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Is Refinancing Worth It with Today’s Falling Rates? (+ How Much It’ll Cost)

Is Refinancing Worth It with Today’s Falling Rates? (+ How Much It’ll Cost)

When should you refinance your mortgage? Is now the time since interest rates have finally fallen? Or will refinancing down to today’s rates not be worth it when, six months from now, interest rates could be substantially lower? We brought on an expert mortgage loan officer to walk through the cost-benefit analysis of refinancing in 2024 and when a refinance is NOT worth the money.

Greg Roller has closed over a billion dollars in loans, but surprisingly, he’s very cautious with homeowners about WHEN to refinance. Mortgage rates have already dropped significantly but could be trending down even more in 2024 and 2025. Is now the time to refinance? Greg discusses how much a refinance costs in 2024, how to know it’s worth it to refinance, what you’ll need to qualify, the differences between cash-out refinances and rate-and-term refinances, and why falling for a “low rate” could cost you in the long run.

Plus, Greg shares some tips to help your refinance go as smoothly and quickly as possible, as well as how you can refinance for FREE with a rate option most people have zero clue about.

Click here to listen on Apple Podcasts.

Listen to the Podcast Here

Read the Transcript Here

Mindy:
Today we’re talking about one of the most common questions homeowners have. When is the right time to refinance your mortgage? As interest rates drop and will refinancing impact my fire journey. Hello, hello, hello and welcome to the BiggerPockets Money podcast. My name is Mindy Jensen and Scott Trenches not joining me today, but he’s here in spirit. BiggerPockets has a goal of creating 1 million millionaires. You are in the right place if you want to get your financial house in order because we truly believe financial freedom is attainable for everyone, no matter when or where you are starting today, I’m bringing on Greg Roller, my go-to lender to help guide you on when you should be refinancing and what to keep in mind. Before we get into the show, we want to give a big thank you to our show sponsor. This segment is sponsored by BAM Capital, your path to generational wealth with premier real estate investment opportunities. See why over 1000 investors have invested with BAM capital at biggerpockets.com/bam. That’s biggerpockets.com/bm. Now, let’s get into the show. Greg, thank you so much for joining me today.

Greg:
Thank you for having me,

Mindy:
Greg. Today we are going to discuss what to consider before you refinance your mortgage, the cost you can expect when you refinance and what the impact of refinancing actually is, especially in 2024. Right now, mortgage refinance demand is 94% higher than it was a year ago, and on the surface that’s like, oh my goodness, holy cow. But when you think about it, a year ago, rates were really, really high. Nobody was refinancing because

Greg:
Yeah, no, there wasn’t any refinances a year ago, so the bar is really low.

Mindy:
Yeah, 94% of nothing is not that much.

Greg:
Exactly.

Mindy:
If interest rates drop as we keep hearing from the Fed, should you actually refinance? Will this help you achieve financial independence or could it actually slow you down? So Greg, can you start by explaining what refinancing a mortgage means and how it works?

Greg:
Sure, absolutely. So you’re refinancing the property, whether that’s your primary residence or an investment property. So you’re replacing the current loan that you have with a brand new loan, or if that property’s free and clear and you have something else that you need money for, you’re refinancing that property with putting new financing in place.

Mindy:
And how does it work? Do I just call you up and say, Greg, I want to refinance, and then you do everything?

Greg:
Not everything. We do most of the stuff for you, but not quite everything. So it’s exactly like a purchase loan except you don’t have the agents involved. You don’t have the seller involved. So you talk to your loan officer, you figure out if refinancing, it’s the right move for you right now. If it is, then you get an application in, we start collecting documents just like on a purchase, we are going to have you get this pay stubs and taxes and bank statements and things like that. We may or may not need an appraisal depending on your situation, and then we just go forward with the loan process as normal. At the beginning of the refinance cycle, it’s about 30 days, but as rates get lower and more people jump in, it can push out. When rates were in the threes, it was taking 90 to 120 days to close a refinance just because everybody was so busy. So timing, it’s not set in stone like a purchase where have, this is when your closing date is. At the beginning of the contract.

Mindy:
You just said you figure out if refinancing is the right move for you right now. What factors am I looking at to help me determine if refinancing is the right move?

