Understanding Your Loan: Cash And Transaction Summaries

Posted on September 29, 2016 by firsttitleandabstract

Page 3 of your Closing Disclosure will compare cash requirements from your Loan Estimate to your actual final charges.

If “Did this change?” is marked “YES” there will be explanation of the changes made regarding the cash to close.

The bottom line final “Cash to Close” is the money you will need in-hand within three business days of the closing.

Understanding Your Loan: Cash Transaction Summaries

If your transaction has a Seller the summary table will show a line by line comparison of Borrower to Seller transaction details.

If there is no Seller you may see a Payoffs and Payments table instead.

Review the summary tables to understand the transaction and your financial commitments at loan consummation.

Don’t let the amount of cash you need to close be a surprise, or a source of anxiety.

We’re experienced at helping our buyers estimate the cast to close requirement within a few hundred dollars, or less.

Let us help!

As the oldest and most established title company in Naples and Marco Island, our experienced staff is prepare to assist you with every aspect of your closing.

First Title & Abstract, Inc. — “Putting You FIRST!”

Understanding Loan Fees

Posted on September 23, 2016 by firsttitleandabstract

Understanding loan fees is an important part of the mortgage process.

In addition to the cost of an appraisal and credit report, which have been covered in other videos, this video help you understand the various other costs of obtaining a mortgage, including:

— points

— loan origination fees

— pre-paid items

— escrow items

As you’ll see in the video, when you turn in your application you’ll be required to pay a loan application fee to cover the costs of underwriting the loan. Sometimes this fee pays for the home appraisal and credit report, or may be in addition to those charges.

You will receive a copy of your credit report and appraisal prior to or at closing.

The application fee is generally non-refundable.

Points and loan origination fees are up-front interest you pay on the loan. Often, this is where mortgage lenders make their initial profit on the work they do for you.

Sometimes you can “buy-down” an interest rate by paying more in points and origination fees. In effect, you’re giving the lender their profit early, so they have less risk, and will capture expected revenues earlier than they might otherwise.

This allows them to charge less in interest.

Understanding Loan Fees Isn’t Hard … We Can Help!

The most qualified individual to advise you on your loan costs is your loan officer. They are required to do so with a loan estimate within three days of your applying for a loan.

However, as the oldest and most established title company in Naples and Marco Island, we have represented tens of thousands of borrowers on mortgage financed purchases. Our attorneys and title professionals are able to review your loan terms and costs to provide you with added assurances that you are choosing the best mortgage for your needs, and fully understand the features of the loan.

For nearly 40 years, First Title & Abstract, Inc. has been the FIRST choice for thousands of borrowers when selecting a title company in Naples and Marco Island. We are TRID, CFPB, and ALTA compliant, and knowledgeable about hundreds of loan products.

We would be pleased to assist you in closing on your refinance, or mortgage financed purchase.

Please call upon us anytime.

What Happens After I’ve Applied For My Loan?

Posted on September 20, 2016 by firsttitleandabstract

What Happens After I’ve Applied for My Loan?

This brief video tells you what to expect after you’ve applied for a mortgage.

Once you’ve supplied the 6 required pieces of information and included any other information the lender deemed necessary, you’ll receive a Loan Estimate within 3 business days.

Waiting is the difficult part, but there are some important things you should not do until after your loan is actually funded and closed!

Very important, be smart, guard your credit while waiting for your loan to close:

1.) DO NOT CHANGE JOBS!

2.) DO NOT BUY A VEHICLE OR MAKE ANY MAJOR PURCHASE!

3.) DO NOT MAKE PALRGE BANK DEPOSITS!

4.) DO NOT CANCEL CREDIT CARDS!

What Happens After I’ve Applied for My Loan? Things NOT TO DO After Loan Application!

Once all the information has been verified if the loan is approved the lender will provide a Closing Disclosure to you three business days before loan consummation.

They’ll usually set a date for loan consummation – which may also be at your closing meeting.

Closing is basically transferring ownership of the property; consummation is commmitting to the loan itself.

Once both are completed, you should be planning your move-in.

At First Title & Abstract, Inc. we believe in “Putting You First!”

We are the most established Naples title company serving Marco Island, Florida and Naples, Florida, and founded in 1978!

And we’re available to help you answer questions at any point of your transaction— not just questions about the title and closing process, but all facets of your sale or purchase.

Please don’t hesitate to call upon us!

How Do I Choose The Right Lender For Me?

Posted on September 16, 2016 by firsttitleandabstract

How do I choose the right lender for me?

This video help you ask the right questions to find a reputable and reliable lender who has a good reputation for customer satisfaction.

You should ask about their years in business, the type of programs they use, why they are a better choice than their competitors, and what Realtors they’ve worked with in the past.

