SPEAKER_0 [00:00:00]

Dramas, please.

SPEAKER_0 [00:00:13]

Yeah.

SPEAKER_0 [00:00:20]

This is life.

SPEAKER_0 [00:00:22]

With a twist of lemon.

SPEAKER_0 [00:00:24]

So did you do your homework?

SPEAKER_1 [00:00:26]

I did not.

SPEAKER_0 [00:00:28]

Yeah. I didn't either, which means this episode will probably not focus on milkshakes, but there is a milkshake episode in our future.

SPEAKER_1 [00:00:36]

Another milkshake episode since we've talked about them on I guess this would be the fourth.

SPEAKER_0 [00:00:42]

Is it really the fourth? I mean, this doesn't count though because we're just talking about not talking about milkshakes.

SPEAKER_1 [00:00:48]

Alright.

SPEAKER_0 [00:00:49]

Fair enough. So so three episodes.

SPEAKER_1 [00:00:51]

Three episodes.

SPEAKER_0 [00:00:53]

Okay. But there will be a fourth.

SPEAKER_0 [00:00:56]

Sure.

SPEAKER_0 [00:00:57]

It's this episode. Depending on how you're counting. Well, okay. That's that's fair. So I will tell you that I realized I had not done my homework around

SPEAKER_0 [00:01:05]

04:30.

SPEAKER_0 [00:01:07]

And I actually looked at my wife and asked if she would run out to Portillo's to get a milkshake and bring it back.

SPEAKER_0 [00:01:13]

But then as and and she my

SPEAKER_0 [00:01:15]

wife is a is a wonderful human being who,

SPEAKER_0 [00:01:19]

loves me despite all of my failings. And this is an example of of where I was just being an idiot, was

SPEAKER_0 [00:01:27]

I was suggesting she go and get one. And she was ready to go. I mean, was just chomping at the bit right ahead of the car. And I got to thinking about it.

SPEAKER_0 [00:01:35]

There's no way that milkshake would have had the same consistency that I wanted to analyze by the time that I got here. Makes

SPEAKER_1 [00:01:44]

sense.

SPEAKER_0 [00:01:45]

So we we we pulled the trigger on that. We're not doing that but

SPEAKER_1 [00:01:49]

Well We'll we'll get to it, John. Eventually. Maybe next week. Yeah. That's okay. Today's been a big day. Actually, this week has been a big week. So I'm just gonna throw random topics at you, and I'm gonna make you talk. Deal?

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:02]

Hit me with all you got. Before you do that, though, I wanna know, did you did you do anything for

SPEAKER_0 [00:02:07]

Labor Day?

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:08]

I did not because

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:10]

we had thunderstorms

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:12]

and tornadoes coming through.

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:15]

I was planning to do a metric century,

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:18]

but

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:19]

those plans were demolished.

SPEAKER_0 [00:02:21]

Why don't you explain what that means? Because I know, but whoever like, when my mom listens to this, which, by way, she's listening to an episode now.

SPEAKER_0 [00:02:30]

Yeah. What's the metric century? We're talking about cycling.

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:33]

Metric century is a 100 kilometers or 60 miles for us Americans who measure things in miles.

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:40]

So we were gonna start down in Ely, Iowa right up to Center Point, which is about 30 miles and ride back. And just to make sure we got to 60,

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:49]

make sure we went a little bit over according to our Strava apps.

SPEAKER_1 [00:02:54]

But I sat around and watched Lord of the Rings instead.

SPEAKER_0 [00:02:59]

Funny enough, I did that a little too. Now, you said we. This is with a a friend from church or something? Yes. Friend from church. Ben,

SPEAKER_1 [00:03:08]

he might listen. He's a big podcaster or sometimes is.

SPEAKER_0 [00:03:13]

Okay.

SPEAKER_0 [00:03:13]

And what's what's the longest distance you've done now thus far?

SPEAKER_1 [00:03:18]

The longest distance was probably a couple months ago and that was 40 miles. So you would

SPEAKER_1 [00:03:24]

tell me not to do this because I'm only supposed to add 10 miles at a time or something like that. But It's it's a bit of a jump. Yeah. I mean, you're you're talking that extra 20 miles.

SPEAKER_0 [00:03:34]

You're gonna feel it in places you don't wanna feel it. But, know, I mean, I I'm I'm regurgitating

SPEAKER_0 [00:03:40]

advice that was given to me by Luther Golsef.

SPEAKER_1 [00:03:43]

Who would know his stuff when it comes to psychic. He would definitely know his his bicycling stuff.

SPEAKER_0 [00:03:48]

However, I did not exactly follow Luther's

SPEAKER_0 [00:03:51]

advice either. So I did ease my way up to the metric century. I actually actually, when I did mine,

SPEAKER_0 [00:03:59]

I came within spitting distance, I think twice.

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:02]

But I was I was riding in,

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:04]

like,

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:05]

the hottest part of July.

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:08]

And I one time,

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:10]

I was so determined so determined

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:13]

to hit my Metric Century

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:15]

and I I'm riding along and suddenly I started feeling cold.

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:19]

And I thought to myself, it's a 100 degrees outside.

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:22]

If I'm feeling cold, this is not a good thing, and I I I probably need to just stop. So I actually

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:29]

pulled over underneath the tree, called my wife, and asked her to come pick me up because I figured at that point, was probably on the verge of, like, some serious problems.

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:38]

So

SPEAKER_1 [00:04:39]

yeah. Yeah. Good call there, especially since you have heart problems, Stan.