Greg:
So anytime someone asks me about refinancing, the very first question I ask them is, what are you trying to accomplish? Nine times out of 10, I’d like to lower my payment, but some people want to shorten the term of their loan. Some people, as we’ve heard, have run up a lot of credit card debt in the last couple years, so maybe it’s consolidating debt, maybe you’re getting divorced or you’re buying a partner out of a property that you own, so you have to refinance to get them off the loan. So the right time to refinance is when the refinance meets the goals that you’re trying to accomplish. You’re not going to shorten your term and save money and be able to consolidate debt, but those probably aren’t all your goals. So we got to figure out what you’re trying to do and then see if a refinance, if it satisfies the goals that you’re trying to meet.

Mindy:
Yeah, it sounds like those are individual goals

Greg:
Mostly

Mindy:
So that there’s not a blanket. Oh, everybody should refinance when rates hit X.

Greg:
Right? Right.

Mindy:
Greg, you just said you have to refinance the loan to take someone off the loan. Is there any other way to get your name off of a loan or somebody else’s name off of a loan? Besides refinancing,

Greg:
There are very, very few loans that are assumable. There are some assumable mortgages out there, mostly FHA and VA loans, but not all of those either. 99.9% of the loans out there are Fannie Freddie loans and almost all those are non assumable. And honestly, unless it’s a rate that’s in the twos or in the threes, it’s probably not worth it anyway, I’ve just heard because if we don’t do the assumptions through the origination end of it, it’s all done through the servicing people that it can take 120, 180 days to actually complete an assumption of a loan that is assumable. So

Mindy:
Yeah, those assumable loans are a great idea in theory, but when you get right down to it, you’re not really saving very much with the larger down payment that you have to get or a second loan if you can get that. There’s just a lot of hoops to jump through. So I remember when rates first started going up and agents were like, oh, FHA loans are consumable, so make sure you advertise those. It’s not as easy as you think.

Greg:
I don’t know anybody that’s ever closed one of those, honestly. So,

Mindy:
Oh, now I’ve got to find somebody. If you have assumed alone, please reach out to me. Alright, so when interest rates drop, we often hear that that’s a great time to refinance, and rates have been as high as what? Seven, 8%?

Greg:
We were eight and a quarter.

Mindy:
Eight and a quarter. So with rates coming down, it seems like it would be a good idea to refinance, but what impact do lower rates have on refinancing?

Greg:
So it obviously lowers your payment if you can lower your interest rate, but you have to look at cost benefit, right? So it costing me what’s the benefit. So assuming someone’s at 7% right, and they can here in three weeks or a month, whenever it takes, we’re back at 6%. So you’re dropping a whole, you often hear that it’s the right time to refinance. We can save 1% on your loan, but that’s not true for everybody. The costs. So our costs to refinance, if you need an appraisal and title and all that on a primary residence, run about $3,200, give or take a few dollars. The costs don’t go down as the loan amount goes down. So the costs are about the same on a $400,000 loan as it is on a hundred thousand dollars loan. So if you have a hundred thousand dollars loan at 7%, your principal and interest is $665 and 30 cents a month.
If you have a $400,000 loan at 7%, your principal and interest is 26 61 a month. If you refinance that, both of those loans to 6%, a hundred thousand dollars loan goes down principal and interest of 5 99. So you’re saving $66 a month, but on the $400,000 loan, if it goes down 1%, you’re saving $263 a month. So if you’re taking what you’re saving by what it costs you, the $3,200 a month, the a hundred thousand dollars loan, you’re going to take 48 months to break even on your cost. So I don’t know if it’d be worth it or not, probably wait until it’s like a point and a half, but on the $400,000 loan, you’re saving $263 a month, so you’re breaking even in 12 months on that loan. That’s probably, and that’s generally where people pull the triggers when they can break even in 10 to 12 months on the cost that they’re spending,

Mindy:
Will refinancing set you back further if you want to be completely debt free on your path to financial independence?

Greg:
Depends. Are you going to stay in that house for 30 years? Most people don’t because I know people are like, well, I don’t want to reset the clock on my 30 year loan. I’ve been in here two and a half years, and probably the answer is, who cares? You’re probably going to move in three or four years anyway. People move every five to seven years historically, but if it’s your forever house or if you’re keeping it as an investment property, you don’t have to reset the term back to 30 years. If you’re two and a half years into your 30 year fixed, you can set the term to 27 and a half months, or excuse me, 27 and a half years. You can peg any term that you want there. It will affect what you’re saving monthly a little bit because there is a little bit of savings when you amortize it back out to 30 years, but if you’ve only been there a couple of years, it’s really not going to change much.