Also, you should ask for testimonials from happy customers who’ve recently closed their loan with the mortgage company you’re considering.

Be sure to choose a company that gives helpful advice and that makes you feel comfortable.

Although you can shop around for mortgages and mortgage products, once you find someone you can trust, it’s always good practice to allow them to prove themselves by working hard for you. That said, if you ever feel a loan officer is not working in your best interest, be sure to seek the guidance of others to select someone you do feel comfortable with.

A lender that has the authority to approve and process your loan locally is preferable since it will be easier for you to monitor the status of your application and ask questions.

Plus, it’s beneficial when the lender knows home values and conditions in the local area.

Our Video Helps You Choose a Lender Wisely

Do your research, and ask family and friends.

And give us a call at First Title & Abstract, Inc.

Our knowledgeable staff in our Naples and Marco Island offices can provide recommendations to you of mortgage lenders we’ve worked with who we like and trust.

At First Title & Abstract, Inc., we believe in “Putting You First!”

We’re more than a title company ~ we’re a trusted friend with the knowledge and experience to guide you at e very step of the process of buying and selling real estate.

Comparing Mortgages

Posted on September 15, 2016 by firsttitleandabstract

Comparing mortgages is an important step in determining which financing is best for your property purchase.

This video gives you valuable tips on how to evaluate different mortgage choices to make the best decision for you.

You wouldn’t buy a car without comparing models, would you?

So, be a savvy consumer and go mortgage shopping armed with the information you need!

Comparing Mortgages is a Good Idea

First, devise a checklist for the information from each lending institution. You should include:

the company’s name and basic information
the type of mortgage (fixed, variable, 15 year, 30 year, adjustable after 7 years, convention, VA, FHA, etc.)
minimum down payment required
interest rate and points
closing costs
loan processing time
whether prepayment is allowed

Speak with companies by phone or in person.

Be sure to call every lender on the list the same day as interest rates can fluctuate daily.

In addition to doing your own research, your real estate agent may have access to a database of lender and mortgage options or suggest a variety of different lender options.

At First Title & Abstract, Inc., our staff can refer you to competent and friendly loan officers who will provide guidance to you on available mortgage products. Comparing mortgages is easy when you are working with professionals who are experienced and knowledgeable.

We hope you will not hesitate to call us for a referral, or to help answer any questions you may have about your mortgage features.

We offer this mortgage shopping worksheet for your convenience as a good starting point.

Mortgage Shopping Worksheet

What’s a Credit Bureau Score-How Do Lenders Use Them?

Posted on September 13, 2016 by firsttitleandabstract

What’s a Credit Bureau Score-How Do Lenders Use Them?

As we show you in this video, a credit bureau score, or “credit score” is a number based upon your credit history that represents the possibility that you will be able or unable to repay a loan.

Lenders use it to determine your ability to qualify for a mortgage loan.

The better the score, the better your chances are of getting a favorable loan.

Credit scoring has changed over the years, and continues to involve new modeling with different credit agencies each using different factors to score your credit behavior.

What’s a Credit Bureau Score-How Do Lenders Use Them?

Your credit score is based on a number of factors such as:

Payment History
Proportion of Balances to Available Credit
Length of Credit
New Credit
Types of Credit Used
Negative Reports from Public Agencies for Foreclosure, Bankruptcy, Collections

Knowing your credit score is an important first step to evaluating what you may be able to qualify for in the way of property financing.

For more information about your Credit Score and how Lenders will use the information, please call us at First Title & Abstract, Inc.

We can put you in touch with some of the best lenders in the area who can guide you through the process of evaluating, and improving your credit score.

Creating Facebook Ads for Real Estate

Posted on September 9, 2016 by firsttitleandabstract

by TitleTap | 2016 |

Creating Facebook ads for real estate is one of the simplest and most effective methods of online marketing and advertising.

Having a Facebook profile is one thing, but actually using it effectively is another.

Did you know Facebook Ads can actually make your company visible to people with very specific interests and demographics?

A couple things to note:

Facebook now has more active users than China’s entire population.

Also, the average American spends 40 minutes on Facebook a Day – that’s 20-30 minutes longer than most any other website.

“Facebook now has more active users than China’s entire population.”

If you don’t yet have a Facebook profile for your business, please contact us at First Title & Abstract, Inc.

We can help you get started!

There are many types of ads you can run but the most common are as follows:

Sidebar
News Feed
Remarketing

“The average American spends 40 minutes on Facebook a Day – that’s 20-30 minutes longer than most any other website.”

News Feed Ads are the focus of this article because they are the most effective way to advertise on Facebook.

News Feed Ads

News Feed Facebook ads, as you might think, are the ads that show up right in your Facebook News Feed. In fact, News Feed Facebook ads are the only ads that show on Facebook mobile and over 60% of Facebook’s revenue comes from mobile devices.

