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Want to learn a quick and easy way to always make your Plainfield house payment on time, and stay on track with your budget? 

Here are a few little tricks I learned from my mom and dad about always making the house payment and having enough money left over to live on at the end of the month:

Take your total monthly payment and divide it by 4.  (because there will always be at least 4 weeks in every month…) Now, depending on whether you or your spouse gets paid weekly or bi-weekly you will automatically deduct that amount from the account and add it to your “ghost funds” every week; just double the amount for bi-weekly payments. Make sure you keep track of your deductions for each month by labeling them clearly in your checkbook.  For example my husband gets paid weekly so I label mine June #1 House Payment, June #2 House payment, etc… 

If you do this every week you will have an extra house payment 1 year after you start. Since you will be deducting for 52 weeks this way, but only making payments for 48 of them have an extra 4 weeks worth of partial payments stored in your bank account as a reserve! 

You can either use this money to pay down the principal on your loan or put in a savings account at the end of the year.  If you apply it to your 30 year conventional loan you can actually pay off your loan 7 years sooner than if you only made the required monthly payments.

By budgeting your money this way, you never have to worry about having enough money to make your Plainfield house payment. You can budget the additional money left over for living expenses, plus in an emergency you’ll have enough “extra” money in your checking account at any given time that you’ll never have to worry about bouncing a check again.

My parents always instilled in us, even as kids… “Before any other bill is ever paid, no matter what, make sure you always pay your mortgage on time!"  I still hear my dad’s voice echo those words in my head to this day, and I have never been late or missed a mortgage payment in my life because of my mom’s little secret checkbook trick.  (This works great for car payments too.)

It’s also a great way to decide how a big purchase will affect your finances.  If you can’t comfortably afford to take the total payment and deduct it from you weekly budget all of the red flags should go up to warn you that you probably can’t really afford it, no matter what the instant credit approval system says you can do. Trust your ability to manage your own finances instead of relying on automated approvals.

I found this particular thread of comments to be extremely helpful in the things you’ll want to think about before committing to a permanent payment of any kind.

I highly recommend talking to a Plainfield mortgage professional before you even begin a home search so that you know what your budget is before you become emotionally attached to a property you probably already know you ’shouldn’t’ be able to afford.