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:44]

I have a congenital heart defect, which is not an issue

SPEAKER_0 [00:04:48]

day to day.

SPEAKER_1 [00:04:50]

Alright. But anyway when you're riding your bike a 100 miles or a 100 kilometers, I guess? You rode a 100 miles too one time, didn't you? I did do I did do a what they call a statute century.

SPEAKER_0 [00:05:01]

No. Like, the

SPEAKER_0 [00:05:02]

my heart conditions don't really play into that.

SPEAKER_0 [00:05:06]

They're and and, like, I'm I'm medicated. Right? So

SPEAKER_1 [00:05:10]

there's really so much damage I can do. We're all grateful for that, Stan. Yeah.

SPEAKER_0 [00:05:15]

Hey, now. I'm talking about heart medication. Good grief.

SPEAKER_0 [00:05:19]

No. So okay. So you didn't do the

SPEAKER_0 [00:05:21]

did do the Metric Century, but but, you know, you got got a weekend coming up, so there's a there's another chance. I'm curious, though. No grilling, no grilled meat,

SPEAKER_1 [00:05:31]

no meat on open flame, nothing like that? I'm gonna tell you this and you're gonna hate me for it. So we did we did make burgers and put them on pretzel buns. And I did grill them quote unquote grill because we have a George Foreman in the apartment.

SPEAKER_1 [00:05:46]

So I cooked them on that.

SPEAKER_0 [00:05:49]

Alright. Well,

SPEAKER_0 [00:05:52]

I I'm going to pretend like that counts. I will give you props for doing that. I I must confess, I actually didn't grill out at all for Labor Day myself.

SPEAKER_0 [00:06:00]

I didn't even have a hamburger or a hot dog I brought. We went over to a friend's house from church who does a a Low County shrimp boil,

SPEAKER_0 [00:06:09]

which was unbelievable.

SPEAKER_0 [00:06:12]

The I mean, it was just absolutely delicious. And I feel as far as, like, labor day tradition is considered,

SPEAKER_0 [00:06:18]

it's not, you

SPEAKER_0 [00:06:20]

know, it's it's not it's not traditional,

SPEAKER_0 [00:06:22]

but it it's it's like it's good food that I wouldn't normally cook

SPEAKER_0 [00:06:27]

on a typical weeknight done in a quantities that are larger than I would normally do on a weeknight. I granted, I wasn't even cooking. But I'm just saying, like, in essence, I think it's acceptable

SPEAKER_0 [00:06:35]

despite not being, you know, hot dogs and hamburgers.

SPEAKER_1 [00:06:40]

Yeah. I would agree with that.

SPEAKER_1 [00:06:43]

So Alright. We successfully celebrated Labor Day. But back to this grill thing. So there's

SPEAKER_1 [00:06:49]

a couple of reasons why I want to own my own home.

SPEAKER_1 [00:06:52]

One of them is because I cannot currently have a grill on the balcony

SPEAKER_1 [00:06:57]

in my apartment,

SPEAKER_1 [00:06:58]

and the other one is that I can't currently smoke my pipe anywhere near my apartment.

SPEAKER_1 [00:07:05]

So those are definitely high on the owning a home list.

SPEAKER_0 [00:07:10]

Interestingly, both things involve flame and smoke.

SPEAKER_0 [00:07:14]

I see a trend here.

SPEAKER_1 [00:07:16]

True.

SPEAKER_0 [00:07:18]

Are you concerned? Probably can't can't light fireworks off of your balcony either, can you? Yeah. Fireworks, I don't really care about. Like,

SPEAKER_1 [00:07:26]

I have no desire to spend money on fireworks. I have no desire to go watch fireworks even on the fourth of July. So

SPEAKER_0 [00:07:33]

yeah. Such a curmudgeon.

SPEAKER_1 [00:07:35]

I so I do enjoy Wait until people wanna celebrate Christmas

SPEAKER_1 [00:07:41]

when it's still December.

SPEAKER_1 [00:07:49]

You were saying something. I cut you off because I was being a grumpy old man.

SPEAKER_0 [00:07:53]

Yeah. It was I I think I think maybe I was going to assert that you've not lit a proper firework in order to feel compelled to spend your money up. But as I got to thinking about that because, like, you know, little dinky fireworks, I don't care. I feel like that's a waste of money. But, you know, you let off a couple big booms,

SPEAKER_0 [00:08:09]

and and that to me feels worth it. But then I got to thinking just you and your personality, it could be the biggest boom of your life and it probably wouldn't

SPEAKER_0 [00:08:20]

wouldn't seem like a rational expenditure

SPEAKER_0 [00:08:23]

for you, which is okay. I'm not judging. I'm not judging. I'm just saying.

SPEAKER_0 [00:08:27]

So

SPEAKER_1 [00:08:29]

So over the weekend, I also hit my mortgage savings goal for a down payment. So

SPEAKER_1 [00:08:34]

now I have a question for you, Stan. I need you to tell me everything that you know about acquiring your first mortgage. What questions should I ask? What things do I need to know? Go.

SPEAKER_1 [00:08:46]

Well,

SPEAKER_0 [00:08:48]

okay. So

SPEAKER_0 [00:08:49]

just some background. I the the house that I currently live in is what my

SPEAKER_0 [00:08:54]

my fourth home my fourth home that I've bought over twelve years. It's not something I recommend. It is only the fourth. I thought it was the fifth, but it is only the fourth.

