maandag 24 september 2007

How much you can afford?


When you buy a house, it’s very important to know how much you spend. In this article we find different factors that can help us, deciding this. The first one is “the mortgage”. Often the worst part for the future-owners. They have to fill in a lot of questions about their incomes and savings, all to determine their mortgage. Another important issue for the bank is to know if you earn enough and if you don’t have too many debts. A third factor is your credit rating. There are different agencies where your lender can control your credits. A house is often collateral for your loan. For this one it’s very important that you can use your house for this loan, otherwise you can have a lot of problems afterwards. These aspects that are mentioned are all from the bank’s point of view, but there are also factors that are important from the loaner’s point of view. Even if you have the mortgage you wanted, you also have to consider which lifestyle you want to have. Because there are more debts you have to repay, than the loan. And the last question the loaners have to consider is if they must buy or rent a house. For some people is renting easier than buying a house.

When I was reading this article I was thinking how easy it is when you have a short list of items you certainly must not forget when you want to buy a house. Of course there are a lot of other things you may not forget, but the financial aspect is, I think, the most important one. The tips are also well explained, so there can’t be any misunderstandings. I must say it’s a nice hand guide for beginning-buyers.
Els

Many people won’t be able to posses a own house


Even a simple house will become difficult to purchase for the majority of the singles and half of the double-income couples. This was showed by a study for “Het Nieuwsblad”.

The price of an average house has increased in the last 4 years with half of it and costs almost 160000 € but the salaries didn't grow in the same amount. People get help from their parents, but is this really the right direction for the future? The question of the researcher is: “why doesn’t the new government establish a new system through which people can deduct the tax-advantage from the advance levy?”.

A house is a necessity, so in my opinion everyone should be able to afford something as precious as that. I just can’t understand that you can’t posses something that’s so important in life. The government should take measures to provide more reasonable prices. Nowadays everything increases in price, even food, but I find it hard to believe that the administration can’t do anything about it. This has consequences for our own economy and also for the world economy (like the stock index in the
USA that quickly declined the last month). I really hope for a solution to this significant problem, because this can lead to even more serious things…

Laura

Source: http://www.standaard.be/Artikel/Detail.aspx?artikelId=S71HKQ7N&kanaalid=3