceless.

When You Would Go Out to Eat Instead

When I worked full-time and my husband was a full-time student and we had an infant, we went out to eat much more than we should have. We wasted thousands of dollars because we were just too tired to go grocery shopping regularly and figure out what to eat. In this case, a meal kit would have saved us so much money. While meal kits are more expensive than cooking from scratch and buying your own groceries, they are cheaper than going out to eat for a meal in a nice, sit down restaurant.

When You Need A Healthier Option

If you eat out frequently or dine on delivered pizza or Chinese, a meal kit may be perfect for you because it’s likely healthier than the food that you’re currently eating. I found Green Chef to be very healthy; each meal had a lean protein and a variety of vegetables that were of different colors. Another bonus is that the meals are already portioned for you, so you won’t overindulge, unlike restaurant portions.

Can you benefit from a meal kit? Only you can answer that. A meal kit service isn’t right for everyone. Certainly, choosing your own recipes, grocery shopping, and cooking for yourself is a more frugal option. But not everyone cares about frugality when it comes to meals. There are times when a meal kit subscription is the perfect option.

Have you ever subscribed to a meal kit service? If so, which one? Were you happy with the food and recipes that you received?

Living Costs to Calculate Before You Sign a Lease

August 9, 2018 By Holly Welles 1 Comment

You’ve found the perfect apartment or house to rent, and you’re ready to sign on the dotted line and move into your dream home. Not so fast! Before you sign the lease, make sure you’ve calculated all your living costs, including unexpected expenses, so that you aren’t blindsided with bills you didn’t plan for.

The only thing worse than not moving into that dream space would be losing it because you can’t afford to live there anymore. Here are the expenses you need to consider.

Add-Ons

In addition to your rent, you’ll have a variety of add-on expenses, depending on the lease agreement. This section might include water, sewer, trash removal and heating and cooling costs. Many landlords cover items such as water and sewer because if these bills aren’t paid in some localities, a lien may be placed on the property.

Ask before you sign whether or not trash pickup is included. It typically is in apartments, but not as often in homes and smaller units. It’s rare for a rental to include your heating and cooling. If any of these items aren’t included, ask for a typical range per month so that you know what to expect.

Parking

Not all rentals, especially if in the city, come with free parking. You’ll need to either make a decision to park on the street — which is challenging when events are going on and may make your car less safe — or pay for parking, which adds to your monthly expenses.

Ask your potential landlord what the deal is when you’re touring, and look up street parking rules (if applicable) to learn more about permits, street cleaning, and winter snow removal. You may even try to use this information to negotiate the overall cost of your rent or parking fees.

That one-bedroom that was $700 per month becomes $775 per month when you factor in the cost to pay for a nearby parking lot space. Trust me, I know the pain — it’s a sacrifice I ended up making to live in a downtown center.

Insurance

Keep in mind that you’ll need renter’s insurance to cover your personal belongings. While most rentals do have insurance to cover the structure itself, it won’t cover the items you own. You must secure a separate policy. Rates will vary depending on the area where you live and how much coverage you need.

The average cost of renter’s insurance varies by state, but nationwide is about $187 per year. While that isn’t a huge amount of money, if you’re on an extremely tight budget, it could make or break you.

Unplanned Expenses

Don’t forget to budget in a miscellaneous or emergency fund. Things will happen that you didn’t plan for. Perhaps you got a parking ticket because you didn’t realize you couldn’t park in that spot (I made this mistake too many times when I first moved). Maybe your car needed a repair unexpectedly.

A good rule of thumb for those getting their first apartment is to first save up a $1,000 to $2,000 emergency fund. This amount should cover most minor repair bills or the little things that happen that you didn’t plan for. Of course, you’ll also need all the typical deposits and first and last month’s rent on hand as well as money to pay deposits for utilities.

Pets

If you have a pet or plan to get one, you should know that most apartments charge a pet deposit and small monthly fee to cover any damage potentially caused by that pet. Occasionally, you’ll find a rental that doesn’t charge this fee, but it’s rare.

You should also budget for damages your pet might cause. For example, if your cat claws up the carpet, you’ll want to get it repaired so that you don’t have to live with frayed carpeting the entire time you rent. Plus, it will be cheaper for you to make the repair than trust the landlord to fix the problem for a reasonable fee.

Flakey Roommates

Perhaps you’re ready to move out, but you need a roommate in order to afford living on your own. The problem is that some roommates are flaky and don’t pay their share of the bills in a timely manner or sometimes ever.

If your name is on the lease, you should protect your living situation by having the other person sign an agreement. If they don’t pay their share, you may have to ask them to leave so that you can get a roommate who will share the bills. Prepare for this scenario by setting aside extra funds to cover your roommate’s portion for a couple of months if needed.

Before You Sign the Lease

These issues are all factors to consider before you sign the lease and take the leap into paying for that place you’ve always dreamed of. Renting can be a positive experience or a horrendous one, and planning ahead helps smooth the edges to make it as good as possible.