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:05]

There there was that one I almost bought, the one that I had a contract on, the short Oh,

SPEAKER_1 [00:09:10]

yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:14]

That's that's another episode right there. No. So I've I've also gone through the refinance process twice. The first mortgage we ever got was right around, like, right before the the housing bubble popped, and so it was considerably higher.

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:29]

And over the first two homes I had, mortgage rates just kept falling and falling and falling, and I was like, it was foolish not to to refi. So I've been through the process

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:38]

six times

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:39]

total,

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:41]

which is absurd.

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:42]

But,

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:44]

you know, the the last

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:46]

two or three mortgages that I've had,

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:50]

it's it's all it's all been pretty straightforward.

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:52]

Like, I I don't

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:54]

I I worked with a mortgage officer

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:56]

through,

SPEAKER_0 [00:09:58]

the bank as well as through the, like and and I don't I don't know if this is common everywhere, if this is just a Pennsylvania thing,

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:05]

the realtor company had, like, a

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:08]

mortgage company that they worked with specifically for their deals.

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:12]

Right? But they couldn't be the same company because of some kind of federal legislation or whatever. But they're they're separate entities. And I've so I've worked with with both sides of that. And then this last time,

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:22]

I went Uber Digital. I think the time before that,

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:26]

I I did the local

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:28]

bank here in town. And truth be told,

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:31]

it's it's I don't know. It's it's all the same. Like, it's such a regulated industry now. I think you go into it and you you look at the full picture, which is the interest rate you're getting. You look at,

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:43]

you know, points, what that'll do to your interest rate, how long it'll take to pay points down. You look at closing costs,

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:50]

and you just kinda compare.

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:52]

You know, you set up a big spreadsheet.

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:54]

I will say that

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:55]

in my experience,

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:57]

it has never made sense to buy points.

SPEAKER_0 [00:10:59]

That's not to say that it doesn't make sense all the time,

SPEAKER_0 [00:11:02]

but you you really gotta do the math because what you're doing is you're basically, like, you're paying extra you will never get back to lower your mortgage rate by some amount.

SPEAKER_0 [00:11:11]

And you can you can do the math. Right? There there's a point at which you will have saved money by having that interest rate lower.

SPEAKER_0 [00:11:18]

But at least in my situation, right, I I don't I've never gone into a home thinking,

SPEAKER_0 [00:11:23]

gonna have that for thirty years. And truth truth be told, four homes, twelve years, that that was a reasonable bet. Your situation may be different. However, I will say that our parents' generation, right, viewed homes as you you buy one and you live it live in it until your mortgage runs out. And I just don't I don't think that holds true

SPEAKER_0 [00:11:42]

anymore. I don't think that's as common.

SPEAKER_0 [00:11:45]

Just looking around at my subdivision. Right? Like, are these are nicer homes that people are building themselves. Right? They're they're going through the catalog and picking it all up, And

SPEAKER_0 [00:11:55]

there's still a pretty high rate of turnover. I think just younger generations

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:00]

view a mortgage more like a

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:04]

rent with a return.

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:05]

So they're not they're not buying a home forever. You know? And I think that that points tend to

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:13]

make a lot more sense the the longer you plan on actually retaining the mortgage. And and I include, you know, any potential refinance or or anything like that down the road. If you're gonna pay it off early, John, which I suspect that you will, they probably make, you know, less sense as well. So you just have to you gotta do the math and break it down.

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:33]

From from my standpoint,

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:34]

I would say don't ever do a variable rate or an ARM or anything like that

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:40]

mortgage

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:41]

just be unless unless you're completely

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:44]

certain you will be out of that house

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:46]

before

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:47]

your variable rate, you know, kicks in.

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:50]

I I wouldn't I wouldn't mess with that. That's just a I'm not I'm not a gambler,

SPEAKER_0 [00:12:54]

and there's an there's an element of that that I think is just too risky for for my blood

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:00]

on

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:01]

terms low risk

SPEAKER_1 [00:13:03]

tolerance.

SPEAKER_1 [00:13:05]

Like Yeah. Yeah. You aren't somebody who's been investing in Bitcoin, have you?

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:11]

No. No. I don't have any Bitcoin.

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:14]

I did buy gold once.

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:16]

Yeah. It's it's similar. Right? No.

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:21]

I I think there's a lot of interesting discussions to be had around the fifteen verse thirty year. And and, you know, there's there's twenty year out there too

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:30]

in terms of of what you do.

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:33]

I have had a thirty year mortgage up until my most recent mortgage, which is just the fifteen.

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:39]

And

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:41]

it was not because

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:43]

I couldn't do a fifteen on, like, the previous

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:46]

home.

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:49]

The one before, I I don't think I could have. But it was more about

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:54]

I I didn't think I would have it for thirty years, and I wanted to optimize

SPEAKER_0 [00:13:58]

for paying principal. So what I what I did over the five years we lived in that home was I opted for a thirty year mortgage where

SPEAKER_0 [00:14:07]

I had a smaller payment and then I added like, I paid on top of my payment every month. And because the way that a mortgage works, right, your first payments, you're mostly paying interest. It allowed me to kinda get more aggressive at my principal month to month. I don't I don't know if that's like a great strategy.

SPEAKER_0 [00:14:25]

It I I think it worked it worked for us. It allowed me to get my

SPEAKER_0 [00:14:29]

my mortgage down faster at a more steady rate. I will say in general, like, when you're looking at

SPEAKER_0 [00:14:36]

when you're looking at how much you can afford, right, the the bank and the mortgage officer and the realtor,

SPEAKER_0 [00:14:42]

they're always going to try to get you to borrow more than you should.

