{"id":15756,"date":"2021-03-24T00:50:56","date_gmt":"2021-03-24T00:50:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/?p=15756"},"modified":"2021-03-23T20:03:00","modified_gmt":"2021-03-23T20:03:00","slug":"your-refund-could-open-the-door","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/2021\/03\/24\/your-refund-could-open-the-door\/","title":{"rendered":"Your Refund  Could Open The Door"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p1\"><em>BY ANNA &amp; MICHELLE<\/em><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\">One of the silver linings to filing your income tax return is finding out that you are going to receive a refund that could literally open the door to owning a home.\u00a0If you happen to be one of these fortunate taxpayers, your next decision is what to do with it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">With the average tax refund near $3,000, it could be the ticket to buying a home sooner rather than later.\u00a0Regardless of the size of your refund, it can be used toward the down payment or closing costs of the home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">Most people think it takes 10% or more down payment to purchase a home, but actually, it is much less because of several low-down-payment mortgages.\u00a0There are VA and USDA mortgages that allow for no down payment for qualified buyers.\u00a0FHA has a 3.5% down payment program and FNMA and Freddie Mac have 3% down payment mortgages for qualified creditors as well as 5% down programs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">Closing costs for originating new mortgages can easily range from 2 to 3 percent of the purchase price, but most lenders will allow the seller to pay part or all of them based on the agreement in the sales contract.\u00a0If you are using a VA or USDA loan, your refund could go toward paying the closing costs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">On a practical matter, if you are due a refund, have it deposited directly into your account.\u00a0It is necessary to trace the source of the funds.\u00a0Cashing a refund check and depositing the cash adds an unnecessary aging requirement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">Maybe you have the money saved for your down payment and closing costs but you have other debt that is keeping you from qualifying for a mortgage.\u00a0The IRS refund could be used to pay down that debt.\u00a0However, you need solid advice from a trusted mortgage professional before you do that.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">While the average tax refund might not cover the down payment on the median price home, it certainly helps.\u00a0Your refund could make it a simple as 1-2-3 to get into a home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p6\">Get the hard, cold facts for the homes and mortgages in your area and price range.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p6\">Get pre-approved with a trusted mortgage professional.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p6\">Start looking at homes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BY ANNA &amp; MICHELLE One of the silver linings to filing your income tax return is finding out that you are going to receive a refund that could literally open the door to owning a home.\u00a0If you happen to be one of these fortunate taxpayers, your next decision is what to do with it. With [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15757,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","_pvb_checkbox_block_on_post":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[64,38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-better-homeowners-news","category-sponsored"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15756"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15756\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15758,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15756\/revisions\/15758"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15757"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}