Freddie Mac Consumer Credit Tutorial

First, for those who are really new to the process of buying a home, here’s a little bit of background.  The Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (FHLMC), commonly referred to as ‘Freddie Mac’ is a corporation authorized by Congress to provide a secondary market for residential mortgages.  It is a public government-sponsored enterprise (GSE),   which buys mortgages on the secondary market, pools them, and sells them as a mortgage-backed security (MBS) to investors on the open market. This secondary mortgage market increases the supply of money available for mortgage lending and increases the money available for new home purchases.  You may have heard of Freddie Mac’s sister, Fannie Mae, another GSE.  They’ve both been in the news a lot over the last few years.  Not as much as the Kardashian’s, but still quite a lot.

Freddie Mac has come out with a free 12 part consumer tutorial called CreditSmart®.  The stated goals of this program are to understand the importance of building credit, see how lenders assess your eligibility for a mortgage loan, recognize the warning signs of predatory lending and scams, learn the steps to successful homeownership and safeguard your home and your finances against life’s unexpected challenges.  It also has a module that talks about what to do if you ever have difficulty making your mortgage payments.

It’s recommended that you take the modules in order to get the most out of the program.  Each module can take up to 20 or 30 minutes, but you can do them at your own pace.  If you’re a potential first time buyer, or if you have bruised credit and are thinking about a home purchase, you would be well off to go through this series. You can find it here.

Livingston Realtors Food Drive – May 4th

Every year the Livingston County Association of Realtors conducts their ‘Fill The Gazebos’ food drive in downtown Brighton and Howell .  May 4^th is the day for 2013. Cars can drive up and have volunteers take food donations, which are piled under the gazebos.

Collectors can also be found at some of the larger grocery stores, piling extra food into pickup trucks for the food drive.  Many local real estate brokerages are collection sites in the weeks leading up to May 4^th, also.  We load the food into trucks and it gets taken to the food pantry in Genoa Township, to serve our area’s hungriest families.

Please consider participating this year.  You can drop off food at Preview Properties real estate office (130 W. Grand River, Brighton 48116) before the event, or drive down Main Street in Brighton on May 4^th and have volunteers take it – you won’t even have to park (but you will have to stop!). The gazebo at the historic Howell Court House is another collection site.

I regret that I’ll be at a conference that day so I can’t volunteer, but I will be making my own food donation before that date.  Keep an eye out for sales and think about buying a few extra cans or boxes of food for the drive.  Some items that are wanted are meat sauce, macaroni and cheese, canned meat, peanut butter & jelly and cereal.  See the flyer here.

Signs Of Spring

We live in a big country.  We have almost every conceivable global climate within our borders. It shouldn’t surprise us that here in SE Michigan, we can have a very lovely Spring day while our friends in Colorado are getting hammered by a snow storm.  But there are always little joys if you have your eyes and ears open.

I had the windows down as I drove today, and in a wetland area, the peepers were almost deafening.  I pulled over and just listened to the chorus of small frogs carry on for a number of minutes. 

My tulips have started to sprout, but are still quite short.  Our winter has been stubborn this year, so even with a couple of warm days, I expect more cold days to come.  Visiting a listing today, I was made happy by the appearance of another harbinger of Spring – the crocus.

Sitting in an unassuming garden bed, they were the only splash of color present.  The iridescent purple petals offset by bright orange anther were like little spotlights in an otherwise drab setting.  I grabbed my camera and took a few shots even though the overall setting was not the most attractive, but let’s face it, crocuses don’t hang around long.  You had better enjoy them when you can!

They sprout and blossom to announce the end of the winter season, then promptly go back to ‘stealth’ mode until the following year.  I’m glad I caught them when I did, and I’m glad I could take a few minutes to enjoy the spring peepers, too.

 

photo by Bob Smith

Earth Day 2013

In case you didn’t know, Earth Day falls on April 22^nd of each year.  Started in 1970 to support environmental protection, this event is now fully international.   The Earth Day Network is emphasizing the ‘Face of Climate Change’ in 2013, but in truth there are many facets to Earth Day, and many ways to celebrate it and support environmental wisdom and consciousness.

Too much trouble to recycle?  Start with something small.  As small as a 9 volt or AAA battery.  Don’t just dump them in the trash, find an old bucket or margarine tub and put the used batteries in it.  When it’s getting full, you can likely find a recycle point right in your community.  As an example, my post office has yellow buckets (look just like a kitty litter bucket) under the counter in the 24 hour area of the building.  Next time you’re at the Post Office – drop ‘em off!  My County (Livingston) has a list on their web site of all the municipal collection sites and the restrictions (no car batteries).

How about newspaper and office paper recycling?  Don’t dump them in the trash.   Put them in a cardboard box and when it starts to get full, find a paper recycling bin near you.  You know there’s one close by.  They’re usually brightly colored so you really can’t miss them.  Look around Elementary Schools and Churches.

Then you can move up to light bulbs.  My local Lowe’s Home Improvement store has a bin right as you walk in.  You can take the burned out bulb with you to be sure you’re buying the correct replacement, and then leave the bad one there for recycling. How easy is that?

There are many, many things you can do all year round – so start now and don’t wait until Earth Day 2014 to act. Celebrate Earth Day every day!