SPEAKER_0 [00:14:47]

Right. They have a they have a number that they have to stop at. Right? Because there's there's just a certain threshold in terms of your,

SPEAKER_0 [00:14:55]

borrowing power that they can't cross.

SPEAKER_0 [00:14:58]

But it's it's an egregious amount. Right?

SPEAKER_0 [00:15:01]

You're you're talking about

SPEAKER_0 [00:15:03]

you could get away with with

SPEAKER_0 [00:15:06]

half of your

SPEAKER_0 [00:15:07]

take home pay, meaning post tax and all that stuff. Someone would give you a mortgage where you would have to take half of your in pocket pay

SPEAKER_0 [00:15:15]

to to make it happen, and you don't you don't wanna be in that situation.

SPEAKER_0 [00:15:20]

The the amount that you're comfortable with, I think, is gonna vary by person. But you know already

SPEAKER_0 [00:15:26]

your rent payment, right, is a is a is a realm that you've been able to function under.

SPEAKER_0 [00:15:32]

It's it's gonna probably be a little bit more than that. And then you have to also consider all the things that get escrowed. And that's one of the tricky things I think with buying a home because you look at a a mortgage and you come up with this number

SPEAKER_0 [00:15:44]

and depending what app you're using to calculate the mortgage, right, they may be taking in PMI.

SPEAKER_0 [00:15:49]

They may be calculating for insurance. And who knows what they're basing that insurance rate off of? They might be doing taxes, but are they using a tax rate that actually represents your area? And so it's so it's really tricky.

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:01]

What I've done with the last couple homes I bought is I focus on just the mortgage payment, principal and interest split,

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:09]

and then I go and I get quotes for my homeowners. I look at that as a separate beast.

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:15]

And you should be able to pull the tax card for the house,

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:19]

and that will also, if it's sold recently, tell you

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:23]

roughly

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:24]

what it sold for last time. So as an example, right, if you're looking at a home that five years ago sold for $130,000,

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:31]

you know what the tax,

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:33]

bill was last year.

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:35]

If you buy it for 150,

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:37]

you need to you need to come up with that percentage of increase and just multiply your tax bill by it. I'm not saying it's gonna always work out that way, but you need to give yourself some kind of buffer. And I think people don't do that. I didn't do that with my first home because I was foolish and because it was an empty lot,

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:52]

and I didn't realize that it would go from basically a thousand dollars a year one to, like, 4,000 year two.

SPEAKER_0 [00:16:59]

That that was that was a reassessment because there was now a physical building on the property. So you gotta you gotta prepare for those kind of things because it does it does amount to a big chunk of change. Right? I I do, in general, recommend escrowing.

SPEAKER_0 [00:17:13]

I know you've you're pretty good at, like, here's an annual payment and accounting for it and planning out. But it is it's there's a timing element to it too

SPEAKER_0 [00:17:22]

that I think is really helpful to have escrowed, especially for the the

SPEAKER_0 [00:17:28]

property taxes. Some banks require you to escrow or they charge you a fee. Some don't. It just depends. The one I went with on this most recent one, I would have had to pay, like, $50 extra a month or something if I didn't wanna escrow.

SPEAKER_0 [00:17:40]

I didn't escrow on the last house. I missed my property tax payment twice

SPEAKER_0 [00:17:45]

and sent it in late,

SPEAKER_0 [00:17:47]

which was which is just stupid. Right? Like, it there was no reason for me to miss it, but I did.

SPEAKER_0 [00:17:53]

And I I think that that's a good reason why it makes sense to,

SPEAKER_0 [00:17:59]

you know, just just

SPEAKER_0 [00:18:01]

escrow it and you don't have to stress about it. You also don't have to worry about the upfront cash

SPEAKER_0 [00:18:05]

year over year, you know, which is also pretty nice.

SPEAKER_0 [00:18:09]

So

SPEAKER_0 [00:18:10]

I don't know. What what questions do you have? Because I've just rambled now for, like, what? Ten ten minutes?

SPEAKER_1 [00:18:16]

Right. So

SPEAKER_1 [00:18:18]

that's

SPEAKER_1 [00:18:19]

a lot of helpful information, but where do I start, Stan? Do I just start cold calling banks in my area or

SPEAKER_1 [00:18:26]

what?

SPEAKER_0 [00:18:29]

Well, okay. How like, how much do you value

SPEAKER_0 [00:18:32]

a human being and being able to talk to them about your mortgage?

SPEAKER_0 [00:18:36]

I have you, Stan. What other human being do I need? Alright. That's a good answer. So here's the thing. The reason I asked that is because when I went to do this mortgage, I made an intentional decision

SPEAKER_0 [00:18:47]

that I wanted to do most of my work online. I did not wanna have to be printing stuff off. I definitely didn't wanna fax,

SPEAKER_0 [00:18:55]

and I wanted to avoid having to meet with someone in person.

SPEAKER_0 [00:18:59]

The the reasons for that are varied, like,

SPEAKER_0 [00:19:02]

I I would things were very busy,

SPEAKER_0 [00:19:04]

and I I just didn't having done it before, I didn't see a lot of value in it. Right? And you know what, Stan?

SPEAKER_1 [00:19:09]

Banks are generally only open

SPEAKER_1 [00:19:11]

when we are working at our full time jobs.