Even though news feed ads are still very popular, as of 2016 the way you get clicks has evolved as people have grown more tech savvy.

You can no longer just post a picture of your office staff and say: “use us for your real estate purchasing, selling, or legal/closing needs.” You need to prove you can solve the customer’s problem first by providing value in the form of useful information.

Social Media Content Creates Buzz and Keeps You Front of Mind!

Here is what you want in your News Feed ads:

1) Graphics with text

These work well and you can test ad variations

2) Faces/emotion work well

The best graphics often have person’s face that conveys emotion. The eyes are a gateway to the soul for a reason.

3) Short text, unless emotional

Either really short and casual posts, or really long “rants” get read most often. People don’t like average or mediocre, they want emotion.

4) Position as “helpful resource”, not an “ad”

5) Focus on the result the viewer will get by clicking

A good example of this is the “Download” button above. Viewers know what to expect when they click.

6) Pose a question

“Pizza or Ravioli? What’s your favorite? Post below.”

Facebook’s algorithm can be summarized as this: The more activity a post gets the more it is shown.

7) Create a Poll

Similar to #6, create a quick Facebook poll to get that same interaction above, that gets your post shown more often and to more people organically.

Memes entertain and inform and are readily passed on … from the Greek “mimēma” ‘that which is imitated’

8) Memes or Quotes

Memes are simply quotes or captions on funny pictures. The easiest way to find them is on Google Images or Pinterest.

9) Video

Did you find a useful video that helps your customers or prospects? Share it!

The same is true for most non-advertisement posts on Social Media as well. Use these “shareable” posts and experiment what works well for you.

Who do I advertise to?

Building an audience: There are several ways to build an audience to display your ads to but here are my favorites for Realtors, Title Agents, Lawyers, and Mortgage brokers.

1) Job title (i.e. Realtor, Mortgage Broker)

2) Interests (i.e. People who have liked The National Association of Realtors)

3) Location radius (Select a city and radius)

4) Lookalike Audience (Have a database of customers? Upload the list of email addresses to find other Facebook users with similar interests to your customer list. This one is really cool and powerful.)

5) Facebook Groups (Advanced Strategy – See below)

6) Retargeting (Advanced Strategy – see next article)

One thing to keep in mind with Facebook Ads…more people doesn’t mean that the ad is better. In fact focusing on having “more people” can both hurt your conversion and cost you dollars; Facebook will charge you more per click for being general.

A far better approach is smaller targeted ad audiences like “Dog lovers” instead of “Pet lovers,” or in real estate, I might start by focusing on specific communities within a city and make the audience larger as I test.

As a general rule of thumb I like to start with an audience size of around 5,000 and no more than around a few hundred thousand.

Create a Group

If you are planning on doing lots of Facebook advertising and want to save a ton of money on cost per click I’d highly recommend creating a Facebook Group.

So I’ll first explain what to do and then why you’d want to do it in the first place.

Step 1: Create a Facebook Group

The first thing you want to do is create a group to benefit your target market. For example, if you are targeting first-time homebuyers in Austin, Texas, you may want to call your group “First-Time Home Buyers in Austin.”

Or if you really want to appeal to Realtors in Nevada, your group might be “Nevada Realtors Marketing Mastermind.”

Do not create a group that is “Fans of Title Co X” but instead think “Realtors in X City (local market)”

Get creative but find something useful where group members would be willing to share on (remember Facebook is social).

Step 2: Post to the Group

Next, visit your favorite industry publication sites like Title News and The Title Report then make a few posts in the group. The only purpose here is making sure the group is not empty.

Step 3: Invite friends and family to join and like the group

This makes it so that the group is not empty when you invite strangers to join. Assure your friends and family that they can always leave the group in a few weeks if they are not interested in the topic, you just need some warm bodies in there.

Step 4: Advertise the Group

Next, use the steps in this article to create an ad to join or like the group. This ad might show up in someone’s news feed as “Realtors in Austin Texas Group…Like this” and you’ll get many people to do so which will grow your group audience.

Note: make sure the group has nothing to do with your company but instead for the benefit of the members.

Why spend money to advertise a free group?

I’m glad you asked! Here is a cool trick that few know about:

Reason 1:

Facebook CPC (Cost Per Click) is typically cheaper when your Call-To-Action (CTA) is a page on Facebook itself and not on an external site. Score!

Reason 2:

Here is where the magic is. Not only do you save money to get someone to “Like” or join your group as opposed to going to your website, but once they have you can now run other direct promotion ads to the people of the group that you own – often times lowering the CPC to mere pennies!