Mindy:
Stay tuned for more after a quick break, and if you’re looking to potentially refinance your mortgage, just like we’re talking about today, you’re going to need a great lender to fight one in your area, go to biggerpockets.com/lenders. Welcome back. Let’s jump right in with Greg Roller. What market factors should homeowners be considering before they decide to refinance? Is it just the interest rate or are there other considerations?

Greg:
Mostly the interest rate, but that kind of goes back to what you’re hoping to accomplish. I would say if you’re trying to prove your overall monthly expenses and you’ve got a couple credit cards out there, 20 or $30,000, you’re paying 28, 20 9% interest that some of ’em are charging on those. Even if you’re not benefiting that much by refinancing on the interest rate, but you’re consolidating that debt and making your monthly expenses much better, then I would look at that. There’s also, are you paying mortgage insurance? Right, because say that same person who has had the $400,000 loan is saving the $263 a month on their principal and interest, but they’re also paying mortgage insurance right now, knock another 160, 170 bucks a month off that. If you’re at the point where you could drop your mortgage insurance, then you’re saving $425 a month. So it’s definitely situational for every borrower. What other things you need to look at to decide whether it’s a right move for you or not?

Mindy:
When you’re refinancing, do you have to qualify for a refinance the same that you do for a regular mortgage, like a first mortgage?

Greg:
Yeah, absolutely. So income, assets, credit the whole nine yards.

Mindy:
Okay. I can see a situation where somebody got a mortgage at a higher interest rate, then quit their job because they’ve become financially independent and now the refinance isn’t available to them. I think that’s another consideration before you start to refinance

Greg:
Depending on their financial independence. So you can look at, so say you’re 59 and a half and you’re retired, right? You’ve put enough money away where you’re retired and you’re not currently drawing on those self-directed retirement accounts. You can do things to qualify. So if you’ve got a million dollars in retirement, 4 0 1 KIRA, whatever, and you’re 59 and a half, you can set up a draw from those self directed accounts, and as long as we can show that you have enough assets where you could continue to draw at that pace for at least 36 months, you can use that as income for qualifying, and then you can turn the draw off. You don’t have to draw.

Mindy:
Oh, interesting. And that’s only for people that are 59 and a half, or is that for any age retiree,

Greg:
You have to be 59 and a half for self-directed retirement accounts. There’s some exceptions, like if you had an inherited IRA or something like that, then you don’t have to be 59 and a half for regular assets if you just have cash in the bank. There’s asset dissipation calculations, but those are much, much harder to qualify for than the self-directed retirement accounts. I believe on our seven year jumbo arm, we do 120 month asset dissipation calculations. So we take whatever you have to provide by 120 months, and that’s what we can use for income. I believe fannie’s 360 months, and I think, don’t quote me on this, but I think Freddie might be 240 months to use assets, so you need a lot more assets to qualify for doing it that way.

Mindy:
Okay. Well, this is something to consider. If you are on the path to financial independence and you have a higher rate loan, maybe now is the best time for you to refinance your loan, especially if you’re considering retirement soon. I would definitely, before you give your notice to your employer, I would suggest that you look into refinancing your loan.

Greg:
Oh, absolutely.

Mindy:
Okay. So let’s talk about the costs associated with refinancing. You said that they’re about $3,200 for a refinance, and that’s the appraisal and that’s just the bank