SPEAKER_0 [00:19:14]

Exactly. Exactly. Like, that's a it's a huge part of it. And so, you know, I was down in Seymour. Right? And my bank options were pretty limited.

SPEAKER_0 [00:19:23]

I didn't I wasn't really keen on a branch down there that would not be up here. Right? So Right. One of the things I learned with the small town bank, because we did we did a bank through the community

SPEAKER_0 [00:19:35]

bank down there

SPEAKER_0 [00:19:37]

initially for that house,

SPEAKER_0 [00:19:38]

is if you have an issue,

SPEAKER_0 [00:19:40]

you you typically have to physically go to the bank.

SPEAKER_0 [00:19:44]

And, you know, again, living down there, it was fine. In in some respects, it was actually really nice because they they did their own servicing. Like, I was physically at the servicing place, and so they could just resolve issues, and I didn't have to wait for any kind of crazy music,

SPEAKER_0 [00:19:58]

elevator music on the phone.

SPEAKER_0 [00:20:00]

But if I am living up in Indianapolis and my bank is down in Seymour,

SPEAKER_0 [00:20:04]

that was gonna be a challenge. So I I decided right off the bat not gonna do a community bank for that reason.

SPEAKER_0 [00:20:10]

So so then it's like, At the end of the day, all of the different mortgage companies, I'm using my finger quotes,

SPEAKER_0 [00:20:17]

really boil down to just a handful of banks that are gonna get the mortgage at the end. Right? So so this is the this is the thing that nobody, I don't think, tells you. I didn't definitely didn't know the first two times that I first time, I I I didn't know. Second time, there was another caveat I didn't learn

SPEAKER_0 [00:20:34]

or I did learn that I didn't know, which is this. If, you know, you go through

SPEAKER_0 [00:20:41]

Bobo and Johnny's mortgage company, right, you're gonna make your first mortgage payment to Bobo and Johnny. They're gonna take care of your closing, all of that, but then Bobo and Johnny are gonna turn around and they're gonna hand it off to another company. It's gonna be Chase. It's gonna be Caliber. It's gonna be Wells Fargo.

SPEAKER_0 [00:20:57]

It's gonna be

SPEAKER_0 [00:20:59]

maybe Huntington, like like one of the bigger banks. Right? They're gonna they're gonna assume all the debt,

SPEAKER_0 [00:21:05]

and you're gonna start servicing through them, which means that you will pay Chase directly. You won't be paying Bobo and Johnny's mortgage company. And so most of these little

SPEAKER_0 [00:21:15]

mortgage companies,

SPEAKER_0 [00:21:17]

they all do that. And then it gets even even, like, sillier because after, you know, Chase gets it, if if you the amount you owe is over a certain threshold, they actually turn around and they sell it to to

SPEAKER_0 [00:21:28]

Freddie May or Freddie Mac Freddie Mac. I can't I can never keep track because you got Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Right?

SPEAKER_0 [00:21:34]

Right. So I think it's I think it's Freddie

SPEAKER_0 [00:21:36]

whatever. Anyhow, one of the basically sell it to the government and then they hold the assets. But the servicing still goes through Chase. So

SPEAKER_0 [00:21:44]

what what I what I came to figure out

SPEAKER_0 [00:21:48]

was I,

SPEAKER_0 [00:21:49]

you know, didn't really care who was doing the closing as long as they could they could get everything done on time. In some respects,

SPEAKER_0 [00:21:56]

it's I think it's actually a little more advantageous to use Bobo and Johnny's for closing over,

SPEAKER_0 [00:22:01]

like, you know, Bank of America. Because I I I know a couple people who've gone through Bank of America, and because it's such a big bank, they're doing so much processing,

SPEAKER_0 [00:22:08]

it took a while to get the closing. I don't know if that's still true. I I really don't. But I I think I think, you know, you've got Bobo and Johnny who the only thing they care about is closing, so they're focused on getting it getting it done and over. But I got to the point where with this last one, I just said, hey, look, I know you're gonna sell this mortgage.

SPEAKER_0 [00:22:24]

You're gonna do a lock in here and when you do the lock in, you're gonna know who

SPEAKER_0 [00:22:30]

is on the docket, right? Like who who I'm gonna possibly go to. And I just want you to tell me upfront

SPEAKER_0 [00:22:36]

that one, you're gonna do that, and two, who I'm gonna get. And so I knew going into this that the the company I was gonna use was gonna turn around and sell it to Caliber Loans, which is who services my mortgage today.

SPEAKER_0 [00:22:48]

So the company I found this last time, I just went to bankrate.com.

SPEAKER_0 [00:22:52]

I

SPEAKER_0 [00:22:54]

I used their mortgage list. I just sorted it by rate and by closing costs, and I started doing the math. And I found what was on that particular day the

SPEAKER_0 [00:23:04]

lowest rate and fee structure

SPEAKER_0 [00:23:07]

that I could I could get. And I called them up, submitted an application, and I did my lock in. And I did my lock in after I found a house that I liked. So the first, like, two times I went to bank rate to get, like, a, you know, spitball idea of what what rates were at, the company, the cheapest company actually changed. And that's I I guess what I'm telling you is that it's fine. Look at the ratings. You can do some some Google searching.