For example, an ad to visit my website might cost $1.25 per click, and one to like my company Facebook page might cost $0.75 per click. Whereas an ad to my own group audience advertising my services where I am the owner of the group and the people in the group are highly targeted might only cost $0.05 per click.

This is why I recommend customers that are in Facebook for the long term perform these extra steps.

Budget

Lastly, always start your Facebook ads at a low cost per day budget that you bump up slowly as you start gaining traction. Not doing so will cause you to waste a lot of money. For example, I always start mine at $5 a day until I have one performing as I like with a 5-10% click through rating (CTR) and then bump it up to $10.

That’s it! Create your ads and let them run. If you found this useful please let me know in the comments so I can share more tips on Facebook ads.

Also if you think this was cool, read the next article in the series, it is 100% on remarketing, what it is exactly, how to do it quickly, easily and cheaply!

We Can Help!

First Title & Abstract, Inc. distinguishes itself from the competition by being a consultative value-added strategic partner.

We succeed when you succeed, and that’s what makes us different! We know what works, and can show you how to build your business and sell more properties!

Contact any of us at our Naples or Marco Island offices, and ask for the marketing department handling social media.

We’re eager to be partners in your success!

Rent or Own?

Posted on September 2, 2016 by firsttitleandabstract

Rent or own?

What makes the most sense in the current market?

Well, much depends upon your tax bracket, whether you intend to move in the near future, the local real estate market, and what your future goals may be.

Other considerations must be included.

One advantage of renting is being generally free of most maintenance responsibilities. But by renting, you lose the chance to build equity and take advantage of tax benefits and also cannot protect yourself against rent increases.

Also, you may be at the mercy of the landlord for the condition of your housing.

Owning a home has many benefits. When you make a mortgage payment, you are building equity increasing YOUR net worth. Also, owning a home qualifies you for certain tax breaks which gives you more available spending money to handle the costs of homeownership.

Each individual is different, depending upon preferences and goals, but generally, Americans prefer the stability and security of owning their own home.

At First Title & Abstract, Inc. our staff on Marco Island and in Naples can assist you in reviewing the decision whether to rent or own.

It’s not child’s play deciding whether to rent or own your castle … let us help!

Just call us anytime and set up an appointment with one of our friendly staff members.

We’re here to help!

How Do I Begin The Process Of Buying A Home?

Posted on August 27, 2016 by firsttitleandabstract

Home-Buying 101 – First Steps

Buying a home is part of the American Dream!

This video outlines some of the basic first steps to consider when embarking on the journey of becoming a homeowner.

Remember these pointers from the video:

Are you ready to buy a home?
How much can you afford in a monthly mortgage payment?
How much space do you need?
What areas of town do you like?

After you answer these questions, make a “To Do” list and start doing some research.

Talk to friends and family, drive through neighborhoods, and look in the “Homes” section of the newspaper, or online.

And of course, you should meet with your mortgage lender to be pre-qualified for a mortgage so you will know what you can afford.

Then, you will wish to pick a Realtor to help you find your dream home in the right neighborhood which meets all your requirements.

We can help by recommending reputable mortgage lenders and Realtors in the area to help you along the way.

Then, we’ll be there at the end to help you take title and insure your ownership rights and protect your investment.

For more information, please call our Marco Island or Naples office of First Title & Abstract, Inc.

We’re eager to answer any questions, make recommendations, and serve your real estate needs!

Closing Costs Explained Visually

Posted on August 26, 2016 by firsttitleandabstract

This video explains some of the basics about closing costs.

At First Title & Abstract, Inc. our Marco Island and Naples offices are dedicated to making sure you understand upfront the estimated costs you will incur for closing.

Purchasing a home is exciting!

However, once escrow begins, the excitement can change to frustration, particularly if you are not ready for the closing costs that quickly accumulate. Many people make the mistake of only assuming they need the down payment money, and have to rush around town trying to come up with money for the closing fees.

However, you need not be surprised!

Just have your Realtor request from us a preliminary settlement statement reflecting an estimate of your closing costs.

As you may know, closing costs simply refer to the fees associated with the escrow and closing process in a real estate transaction.

Typically, you will incur charges for tax pro-rations, homeowner’s association or condominium fee pro-rations, lender’s fees, including credit check and appraisal fees, points and loan origination charges, and pre-paid escrow fees for your escrow account with the mortgage company. As well, there will be title charges, including the settlement fee, abstract fee, courier and delivery fees, title insurance premiums, and recording costs paid to the clerk of court.

Should you desire a preliminary settlement statement for your closing, just click on the link below and complete some basic information about your sale or purchase. We will provide an estimate for you with no obligation or cost for this service!

At First title & Abstract, Inc. we believe an informed consumer is a happy customer. All of us stand ready to serve you in your real estate transaction, and look forward to working with you!