Greg:
Title, work, underwriting, credit reports, stuff like that, and there’ll be some variation between financial institutions on those costs. We don’t charge an origination fee, so some places just mandatorily charge an origination fee, which can be a quarter point to 1%. I probably would look for somebody who doesn’t charge an origination fee. I wouldn’t pay points to buy down the interest rate because I know hopefully your listeners are familiar with you can pay additional fees to buy down the interest rate, especially since we’re at the beginning of the interest rate cycling down, because odds are, if you’re refinancing now, you might be refinancing 10 or 12 months from now, but yeah, it’s about $3,200 when you’re looking at appraisal title, credit report, filing fees, all the fun stuff that goes into making a mortgage. Lots of times, especially now since we’re at the beginning of the refinance cycle, you can, instead of paying points, you can actually get points to offset your closing costs.
So say you’re at seven and a half on your current mortgage rate and today’s refinance rate is six and a half at par, you’re not paying any points to buy down the interest rate. You’re not getting any credits to offset the closing cost. You might be able to go say, well, if I take 6.75, my lender could give me a half a point credit towards covering those closing costs. So on a $400,000 loan, one point’s equaled 1% of the loan amount, so a half point would be $2,000 towards offsetting that $3,200. So now your costs are like 1200 bucks. So then you’re not putting out as much money. So if we keep continuing to move through the cycle and rates continue to move down into 2025 and 2026, then your break even time’s shorter. So your cost for doing it’s less, you’re saving money quicker. And then if rates present themselves again where it’s fortuitous to refinance, you can jump in and do it again at that point.

Mindy:
Okay, so let’s say I want to do all of that. What do I say to my lender if I’m not using you, because not everybody listening will be able to use you. What do I say to my lender so I can get that higher rate and the credit so that I would reduce my out-of-pocket costs?

Greg:
So I would ask them to see a rate stack. So when I run rates for your scenario, right, with your credit score and your loan amount and your purchase price and your type of property, it gives me a spread of rates. So most days there’s a zero rate where you’re not paying any points and you’re not getting any credits, and then you can buy down the interest rate and it’ll say, okay, for a quarter point, you can buy it down this much for half point, you can buy it down this much. And then there’s the opposite, says you can bump it up an eighth of a point and get this much of a credit and you can bump it up a quarter point and get half point credit. So I would ask ’em to see that and they could even send you a cost illustration that shows the lender credit towards offsetting your costs that way.

Mindy:
Ooh, I love that. I’m glad I asked that because those are words I would not have used. Perfect. What about multiple properties at once? So a lot of our listeners are real estate investors. If they bought a property in the last couple of years, they might have a higher rate than what’s current. Can you refinance multiple mortgages at the same time?

Greg:
You can. It’s easier if you do ’em all at the same lender at the same time. So I think my record was three or four at the same time, because the ones that are closing first, you have to use the principal and interest payment on the ones that haven’t closed yet for qualifying because that doesn’t exist yet. They haven’t closed that one yet. And if your lender’s really good and creative and you’re tight on your ratios, you can say, okay, if I close this one first and then that one second, and then that one, that makes the whole thing work better. Because as those payments come down, your income to debt ratios on the remaining loans you need to do will also come down accordingly.

Mindy:
Oh, okay. So you want a knowledgeable refinancing lender to look at all of your things, and here’s where your is your partner in this transaction. You need to give them all the information. So if you want to refinance four mortgages, tell them about it and let them help you ask them questions. I mean, lenders, I don’t want to throw lenders. I’m not talking smack about lenders, but lenders aren’t nearly as busy now as they were three years ago. So they have some time to have conversations with you and they want your business, if you’re going to refinance four loans with them, they’re going to look through the numbers and be like, oh yeah, do number two first and then do number four second and then number one, and then number three, or whatever it works out to,

Greg:
Even if they’re busy, if your lender doesn’t have time to talk to you about all this stuff that you need to know for your transaction, whether it’s one property or four properties, then you’re talking to the wrong lender.

Mindy:
Yes, yes, yes. If you’re in Colorado, call Greg because he is the right lender. Alright. Is there ever a situation where refinancing might not be the best option even if rates are lower?

Greg:
Yes, absolutely. I’ve talked to, the ones that come to mind have been elderly borrowers when I’m talking to ’em and they’ve heard that rates are coming down and that’s a good thing. And I look at, I’m like, okay, well, it’s saving you 180 $200 a month, but they’re like, well, I’m probably not going to be in the house more than two years if I look at it. And it’s like, well, you don’t break even for 20 months. You’re not really saving anything. You’re going through this effort. You’re going through this expense. You’d obviously be generating a commission for me. But that’s not what it’s all about. It’s about the borrower at the end. So if you’re not going to be there, then what’s the point? Or somebody whose job’s planning on, they move a lot with their job if you’re not planning on because you have the break even point, right? This is where I break even and this is where I start saving money. Okay, well if I break even in 20 months, but odds are my job’s going to move me in two years, it doesn’t really make any sense. I mean, you can do it if you want to, but I would probably tell somebody it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to do it.

