I just saved $120k!! Woohoo!!!

[vivianmarie244]

So you didn't have to pay closing costs? How long have you had your loan? We have WF, too, and when I do the estimates, there is about $5/6,000 of closing costs for each option. We'd still save money, but that is a lot, I'd like to be able to do one without that!

I was wrong when I said 2k before. It was 5k for the closing costs. But she rolled it into the amount of the loan so we didn't pay anything out of pocket. Sorry for the confusion. Didn't mean to get anyone's hopes up on no closing costs.

 

[lorisnuts]

we went this week and did the refi paperwork. We went from 6% with 22 yrs remaining to 3.5% for 20 yrs. It is saving us over $20,000. I think the closing costs were around $2500. 15 yr mortgages were 2.87%. This was with our small hometown bank.

 

[bdcp]

I was wrong when I said 2k before. It was 5k for the closing costs. But she rolled it into the amount of the loan so we didn't pay anything out of pocket. Sorry for the confusion. Didn't mean to get anyone's hopes up on no closing costs.

We signed all our papers about 3 hours ago. Our total closing costs were quite a bit more. We used VA for the second time (first time was on our first house 30 years ago) so there's an additional charge for that but we were credited 2/3 of it as a lender credit. We were able to roll it all in because we have equity and VA can be used to finance 100% of the loan. With funding the escrow and the other fees involved, it adds up. It will take us about a year to make up what we spent on closing with what we're saving every month.

My son doing the FHA streamline only has to come up with about $250 at closing because the lender credit covers all but that much of his closing. And for streamline, you cannot add to the amount of the loan. You also don't need an appraisal.

 

[powelweb]

We're taking a slightly different approach-

We signed a new 30 yr note in 2010 when we moved to our new home at 4.5 %, but we've been paying extra principal each month to effectively make it a 17 yr loan without refinancing.

I keep watching the rates drop, and re-running the numbers, but the end game is usually the same- we'd be out of pocket for the closing costs and only end up paying off the mortgage a couple of months sooner if we actually officially re-financed to a 15 yr note.

with the uncertain economy, I like knowing that we would be ok paying the minimum P&I without the extra principal if one of us were suddenly unemployed (DH returned to the workplace after being a SAHD for 8 yrs), but if we were locked in on the 15 yr mortgage that wouldn't be the case.

So this saves us lots of interest in the early years of the loan, but we can flip it back to the original 30 year payment schedule if we want because we never legally changed it- we've just been sending in extra payments every month on auto deductions.

 

[v.t.]

I just contacted our mortgage company thanks to this thread. We have a choice of modifiying our loan for a $1200 fee which will reduce our rate by 1.5%. If we want to change the loan we might be able to get a better rate, but we would have to pay closing cost. I haven't heard of a loan modification, has anyone done this? Is there a standard formula for closing cost, if I think about going that route?

Thanks!

 

[dreamin_disney]

Dh called and we didnt qualify. We have good credit and pay our bills and house payment every month. Our loan was done in 2010 and inorder to qualify it had to be done before may 2009.

Dh have sat down and decided we will work on paying off creditcards. Then we will pay extra on our mortgage and hopefully pay it off early.

 

[TheRatPack]

Has anyone done this with Bank Of America yet? We actually got contacted by the company that closed our loan 3 years ago and she told us about the rate change/term change that is available now for certain FHA loans. Still we'd drop from 5% to 3 or 2 depending on whether we brought closing cost or rolled those in. I didn't think that closing cost were part of a term and rate change or streamline finance.....so we never pursued it.