Finance

By Alain Valles, CRMP The Reverse Mortgage rules changed Oct. 2. For the past 25 years, reverse mortgages have allowed hundreds of thousands of homeowners...

Reverse mortgages have helped tens of thousands of older homeowners avoid serious financial difficulties by converting illiquid home equity into available tax-free cash. Recent changes in this government-insured loan program have helped to significantly reduce the cost while also strengthening protection for the borrower.

The biggest pain is likely to be felt by baby boomers, who are mostly still in the workforce but facing increasing prospects that their employers may freeze their pensions.

On the heels of a new report showing the top scam in Massachusetts involves debt collection, the AARP Fraud Watch Network offers tips so you can learn how to protect yourself from the five top scams reported by Massachusetts residents in 2015. According to the FTC’s Consumer Sentinel Network Data Book, of the 46,414 Massachusetts complaints recorded last year, 37,884 were fraud-related, ranking the Bay State at number 22 of 50 states.

Christy Landrigan, of Fort Wayne, belongs to a growing number of adults who have moved back in with their parents. Adult children living at home climbed from 19 percent to 22 percent in Allen County between 2000 and 2010, according to recently released census figures.

Not only are the retro-looking “silver bullet” travel-trailers still being built by hand at the same western Ohio site that has produced them for 60 years, but the company also can’t roll them out of there fast enough.

By Alain Valles, MBA, CRMP, CSA Home Equity Conversion Mortgages (HECM), more commonly known as reverse mortgages, were authorized by President Ronald Reagan in 1987 and...

By Alain Valles, CRMP No other loan product is wrapped in as much mystery and misinformation as a Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM), more commonly...

By Linda T. Cammuso A Durable Power of Attorney (DPOA), sometimes called just a “Power of Attorney,” is a legal document that allows you to...

But as many boomers have lost their jobs and faced long-term unemployment in the Great Recession, career change has been difficult.