Mindy:
Okay. I appreciate the honesty in your answer. Can you explain the difference between a rate and term refinance and a cash out refinance?

Greg:
Yeah, so rate and term refinance, you can refinance the loan balance. You can refinance the closing cost. If you’re escrowing, you can include the prepaids because even if you have an escrow account on your old loan, excuse me, it’s the same lender, you can’t move that escrow account from the old loan to the new loan. You can’t do that. The only thing we can do with the old escrow account is give that money back to you. So if you’re going to continue escrowing, we have to collect enough taxes and insurance to start the new escrow account. So you can do loan amount closing costs, prepaids for escrows if you’re escrowing, and you can receive up to $2,000 cash in hand at closing, and that’s a rate and term refinance. Other than that, if you’re getting $2,001 out, whether you’re paying off debt or consolidating a second, or unless it’s a purchase money second, that’s considered a cash out refinance.
If you have a first and a second used to buy the house, which hasn’t been that common in the last few years, but there’s probably still a few of ’em out there. If you’re taking a purchase money second and an original first and putting those together, that’s a rate and term refinance as well. And then the other one is if you’re buying out someone divorce or a partner like you went in with somebody on an investment property and that person wants out for whatever reason, if you’re buying out that person, as long as it meets the same criteria, you’ve got the buyout closing cost and no more than $2,000 cash in hand, then it’s considered a rate and term refinance.

Mindy:
And you said earlier you can choose the length of time that you want your loan to be. So just because you’re two years into a 30 year doesn’t mean you have to refinance and reset the clock to 30 years. Although I believe in having mortgages for as long as possible, I might get a 40 year the next time I do it.

Greg:
No, absolutely. Yeah, no, and that’s kind of what I talk to people about as well because especially people that are thinking, oh, maybe I’ll move to a 15 year or something like that, even when rates were eight, my 401k was earning 14.5%, why would I pay anything off that’s costing me eight if I can earn 14? That’s just always, and that’s not everybody’s philosophy, but that’s always been my philosophy with it as well. But no, absolutely, you don’t have, the rate won’t change. It’ll still be a 30 year rate, it’ll say 30 year fix, but you can set the term, the amortization term for 27 and a half years or 26 years or whatever you want it to be.

Mindy:
I love that. I didn’t know that. We have to take one final break, but more from Greg on the impact of refinancing after this. Welcome back to the show. What should homeowners expect? They’ve listened to this episode and they’re like, you know what, now is the right time for me to refinance? What should they expect when they’re working with a lender during the refinancing process? And are there any tips for making it go smoothly?

Greg:
Just be as organized as you can and everybody operates differently. When somebody does an application with me, I either take the application or the application comes in line and I review it, and then I have two assistants that work full-time for me and one of my assistants will send them out a needs list that says, okay, based on the application that you put in, we’re going to need this and this and this and this, and we have a secure portal that you can upload ’em to. We may or may not need an appraisal. Appraisal waivers. They don’t come from the lenders, they come from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. So if it’s a Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac regular loan, and we run it through their automated underwriting system and they come back and say, yes, you need an appraisal, or No, you don’t need an appraisal.
So if you don’t need an appraisal right now, if you apply for a refinance today, I can get you closed in two and a half weeks. But a lot of it’s dependent upon you. I think we’re going to be moving into a refinance boom here in the next few months. At the beginning of it, the delays are mostly on the borrower side. Once it really gets rolling, I don’t think we’ll see it like it was in 20 20, 20 21. It’s just rates were at three, no one had three. But as lenders get busy, appraisers will get busy, title companies will get busy, and then that timeline on that refinance will move further and further out. Just you can only do so many in a month. And when it’s busy, purchases are always king because purchases, you’ve got a closing date, this is the closing date, you’ve got to meet it for the agents, you’ve got to meet it for the seller, you’ve got to meet it for the buyer. So when it was busy, we’d make sure all our purchases for the month were good to go, and then we would cram as many refinances into the month as we possibly could to get people closed and get ’em down the road. But yeah, a lot of it’s on the borrower because the lender’s ready. We’re just waiting for your stuff. We can’t do anything until you get us the stuff we need.