SPEAKER_0 [00:23:31]

But if you're not interested in

SPEAKER_0 [00:23:33]

human interaction I mean, I I did talk to people on the phone, but, like, physically meeting somebody. If if that's not important, if you're comfortable transmitting things electronically or even if you prefer it, and if you accept the fact that, you know, it's they're gonna turn on and sell it,

SPEAKER_0 [00:23:46]

I think just doing the who's the cheapest on bankrate.com

SPEAKER_0 [00:23:49]

is perfectly fine. I'm sure some people will disagree with that. You know,

SPEAKER_0 [00:23:54]

more power to you. I'm I'm just saying, like, at the end of the day,

SPEAKER_0 [00:23:58]

the company that you close with is most likely not the company that you're gonna service with.

SPEAKER_1 [00:24:05]

Alright.

SPEAKER_1 [00:24:06]

So bankrate.com.

SPEAKER_1 [00:24:10]

Look at

SPEAKER_1 [00:24:11]

rates and

SPEAKER_1 [00:24:13]

fees,

SPEAKER_1 [00:24:14]

and sometimes low rates have really high fees compared to everyone else. Exactly. Yeah. That's why you gotta do all the math.

SPEAKER_1 [00:24:21]

Yep. And then you

SPEAKER_0 [00:24:24]

applied online or you called them up or what? I I applied online and I got they did like a a preapproval.

SPEAKER_0 [00:24:32]

Right? So when you go to make an offer on a house This was confusing when I was first looking around

SPEAKER_1 [00:24:38]

because there's, like, this prequalification,

SPEAKER_1 [00:24:40]

which apparently means nothing, absolutely nothing. And then there's preapproval, which is super important.

SPEAKER_0 [00:24:46]

Right. So so here's here's the way you think about it. Right? The prequalification stuff is basically getting you into their CRM software. Right? They they're gonna put you on a mailing list. Like a lost leader.

SPEAKER_1 [00:24:58]

Yeah. There you go.

SPEAKER_0 [00:25:00]

So they're using that to get you on an email list. The preapproval thing, I think that's actually a soft credit check. I don't think it's a hard credit check, but I could be wrong on that. Basically, they're gonna just see what your borrowing power is because they're going to slot

SPEAKER_0 [00:25:14]

you into

SPEAKER_0 [00:25:17]

a rate range

SPEAKER_0 [00:25:19]

for your, you know, credit score and and kinda your liability, if you will. So,

SPEAKER_0 [00:25:26]

you know, the the rates you see on bankrate.com will always be the absolute cheapest rates that they can give you. It doesn't necessarily mean it's the cheapest rate that they can give you,

SPEAKER_0 [00:25:37]

John Kolmeier, the individual.

SPEAKER_0 [00:25:39]

It will depend upon, you know, how you slot into things. So

SPEAKER_0 [00:25:44]

from the preapproval, you usually need that in order to make an offer on a house. If you don't have that, typically,

SPEAKER_0 [00:25:50]

a seller will ask for it. So,

SPEAKER_0 [00:25:52]

you know, you you do the whole shopping thing. You walk around. You look at this home and that home, and you decided this is the one for Anna and I. I'm gonna buy it. I wanna make an offer. Then you go get your preapproval letter, and you tack it on to your offer,

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:06]

you know, as as evidence like, hey. I've got I've got the borrowing power necessary

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:10]

to to buy this home because that gives it, like, a legitimacy, or at least that's that's what they say.

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:15]

And and then after the offer is accepted and approved, the offer typically has a window of time in which you have to get fully qualified for a mortgage. And so within, you know, four or five days or whatever it is. And and that's that's like go time. Right? So then you take that that

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:30]

preapproval,

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:32]

and you do

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:33]

all of the paperwork

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:35]

to get, you know, actually, like, a locked in rate for your mortgage.

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:39]

And, you know, I think I think that can take a couple days. Or if you're really ambitious, it can happen in a day if you've got a really ambitious

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:47]

servicer. But there's there's a bunch of back and forth. You gotta give your w twos. You gotta give some bank statements,

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:52]

things of that sort.

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:54]

And that's gonna all factor into your

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:57]

lock

SPEAKER_0 [00:26:58]

in.

SPEAKER_1 [00:27:00]

All right.

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:02]

It's a lot of information. You'll sign your name a thousand times. I will tell you that one of the nice things about this most recent round is that all of my back and forth with my agents

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:13]

as well as with

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:15]

the

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:17]

mortgage company happened through DocuSign.

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:19]

So I I didn't I mean, until closing day, I hardly signed anything in a pen,

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:25]

was I I did it all on my computer.

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:28]

Excellent.

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:29]

In fact, so Sarah had to sign things too. And, you know, Sarah's got a little bit of a

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:34]

allergic reaction to

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:36]

computers.

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:37]

She was able to do the DocuSign app on her phone, and I could say, hey, Sarah. And she would, you know, pull it up on her phone, sign it, and we were we were good to go, which is awesome. Right? So it was like that was the the least stressful way to do

SPEAKER_0 [00:27:51]

a mortgage and a buying a house that I could imagine.

SPEAKER_1 [00:27:58]

So what's your going rate for you to buy me a house, Stan?

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:02]

For you for me to buy you a house? I don't even know what that means.

SPEAKER_1 [00:28:06]

For you to do all the hard work for me.

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:09]

The I just told you. The hard work is real easy. You just go to bankrate.com.

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:13]

The the hard part is finding the house you wanna buy. And the math.

SPEAKER_1 [00:28:18]

Help

SPEAKER_1 [00:28:19]

on finding a house I wanna buy too.

