Mortgage Refinance and Credit Edition

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This past week much has happened on the personal finance front at the PT household:

Failed Attempt at a Mortgage Refinance

I called up our current mortgage holder, Countrywide (now Bank of America) and inquired about a refinance. Our loan is about a year and a half old, and current rates are around 1.5% points less than they were when we signed on. I used the “will you save by refinancing your mortgage” calculator at bankrate.com and ended up passing on the idea, based on the rates and closing costs quoted to me. However, Kevin from No Debt Plan recently completed a mortgage refinance. Congrats, Kevin.

Local Farmer’s Market

Yesterday we tried out our city’s newly-formed farmer’s market. We didn’t buy anything, nor were we that impressed with the selection. Still, I think it’s something that, given enough time and progress, we could actually begin using. A farmer’s market was one of the things that John the millionaire mentioned in his interview with JD from Get Rich Slowly this past week. This is a must read. Do you use the farmers market in your area?

Credit Limit Lowered

We just received a letter from Bank of America about one of our credit cards. Apparently they are lowering the credit limit on the card significantly because of how we’ve been using the card. We only use this particular card to pay our toll tag bill each month. We set it up this way so this wouldn’t happen and we could keep the card active. Very frustrating. This happened to Jason from Frugal Dad last year. He explains how this lowers your FICO score and what he did to try and fight back. We’ll likely try the same next week with hopefully better results. This makes two big strikes against BOA in the last year or so (see BOA fraudulent bank account switch). Makes me glad we’re moving more and more away from being dependent on traditional banks and lenders.

Joined a Discount Warehouse Club

We were able to sign up through a family member’s account with Sam’s Club. We’ve considered joining before, but the annual fee has always deterred us. Now there’s three of us in the house and needs have changed. We were able to purchase a nice deep freezer (which we’re using to store extra milk, among other items) and will use the membership going forward to buy diapers, which we’re learning we use a ton of. FFB from Free From Broke recently mentioned he always gets his kid’s diapers from a wholesale club.

Carnivals from Last Week

I was in the following carnivals last week: Carnival of Personal Finance, Money Hacks Carnival, and the Carnival of Pecuniary Delights.

Up this week on the blog I’ll have another book review, followed by some information on using 0% balance transfer credit cards. Thanks for reading.

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