recommendations of websites

[iwannbindisnee]

My sister is trying to figure out if they can afford a house or not & was wondering aloud if there was a business that would look at their financials & see if & how much of a house they can afford. I thought there might be reputable websites that could help too. And I figured the "info-rich" people on the budget boards would be the ones to ask!
So, any good websites to recommend when looking at this sort of thing? THey rent now & really want to know if buying a house is in their near future or further down the road!
Thanks, Debbie

 

[4HppyCamprs]

Your sister can always try googling mortgage calculators there a number of sites that have pretty good ones. Also have her keep in mind the cost of continual maintenance when factoring housing costs

 

[dawson5]

http://cgi.money.cnn.com/tools/index.html

Have they tried googling "how much house can I afford?" or something along those lines? I would look at a few and make sure they are figuring in insurance and taxes.

 

[jodifla]

bankrate.com

 

[Malibustyle23]

When we were looking to buy a friend recommended a mortgage consultant. We set an appointment with him and he was very thorough and helpful. He worked with us for over a year in order to buy a house. We intially went in and he went through our paperwork and told use everything we needed to clean up and do in order to get approved for a home loan with no cosigners or we could buy now with a cosigner. We spent the year doing everything he asked then he told us the amount we were approved for (way more than we could technically afford), locked us into an interest rate while we were house hunting and told us what the monthly payments would be with each price point including the interest. He was very helpful and always available. The best part is his service was free (or just included in the loan fees, etc probably). I would suggest she go in and talk to someone one on one.

 

[CowboyCO]

I like Dave Ramsey's simple math on this subject.

Take 25% of your NET income, after taxes and then work that number backwards on a 20-year mortgage.

So if you take home $3,600 a month, you shouldn't borrow more than $135,000.

Then, pay it off as fast as you can.