IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

DH sells air conditioner/heating units as a side job.

he goes out, sells....time for financing, and ughhhh, no one is getting approved! the homeowners are shocked, they have good credit, blah blah blah.

most thought they had equity in their homes, this year, they don't.

so if you let's say replaced your roof, went with central air, something in the 8K-11K range, how did you pay for it? how would you pay for it?

tia!

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

Savings. I don't like the idea of owing anything more than the mortgage on our house.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

we use savings, when we first bought our house we had high limit 0% cards we used & payed off before the interest kicked in. We have never taken a HELOC or re-fi'd to get cash out.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

We got the roof and siding on the entire house done, brush cleared and yard landscaped and only did so because we could pay in cash. We saved for a while before we bought the house.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

I guess these are people without savings.

thanks!

they haven't declined so many people for financing like recently.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

if accepted, credit card for the points and then pay off once bill is received (money from savings). if cash only, pay with savings.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

we only do home improvement projects with savings--we won't refi or heloc for that.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

We've had a new cesspool, fence installed, brush removed, trees trimmed, landscaping, cleanups and a new patio put in, all with cash.

We too don't like racking up debt. Nothing on our credit cards, car is paid off, school loan will be paid off in a few months.

If we had a bigger house, or were planning on a family, I would not be able to say this.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

we have major rens to do on our future house but we are using only savings to do majority of the work. The only way we might finance through a contractor is if we get the siding, gutters, sofits, fascia, new windows (finance the windows) because we only have 10K to play with.

Everything else is what we get back in taxes and savings. I would never pull money out on a house - too risky in my mind. We also do not plan on putting more then what we could ever sell for (within reason.)

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

Message edited 7/20/2009 10:24:40 PM.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

if we do anything major we are going to use our savings....

the only thing we might put on a credit card is appliances if we can get a 0% card for a year - that way we can pay it off slowly over the year instead of pulling all of it at once from our savings...

everything else we plan on doing (flooring, cabinets, paint, furniture) we'll use cash

ets: and we'll be able to replenish some of our savings with the tax credit

Message edited 7/21/2009 11:06:07 AM.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

We are in the middle of remodeling our kitchen. We are using my husband's commissions.

Message edited 7/21/2009 10:03:20 AM.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

Cash! When we bought 2 years ago, we still had money after closing thank god for all the home improvements we did. New kitchen, new flooring, new roof, new boiler, hot water heater and converter to gas. And every other smaller project we did because we had the cash. This last year we had the cash from our tax return. Thank god for tax returns. I don't think we will ever finance anything for the house unless we expanded our house in some way, then we might have to, but I don't see that ever happening, we have plenty of room in our house.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

Tax refund, work bonus, savings, low rate credit card


My next big project will be new windows, siding, roof and maybe solar panels.
When I'm ready to do that, in 2 years, I might need to finance part of it if the market is better

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

Tax refund and savings paid for all of our recent home improvement projects.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

Savings. If we want something for the house, or anything really, it is put on the cc for the points and we pay off the balance in full the next month.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

Cash. Our "plan" is to use DH $ for bills and savings and mine for renos (kitchen), furniture (pretty much all new), all decor and home needs(from paint and moldings to garbage bins and lawn mower), pool (hopefully soon) ! We are both against cc, if we can't buy it in cash, we wait, hence the pool and deck for next year.
So far its worked for us and we still have a nice amount in savings.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

we paid almost 20K for renovations that we paid cash for, even all of the appliances, tiles, toilet, sink, everythign cash

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

We had a house fund when we bought the house for renovations we knew we'd need (hardwood floors, kitchen and bath remodel, added a bath fireplace, etc). Other projects in that range would be from a bonus, tax return, etc.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

too bad none of you guys need new units!

he RARELY gets anyone who pays in cash.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

We have saved and paid cash for our major renovations. If down the line we decide to stay here and put an extension on the house I could see us taking out a HELOC, unless it happens far enough down the road that we have the money for the extension saved.

I don't like to borrow money and we pay off our CCs in full every month.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

Mostly savings and cash with a little bit on the HELOC, but the mortgage and HELOC are our only debts, no student loans, cc debt, etc. and it's just a very small fraction of the total equity we have in the home, definately not over-leveraged.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

We did ours with savings.

Re: IF you have recently made a big home improvement, how did you pay for it?

Cash. Only debt we have is our mortgage, and even that I'm trying to keep paying ahead on it. Would never pay interest on something like a roof or AC unit!!