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:21]

Well, we we can work through the math. Like, I the the math is more intimidating before you go through it the first couple times.

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:28]

But, you know, like,

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:30]

again,

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:31]

focus on

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:33]

start with a

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:35]

a rough mortgage rate that you see out there today with reasonable fees. So, again, go to bankrate.com. Just kinda see what the national average is. Use that for all your calculations.

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:45]

Cut you know how much money you wanna put down so you can determine the the principal and interest part that you wanna pay month to month. Have that number in hand because that kinda dictates

SPEAKER_0 [00:28:56]

your upper bounds. And again, you need to need to figure out you need to be smart in terms of, like, looking in the area

SPEAKER_0 [00:29:02]

that you want to live and just kinda eyeball

SPEAKER_0 [00:29:05]

what,

SPEAKER_0 [00:29:06]

you know, mortgage or what property taxes are right now. And so if it's 1,500, 2,500, whatever,

SPEAKER_0 [00:29:12]

you you write that down. Again, write it high, and you know what that's gonna be spread across twelve months.

SPEAKER_0 [00:29:18]

From the homeowners insurance standpoint,

SPEAKER_0 [00:29:22]

you can go on at any point to like statefarm.com

SPEAKER_0 [00:29:26]

and and get a quote. And for any property, like, could just do whatever quote you want. And what I would say is start with a ballpark

SPEAKER_0 [00:29:35]

quote,

SPEAKER_0 [00:29:35]

and then worry worry about getting, like, a really precise quote later on. So what's gonna happen is you're gonna fill out, you know, the form on State Farm. You gonna get that quote. You're gonna pocket it for later. And they're gonna email you every other day. They're gonna call you in between days that they're emailing you. And you just gotta send those to voice mail. Yep. But, you know, you're gonna make an offer, and it's gonna get accepted. You're gonna do the mortgage stuff, get that locked in, and then the next thing will be securing homeowners insurance. And you can go through the the rigmarole

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:04]

of of all that. I like, we could do a whole episode on homeowners insurance and and auto insurance and figuring out how to not, you know, stress out and spend a lot of money there. But will say in general,

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:16]

you're gonna wanna look at, you know, the State Farms of the world. If you've got

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:23]

like, I've been handled really well

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:26]

by the local mortgage or insurance

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:29]

guy in Seymour,

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:32]

Matt Winicki at at Shepherd Insurance down there. He he does my insurance up here in Indianapolis for the house and the car. He nobody's been able to beat the rates. Like, I I literally I quoted everybody under the sun. GEICO, Progressive,

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:45]

State Farm.

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:47]

What's what's the one with

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:51]

with the accident forgiveness? Isn't that different?

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:55]

The dude that was president on '24.

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:57]

Allstate?

SPEAKER_0 [00:30:59]

Allstate. Yeah. I quoted them all. Right? And at the end of the day, they were still able to be most competitive.

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:04]

So you just just kinda gotta play with it. And it'll change from year to year. I think that's the other thing. With homeowners insurance and auto insurance especially,

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:12]

you know, you just gotta be willing to reevaluate it every couple years and just see if somebody else out there is is more competitive. And it it doesn't have to take a lot of time.

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:20]

But yeah.

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:22]

Anyhow, so

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:23]

get that first quote. That serves as your baseline to know how much am I going to spend

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:29]

per month. Right? So you've got your mortgage amount. You've got your insurance amount. You've got your property taxes amount. They're all gonna be high, which would be great because then you'll have less thereafter.

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:42]

I personally

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:43]

like to try to figure out in my budget how I can add a little extra to my mortgage payment month to month. Right. You can also

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:51]

another way of doing that,

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:53]

when I a couple jobs ago,

SPEAKER_0 [00:31:55]

I had that, like, extra paycheck a month, you know, because they did it every two weeks. And so there's like, what, two two or three

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:03]

times four times that you got an extra pay period.

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:06]

And we just we took that whole paycheck. Right? And we we dumped it onto the mortgage. So that's another way you can do it. If you get a bonus, this is what I do now. My bonus just goes straight to my mortgage. So the thing I think that's important is not

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:20]

when or how,

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:22]

but just actually

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:24]

being in the habit of paying extra on your mortgage.

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:28]

Because I I think that that's

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:29]

like,

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:31]

debt in general is not something you want to carry forever. Right? And so

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:35]

just you treat it like you would any other loan, which for me

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:40]

has always been to go at it as aggressively as I can to get it off of the ledger.

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:44]

So other people are comfortable running this out the full full term, but I that's that's not been me. This is why we're friends, Stan.

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:53]

Because I like to pay extra on my mortgage? Because because debt is the enemy,

SPEAKER_0 [00:32:58]

And we attack. It's just Yeah. It's it's it's not productive. Right? Like, think think about it this way. The the money that I'm spending if you sit down and you look at a

SPEAKER_0 [00:33:08]

a mortgage schedule, which, you know, is is all of the payments that you're gonna spend over thirty or fifteen years, whatever you do,

SPEAKER_0 [00:33:14]

and you look at the first couple months, first couple of years, first ten years on a thirty year mortgage,

SPEAKER_0 [00:33:21]

it is mostly

SPEAKER_0 [00:33:22]

interest. And so you are, you know,

SPEAKER_0 [00:33:25]

that's not money you get back. If you look at a full mortgage schedule, if you pay close attention to your closing docs,

SPEAKER_0 [00:33:31]

they will actually list the amount of money that you're gonna spend in interest over the life of this loan. When you stop and look at it, most of the time, it is comparable to the amount you're paying on your house. Or it's it's within spitting distance. It's it's all like,

SPEAKER_0 [00:33:43]

it it always varies. It's it's a lot of money. Right?

