Federal regulators recently announced a number of initiatives to loosen mortgage lending. Their view is that the current standards, adopted years ago in response to the financial crisis, were an overreaction, and the current tighter rules are choking off a housing recovery. Here’s the background: After the housing bust six years ago, the government wanted to prevent another round of risky loans that led to foreclosures. So it required that lenders insist on higher down payments

What can you do if you live in a condo, townhouse or multifamily home, and you need more space but don’t want to move? For a growing number of people, the solution is to buy the unit next door, tear down a wall, and create a single, larger unit. Recently there’s been an uptick in the number of people combining two small condos into one larger one, or converting a two- or three-family home into a

Most stores that lease space in a mall or other commercial area would like a guarantee of “exclusive use,” meaning that the landlord won’t also rent space to a competing business. Here are some things to consider if you’re negotiating over such a right in a lease: What’s the use? The “use” you have in mind should be described in detail, to avoid problems later. For instance, if an ice-cream-cone shop also sells some ice-cream cakes,

Some homeowners are running into a big problem when the take out a mortgage (or refinance a mortgage) to pay for a remodeling project. The problem occurs if the remodeling is so extensive that the owners temporarily move out while the work is being done. Generally, lenders give better terms and rates to homebuyers who plan to stay in a home as their primary residence, as opposed to investors who plan to quickly remodel a home

The company behind the most widely-used credit score in America has announced three major changes to how it calculates consumers’ scores – and they could potentially help millions of people to get a better rate on a mortgage. The so-called FICO score is used throughout the lending industry. A new version – called FICO 9 – has now been introduced, and it includes these changes: (1) A limited credit history is less of a problem. Currently,