Your home is where you raise your family, build memories and the average person spends nearly 50% of their time in it. No wonder it is of such importance and the first priority for most in keeping it comfortable and beautiful. Many times the home is also passed down through the family and becomes a multi-generational homestead of sorts. What some people fail to realize is it is also their biggest asset financially.
While many people in the world now have a hard time putting significant sums of money away for savings, they are really doing that to some extent with each mortgage payment. Despite a hard hit in 2008 and 2009, home values have already in large part recovered. Historically over time real estate has proven to be a good investment and in any 20 year period you can expect to see a noticeable appreciation in value. The good news is, this means people that are stretching their budget for their dream home are really also stretching their budget to increase the net worth or saving for the future. You may not have socked away $250,000 into a retirement account while working, but if you pay off the mortgage and the house can be sold for that then you accomplished the same thing.
In addition to future financial security, you can leverage the equity in your home for other expenses such as debt consolidation, vehicle purchases or children’s educational expenses. Compared to interest rates for unsecured loans it is a wise financial move. Using a line of equity secured credit you can pay for major upgrades to your home. This is like double dipping – you may use up $20k in equity but if the improvements add $20k in value you still have the same net worth financially as prior to the project.
It would be very strange if the average person could not tell you within a matter of minutes what the balance was in their checking and savings account with reasonable accuracy. A slightly longer process but still within an hour for retirement accounts most often. Yet most people if you ask them what their house is worth either have no clue or are guessing completely and are off by tens of thousands. Since it is usually your most valuable asset, the only way to maintain your financial health as fully as possible is to know what you have. Using services such as those of House Network Limited, you can receive guidance on what the true value or your home is.
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