J Scott Funk
NMLS # 71312
Company NMLS ID 1025894
As a Home Equity Conversion Mortgage reverse mortgage consultant, I’m asked a lot what I do. My answer is, “I help protect middle-aged people from their Parent’s problems”. How do I do that? By assisting the 62-plus crowd in maintaining their financial independence. They are called the sandwich generation, middle-aged people at risk of having to su
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One of the things I’m learning about aging is that it is like riding a roller coaster -- you can stand by and study it for years, but until you get on for a ride and come out of the loop-the-loop, you really don’t know anything about riding a roller coaster. All of us age and react to our aging differently. There are also markers that confirm the p
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There are two ways a HECM can help homebuyers 62 and over buy a home for their primary residence. Each requires a down payment around 58% of the home price. The first way is to help you right-size to an aging-appropriate property without trapping all your money in the house. This enables you to move to a new property while setting money aside for t
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The first time it happened, I had no idea what was going on. I was at the mall and noticed a couple of young Asian ladies talking on their cell phones. The thought popped into my head, “Sounds like Chinese. How can they be understood on an American phone?” Then, with a second pop, came the answer, “Of course, the phones are probably made in China.”
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There is a simple and a more complicated answer to the question, “what is a reverse mortgage?” The simple answer is a reverse mortgage is simply a loan where you have the option to make payments or not. If you choose not to make payments, the interest due each month is added to your debt. Because of this, the amount of your debt increases over time
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The 1950’s were such a different world. Christmas came upon us like an unexpected relative. Decorations didn’t appear in the stores until well after Thanksgiving. The first sound of carols was brought an it’s-almost-Christmas thrill. Things weren’t nearly as extravagant then. My recollection of that time is a Charlie Brown sort of tree you could se
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FHA is expected to start requiring financial assessment of Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) reverse mortgage applications at the beginning of 2014. Credit history will be considered, but lending is not expected to be based on scoring. The purpose of financial assessment is to determine if a borrower can afford his/her housing expenses after s
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Some birthdays are milestones and we know it before we get there. 5’s probably the first one, because we know we are going to go to school. Next come 16 and a driver’s license. Then 18, when we have to register for the draft and begin voting. At 21 we can drink legally. And at 50, we get our AARP invitation. We can see these coming and it is hard t
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It continues to astonish me when people will say “No” to a reverse mortgage without an alternative in mind. By people, I mean the family, friends and trusted advisors who are willing to nix an idea they don’t like or understand, without considering all the facts or offering a viable alternative. It’s like the old story about the conservative lawy
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This summer, congress gave the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) increased authority and flexibility to make changes to the Home Equity Conversion Mortgage program. This quickly resulted in some of the most significant changes to reverse mortgages I’ve seen in over a decade of specializing in HECM loans. HECM’s are the reverse mort
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