Mortgage Accelerator programs : Well, you sell mortgage accelerator programs. Or you are a consumer that is fascinated by certain programs such as the MMA (money merge accounts) which is sold by UFF or by CMG. UFF's program is all done through a second mortgage, home equity program. CMG does the same type, but with a 1st mortgage. In my opinion, both are as good as advertised. Not only do you need discipline to get even close to the standard ways of paying down your mortgage, but it's a risk in many areas.
Here is how they addvertise these products most of the time.....
Compared to a traditional mortgage you could...
...Save tens of thousands in interest
...Pay off in half the time
And do it with no change to your spending habits!
Okay.... let's attack the last statement. It's called common sense. How do you or how could you pay something down quicker without changing your spending habits? I sat in on a presentation by UFF and yes, their program had me wooed in the first 10 minutes.... but then I started to look deeper and not be "wooed" in regards to how quickly my principal accelerated. Here is what actually happened...
You take your whole paycheck and dump it into the program. Yes, you then paid your bills from this account, while it still paid down your pricipal. I questioned the UFF reps. over and over and never got an exact answer. In their example, you still had to leave an extra $1,000 a month in your account for this program to truly work, paying your mortgage off in 15 to 20 years. But wait, you said that this whole method wouldn't change my spending habits. How many of you have a $1,000 extra month that you could pay down your mortgage?
Now, I am not going to even get into the specifics on how this program works and what they tell ityou. That is not the point of this post. Just make sure that you aren't "wooed" by a program that works wonders. yes, it does, as long as you put "X" amount of dollars into your mortgage per month. Then they have the nerve to tell you that you can spend most of this money, your check, even at the end of the month, and that it will still work. People, common sense again. They make it appear this way, but it doesn't. I ran the numbers and it didn't work out this way. And many people that sell these programs, don't even have a license or the knowledge to sell mortgages in general. And if you want to see what numbers that I ran, here is a post that I wrote a while back : Money Merge Accounts aka Mortgage Accelerator programs...... beware!!!
So, do you want more conformation on the fact that these programs don't work? Robert Ashby wrote this post : Money Merge Accounts: My Sincerest Apologies to Those With MMAs
Overall, the real truth are in the numbers and not a program that people can manipulate to make it look great and foolproof. Don't become the fool. And one last thing that disturbed me a little. Now companies are coming back out of the wood work to sell you the program for the bi-weekly payment plans. Again, these work, but first off, they cost you money. Secondly, you can still save pennies by doing it yourself. If you want to read some comical comments, please go here.... 06/13/2008 02:26 PM and 06/14/2008 12:37 PM You basically can do the same yourself, without spending any set up fees. Besides, you are locked into this type of payment and if you ever ran into financial problems, you are stuck with the monthly payments.
Be smart......yes, these are my opinions, but with 15 1/2 years experience in the mortgage business. I run numbers every day. thanks for listening.....
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