Mindy:
Ooh, that’s a really good point. So I have applied for a lot of mortgages in my life, and there’s always something else that the lender needs. They will give me a list of 10 things and I get all 10 things. I send them over and they’re like, oh yeah, by the way, we just need one more thing. If you don’t get that one more thing back to the lender, they’re not going to just sit there and wait for you to get that one more thing to them. They’re going to move on to the next thing.

Greg:
Absolutely. Especially when it gets busy

Mindy:
And finish that as far as they can. If that person only gave ’em 10 things and they need the 11th thing, they can send it back and then come grab your 11th thing. But yeah, when your lender asks you for things, they’re not asking you for things just for fun. They don’t really want to see your W twos. They have to see your W twos. So get ’em both years that they’re asking for, get them all the extra stuff that they’re asking for as quickly as possible. You don’t want to get stuck behind a regular loan.

Greg:
Right? Kind of like triage. We’ll take the ones we can get done and then circle back around to the ones next week when we have our pipeline meeting. Oh, have we still not gotten this thing from Bob? Are we still waiting for this thing from this person?

Mindy:
Come on, Bob.

Greg:
Yeah, if it’s busy, if it’s busy, we don’t have time to chase you down for stuff.

Mindy:
Oh my goodness. Yeah, no, it’s on me. And then I’m the one who wants to refinance. I’m the one who’s going to save money. I should be the one getting my stuff to you.

Greg:
Yeah, every day you delay, if that’s your $400,000 loan every month, you don’t close, you’re losing $240.

Mindy:
And that’s only if I don’t have PMI. If I have PMI now I’m losing $400 a month. So is it worth it to find that one document? Greg, do you have any other advice for our listeners who are considering a refinance?

Greg:
I tell all my clients, whether it’s purchases or refinances, I’m like, you can almost see some people come into my office, they sit down and they’re talk to me about rate and say this today. And I’m like, okay, we’re at 6.375. And they’ll be like, well, the guy down the road told us it’s a sixth and an eighth. I’m like, well, are you paying points to buy down that rate? Are you paying an origination fee? What’s your total cost? What’s your breakeven is? Don’t get so fixated on rate that you don’t pay any attention to anything else. And I’ll print out that rate stack. I was talking to you and I’ll show them the math. I’m like, here’s what it’s costing you. Here’s your principal and interest. Here’s your break even. And if the other lender gives ’em a loan estimate, I’ll say, here’s my cost.
Here’s their cost at this. And do the same cost benefit over time analysis, because just because it’s a lower rate doesn’t mean you’re getting a better deal. But you see people get so fixated on that number, it’s a lower rate. It needs to be better. And there’s a lot of shady lenders out there, and they depend on that. They’ll throw out any rate out there and they’ll sell you the cost. They’ll be like, oh, they, they’re good sales guys. I’m not a good sales guy. I’m a good math guy. I’m, here’s the math. At the end of the day, if I explain the math to you and you want to pay two or three points to buy down the rate, it makes you happy. I don’t care. I don’t get paid any more, any less either way. But as long as they understand the math and why they’re doing something than I did my job correctly.

Mindy:
I love that answer. Thank you. Greg, any other questions that you want me to set you up with so that you can give yet another amazing answer?

Greg:
So back when rates were in the threes, right? All these online lending companies and fly by night lending companies came out of the woodwork. So when rates went up, these guys started to starve to death. So what they started doing was they started paying the credit reporting agencies to sell them what are called triggered lead lists. So when I hit the button and pull your credit, if you haven’t done the opt-out prescreen, you’re on the triggered leads list that goes out to all these lenders. And I had my clients tell me they were getting seventy, seventy five phone calls a day from these guys trying to get them, Hey, do the application with us and just bombarding ’em with texts and phone calls and stuff like that. So opt out, pre-screen is put on by the credit reporting agencies where you can go on there and opt out electronically for five years from these triggered leads lists. And it’s the best way to protect yourself from all these harassing phone calls. So even if they’re not going to refinance, or even if they’re going to refinance with some other lender or everybody in the world should know about optout prescreen

Mindy:
And how do you check that box or do the optout?

