OK. Mortgage interest rates are falling. Everyone is refinancing or at least trying to do it to benefit from the lower rates. So, I did a research myself as well. There were three distinct ways to do it. I'm describing them below.
No-Cost Refinancing Offer From My Current Mortgage Bank
The WaMu offered to reduce my mortgage by 0.25%, for no cost. The savings looked fabulous (down to $500's from almost $1200 a month), but after I looked at it carefully, it was primarily because they calculated as if for a new 15-years loan, while on my current loan I have only 10 years left. The actual savings would be only about $40 a month.
Best Deal I Was Able To Find on The Internet
I did a search for the best rates. The website (don't remember which one), took me into a lender search instead of giving me a rate. When I clicked the button that said Get Your Rate, I've got a list of lenders instead, and after 5 minutes (yes! even though it was Saturday night, around 8pm), my phone rang and one of the lenders from the list wanted to talk to me. So, in a way it worked smoothly. The thing is, that the best deal the lender had was a rate lower by 0.75% for a closing cost of some $4500. And, no, it wasn't because of my credit score. Mine is over 800, and it was him who checked and told me the score.
ING Direct EasyOrange Refinancing Deal
This deal is about a 5 year loan based on a 30-year period. So, I'd have to payback the whole loan after 5 years. But that wouldn't be a problem in our situation. Anyway, they're giving a rate of 4.75%, which is pretty good right now, for closing costs of $1750 only. Seemed a great deal. Just to make sure it makes even sense to refinance if we don't plan to live in this house more than 2-3 years, I went to timevalue.com website and compared my current mortgage with th EasyOrange deal. The image below shows the results:
It seems after all, that the EasyOrange doesn't save as any money after all.
That was it. I guess, the no-cost 0.25% is the best deal after all. But it will lock me for a year at least. What is rates go down a lot within months?
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