SPEAKER_0 [00:33:48]

So

SPEAKER_0 [00:33:49]

do do you wanna throw that money away? Or are you interested in

SPEAKER_0 [00:33:53]

trying to get out from underneath that before you reach point. And I've always been of the mind that the sooner I can get this mortgage paid off, the more financial freedom my family has, the more financial stability my family has. If, god forbid, something should happen to me, Sarah doesn't have to worry about, you know, selling this house right away because it'll be paid off. Like those are the kind of things that factor through my mind.

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:15]

Granted I've got three kids and a wife

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:17]

and a very very needy dog, but

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:19]

nonetheless,

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:21]

you know, that's kind of the way that I approach it. I did the same thing with the cars. Right? I went very aggressive on the cars. I I think we've talked a little bit about

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:29]

Dave Ramsey and his kind of strategies

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:32]

before, but I I'm a big believer in you go after the highest mortgage rate first Or highest

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:37]

mortgage rate. Highest interest rate first. So if that's your car loan, if that's your home loan, whatever,

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:44]

you work to pay it off.

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:45]

And you just keep minimizing that debt, you know.

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:50]

Alright. We visualize it. I have I did did I show you the the

SPEAKER_0 [00:34:54]

visualization we have on the fridge for the house? No.

SPEAKER_1 [00:34:58]

Oh, I should I should take a picture of some of Yeah.

SPEAKER_0 [00:35:01]

I don't remember where I got this idea. It it was not original to us. But I told Sarah, said, let's have a let's have a picture of a home that has squares for all that we owe remaining on the house. Not the cost of the house, just what we what we owe from closing date.

SPEAKER_0 [00:35:16]

And, you know, month to month as we pay stuff off or as we make extra payments, let's fill in boxes. So of course, my wife being artsy and craftsy

SPEAKER_0 [00:35:25]

actually did a house that looks like our home.

SPEAKER_0 [00:35:28]

Nice. And yeah. And

SPEAKER_0 [00:35:31]

made it made it real pretty. And so we got that on the side of the fridge. And every every month, you know, we fill in a box or two or whatever.

SPEAKER_0 [00:35:38]

And and so that we see exactly how much is left. So it's very visual. It's right there. The kids can see it. They ask questions about it. Like, we're, you know, it's it's there for the whole world,

SPEAKER_0 [00:35:47]

including random people that that walk into the house. So but it, you know, I like, to me, it's it's front and center. It's something that I am actively thinking about and thinking of getting rid of.

SPEAKER_1 [00:35:58]

Nice.

SPEAKER_1 [00:36:00]

Thanks, We're

SPEAKER_1 [00:36:01]

now at thirty five minutes. So I guess I would That's an episode.

SPEAKER_1 [00:36:05]

Get just in passing, say that I have been on Facebook for thirteen years as of today, and we're recording on Tuesday before this airs. So thirteen years I've given my life to Facebook.

SPEAKER_0 [00:36:17]

Congratulations.

SPEAKER_0 [00:36:18]

How many of those years do you regret?

SPEAKER_1 [00:36:20]

At least three.

SPEAKER_0 [00:36:25]

Well, there is that.

SPEAKER_0 [00:36:27]

One last thing, I did I did finish that third Hobbit movie with The Hobbit movie. Magneto and realize that there are Hobbit movies that you have to go watch now. Right? Like,

SPEAKER_1 [00:36:36]

there's the Hobbit movies, and then there's the Lord of the Rings movies. I realized that Lord of the Rings is hard for you to say, but it's just gonna end up Lord of the fly? Lord of the Rings. Lord of the Rings. Okay. There you go.

SPEAKER_0 [00:36:48]

I I I will say we'll we'll save this for another episode, but I like, the slowest possible ending to a movie I could have seen, that that was that was number three. I really enjoyed number two. Number three though, oh, man, was that slow. You've gotta watch it again, and I think they'll grow on you.

SPEAKER_0 [00:37:04]

Maybe. I don't know.

SPEAKER_0 [00:37:06]

I mean, I I was like I was dozing off, John. It was it was rough. What? It was like three in the morning at that time?

SPEAKER_0 [00:37:12]

Oh, no. You spent another two days. This was last night 10:30. Yeah. Oh, we I spread I spread the third movie over three nights. So yeah.

SPEAKER_0 [00:37:21]

Alright. Well, hey. Listen. Next time, we'll make sure we do the the milkshake thing because I I feel like Right. When my mom tunes in as after she gets back from Greece, she's gonna wanna know about my milkshake adventures. We have a cocktail episode coming up too. So, Amy, sorry we didn't to that again today.

SPEAKER_1 [00:37:36]

It is coming eventually.

SPEAKER_1 [00:37:38]

Maybe Stan and I just need to be in the same room drinking cocktails when we record that.

SPEAKER_0 [00:37:43]

We that I I like the way you think. So when are you when are you coming to town? I don't know. Is your calendar open yet?

SPEAKER_0 [00:37:49]

It is in November.

SPEAKER_0 [00:37:51]

Woah.

SPEAKER_1 [00:37:52]

I'll be there the week of Thanksgiving then. Oh, alright.

SPEAKER_0 [00:37:55]

We'll see you later, John. We'll see you.