Greg:
So it’s a website, optout prescreen.com, and you click the home, I think, and it says opt in, opt out. You clicked opt out for five years electronically, and then you fill in your information name, social security number, date of birth, address, phone number, all that good stuff. And it’s the credit reporting agency. So it’s okay to put this information in there, but then that gets you up the triggers leads list. But it does take a couple days for that to work through the system to make sure you’re off the, so when I have people call me on a Friday night to do a loan application, they found the perfect house and they didn’t listen to me earlier in the week and do the loan application and opt out, I can do it for ’em then, but it’s not nearly as effective, right? They’re still getting 30, 40 phone calls a day for a while. So do this now, if you’re waiting for rates to come down, do this now and then save yourself the pain and heartache later on.

Mindy:
I love that. Opt out prescreen.com, go there, put this show on pause and go over there and fill it all out so you’re not getting these 70, 80 phone calls. I have clients that were telling me the same thing. Oh my goodness. I just put in an application and now I’ve got 50 phone calls.

Greg:
Yeah, yeah. It’s crazy.

Mindy:
And we’re not exaggerating. It is 50 times your phone is ringing, you just want to throw it against the wall. Or maybe that’s just me. Alright, Greg, this was so awesome. It’s always lovely talking to you. This is even better to get all of this information and share it with my fantastic listeners for my listeners who are in Colorado. Because you’re only licensed in Colorado, right?

Greg:
Correct.

Mindy:
Yeah. For my listeners in Colorado, where can they find you

Greg:
Through the elevations Credit union website or they can just dial my cell phone. That’s my only phone. Don’t call my office line. My cell phone’s (303) 807-4777. So you can text me or call me, but that’s how to find me.

Mindy:
Yes. And what I love most about Greg, why he’s my go-to lender is because he doesn’t lie to me or my clients. If you’re not going to qualify, he’s not going to tell you you are. And then come back later and be like, oh yeah, sorry you did it. He won’t say he can close in 15 days if he can’t. And he has never missed a deadline for me, ever. So that’s my little spiel for Greg. Yes, but also he’s just a great source of information. I can call him about anything. I just wish every one of my clients would use you, Greg. Unfortunately, I can’t direct all of them to you because some of them are like, no, I’ve got a lender. I’m like, oh, that’s always code for I’m not using Greg and it’s going to be a disaster.

Greg:
That’s okay. That’s okay.

Mindy:
That’s okay. The ones that use you, I have a great experience with.

Greg:
I appreciate that.

Mindy:
Alright, Greg, well thank you so much for your time today. This was so informative and anybody listening who still has questions about refinances, go back to the beginning and listen to it again because maybe you missed something. I feel like this was just very all encompassing. So thank you. Thank you, thank you so much for joining me today.

Greg:
Well thank you for having me on. I’m glad we finally did this and I’m happy to come on anytime you’d like me to.

Mindy:
Awesome. Okay, well then I’ll have you on next week. Okay. Bye Greg.

Greg:
Bye-Bye.

Mindy:
Alright, that was Greg Roller and that was a ton of information we just threw at you. Now you can see why he’s my go-to lender. Refinancing your mortgage can save you a lot of money every month, but it’s not the right fit for everyone. Run your numbers, compare how long you’re going to be living in that house with how long it’s going to take to break even on the refinance before you start the process. I love Greg’s tip about buying up the rate to reduce your out-of-pocket costs. But again, run those numbers to make sure you are aware of what it will cost you. And huge thanks to Greg for that Opt-out Pre-screen tip. I went and did it between the recording of the show and recording this outro and it truly took me 45 seconds to do. All they ask is for your name, your address, your social security number, and your phone number, and then you hit enter and they say, thanks, you’ll never get another email again. And that is what I love. Alright, so go do that now. If you are thinking about a refinance or a mortgage loan that wraps up this episode of the BiggerPockets Money podcast. I am Mindy Jensen. Scott Trenches here in spirit. He’s like hovering over my shoulder. He’ll be back next week and I am saying, take care, Teddy Bear.

 

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In This Episode We Cover

  • Refinancing explained and how much the average refinance costs in 2024
  • When to refinance and the rule of thumb that highlights whether or not it’s worth it
  • The low-rate trap that inexperienced borrowers get caught in (you’ll get hit with hidden costs!)
  • Refinancing multiple properties and how to do this the RIGHT way
  • The easy method to see where mortgage rates are headed and whether they’ll rise or fall
  • How to refinance for free by asking your loan officer for a “rate stack”
  • And So Much More!

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Note By BiggerPockets: These are opinions written by the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions of BiggerPockets.