Real Estate Blog - The Asher Institute Report: Fact, Fiction, or Distorted Reality?

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The Asher Institute Report: Fact, Fiction, or Distorted Reality?

Many of you may have heard about the report titled "Profiting from the Banking Industry's Biggest Secret" released by the Asher Institute for Consumers. If you have, hopefully you saw through some of the so-called facts portrayed in this report and did not succumb to its fallacies.

This report provides an ingenious mix of both fact and fiction to ultimately sell a product. This report has been used by numerous Money Merge Account and other Mortgage Acceleration program agents as a way to get people to buy their products. While there is some truth to it, which we will get into, people who use this report should be avoided at all costs.

To read the remainder, please click here.

Posted by Florida's #1 Mortgage Planner on 07/23/2007 11:43 AM

Comments (8)

money merge accounts, mma, mortgage acceleration, asher institute

8 Comments on The Asher Institute Report: Fact, Fiction, or Distorted Reality?

JUL

2007

I agree with you that at least some of these companies selling these mortgage acceleration products use some off the wall mathematics! A 30 year fixed rate mortgage is just that! If you're interest rate on that loan is 6%, that's what it is. As far as interest being "front-loaded" that is not true.

The interest portion of your payment is higher at the beginning because you owe more at the beginning. As you pay the mortgage off, your interest rate remains the same, but since your balance has been reduced by each principal payment, the portion of your payment going towards principal goes up while the portion going towards interest goes down. No front end loading here at all!

All that said, for the right person a MMA program can be useful, but I don't see why you would have to buy a program to institute it. The other problem that I have with these programs is that the HELOCs that they use to fund these programs are adjustable loans. If interest rates shoot up, a person could get hurt if they have too big a balance on these helocs.

Bob Mitchell

ValueList Real Estate Services, inc.

Bob...Very good explanation of how amortization tables work. The topic of "front-end interest loaded" is their term and does have some truth behind it. That is the reason I put it as fact. The whole report is a twist on that fact and how they distort that reality making up formulas to lead people into believing something. I cannot stand this type of marketing in which distorted reality is used.

I also like these types of programs as they can be used wisely to create huge benefits. While I do not advocate paying off your mortgage as fast as possible (it robs you of being able to invest and take opportunities elsewhere), combinations of MMA and equity harvesting can create interesting scenarios as well.

Disclaimer: There is no "one size fits all" solution, whether MMA, or any other type of strategy, so please seek expert advice before commiting to one.

Robert great post. I believe the only people who make money are the people who are selling this crap. I just had a client get into buy property at auction. He just read the on how to buy homes with no money. Yeah. right investment property with 2 months on the job and no money in the bank... Let me jump on this deal..

JUL

2007

Robert.... I totally agree with your statements. While distorting the facts, they are selling you their product.

As I have stated in several comments and a few of my pwn blogs, when people lenders pray on other programs, for the most part, they are just trying to sway you to one that they make money on. Nothing in this business is completely awesome. As you mentioned and what I have stated before.... each loan is different and each client is different.

Good post.

JUL

2007

Robert, you are a missionary on this topic. That's not bad. I'm a missionary on several topics myself. But if you want to "convert" people you need to lay out a step-by-step logical argument that arrives at your conclusion. I've read several of your posts on this and you just keep saying that 'they" are liars. You need a better argument.

Bill Roberts

JUL

2007

Jeff...Thanks for your comment. I know you have known this type of information for a long time as well as posting about it. Keep up your posts as well, the public needs to know.

Bill...I am not looking to "convert" people, just make them aware of the truths not being told. I do not consider myself a missionary on this subject by any means. This post is about this particular report being used and how this report is simply distorting reality to persuade people to their product without providing other options. I like mortgage acceleration products for some of my clients, but other options may be better and reports that are false or misleading should not be allowed to be used, simply put.

Also, I have posted several side by side comparions that show that using other strategies provides better options and can lead to greater wealth thatn focusing on paying off your mortgage with these or any other types of programs. The point of those is that homeowners need to seek the guidance of a truly qualified mortgage professional that can show both sides and assist the client in providing the best solution.

JUL

2007

Thank you very much for sharing and hopefully helping some people get a better understanding of this topic.

Shane...You are welcome. I just want people to realize what is going on and how this information is being used.

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