Russ Msrtin's (edumakated) Blog

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Mortgage and Lending - Perl Mortgage
RECENT BLOG POSTS
The question that I am asked most by potential homebuyers is "How much can we afford?"   This is a loaded question.  The first thing I tell my clients is I cannot tell you how much you can "afford", but I can tell you how much you will qualify to borrow.  There is a distinct difference between th...
08/01/2007
Foot in mouth disease is something that all of us suffer from at some point in our lives.  From the mortgage front, John Devaney, who runs United Capital Markets, a hedge fund that made ungodly amounts of money from trading subprime mortgages is now having a little finanical difficulty as a resul...
07/31/2007
I like to keep things simple.  In fact, the longer I work in this business, the more I realize consumers want things as simple and plain as possible even when it would be to their advantage to understand the complexities of the mortgage market and their largest financial transaction.  As such, I...
07/25/2007
How do you tell someone their baby is ugly?  It is very difficult.  One of the characteristics of many of the good Realtors I have worked with over the past several years is that they aren't afraid to tell home buyers or sellers their baby is ugly.  I know, it is cruel.  But when dealing with lar...
07/23/2007
The hunt continues!  A couple of weeks ago we discussed the various types of Realtors one is likely to come across.  Now it is time for the loan officers to be exposed.  Once again, this post is littered with stereotypes and generalizations, but we all know we have run across these folks at some ...
07/18/2007
The NAACP is suing several major mortgage banks because the organization believes blacks have been steered in to high cost mortgage loans.  The NAACP is citing the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) data that is collected on all mortgage applications which identifies the racial make up of mortga...
07/16/2007
New York City is notorious for having a high cost of living with typical condominiums costing $1000 or more per square foot.  A typical Chicago 2×2 condo that would sell for around $400-$500k in Lakeview or Lincoln Park would probably be in excess of $1.25 million in New York!  However, the madne...
07/13/2007
Several weeks ago, Bank of America announced to the world that they were going to change the mortgage world by offering their No Fee Plus mortgage.  This mortgage is supposed to be revolutionary in that it offers the following: -Up to 95% financing with one loan -No Private Mortgage Insurance (PM...
07/11/2007
I am sure you have seen it by now, but there is a Coffee Calculator that was flying all over the web a few weeks ago that shows how much money you would have if you invested the money you spend on coffee at Starbucks. The website is hilarious and quite frankly as a certified coffee addict, I know...
07/02/2007
Has anyone else noticed Ditech.com's brand repositioning? I was watching TV the other day and I noticed a Ditech.com commercial and it actually looked like they were trying to come off like a respectable mortgage company. If you remember during the refi boom Ditech was all over the TV with their ...
06/21/2007
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Russ Msrtin

Residential Mortgage Advisor
local_phone(312) 651-5355
smartphone(847) 722-5355
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