A reverse mortgage can help the elderly keep their homes without having to worry about foreclosure. Interestingly enough, some new robots can help them live more comfortably in those homes.

Robots and sensors to help elderly stay independent

12:42 PM CDT on Wednesday, October 15, 2008

By BOB MOOS / The Dallas Morning News
bmoos@dallasnews.com Someday soon, older adults may not need to move into nursing homes because they’ll have a household of technological wonders to keep an eye on them when they become frail.

MICHAEL MULVEY / DMN

UTA professor Fillia Makedon displays some of the equipment as Kevin Xu wears an Motion Capture suit that digitally captures human motion as they do research at the Human-Centered Computing Labratory at UTA. The research they are doing will help build and develop devices that will help elderly people live independently.

Like smart pets that never require feeding, robots will scoot from room to room to wake the homeowners in the morning, remind them to eat and send for help if someone falls.

Sensors embedded throughout the seniors’ homes will detect when the residents have sleepless nights or forget to take their medication. Web-based computer software will notify caregivers.

“This is the future of aging,” said Fillia Makedon, a professor of computer science and engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington. “Technology will let people grow old at home.”

With support from the National Science Foundation and others, Dr. Makedon has created the Heracleia Human-Centered Computing Laboratory at UTA, where she, other faculty members and their students are designing technology that will allow tomorrow’s seniors to remain independent longer than previous generations.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Seniors Benefit From New Higher Loan Limits
• Reverse Mortgages Are a Bright Spot in a Weak Economy
• Seniors: How to Get Cash Tax-Free and Payment-Free
• Another Great Article Explaining Reverse Mortgages
• Reverse Mortgages — Much Better Than Most People Think

What’s frustrating is that there is so much misinformation out there about reverse mortgages. If people really knew what a good thing they are, they would be rushing to get them! This is a good article; please click on the title if you want to read the entire thing.

Foreclosures hitting seniors hard

Possibly Related Posts:

• Seniors Benefit From New Higher Loan Limits
• Reverse Mortgages Are a Bright Spot in a Weak Economy
• Seniors: How to Get Cash Tax-Free and Payment-Free
• Another Great Article Explaining Reverse Mortgages
• Reverse Mortgages — Much Better Than Most People Think

I read some statistics the other day that indicated that seniors make up about 30% of all foreclosures right now. That’s somewhat shocking, but also very sad considering that many of those could have been prevented with reverse mortgages. With a reverse mortgage, any existing payment would go away and you could receive a monthly payment for as long as you live in your home.

US foreclosure filings up 71 percent in 3Q

(WASHINGTON) The number of homeowners ensnared in the foreclosure crisis grew by more than 70 percent in the third quarter of this year compared with the same period in 2007, according to data released Thursday.

Nationwide, nearly 766,000 homes received at least one foreclosure-related notice from July through September, up 71 percent from a year earlier, said foreclosure listing service RealtyTrac Inc.

By the end of the year, RealtyTrac expects more than a million bank-owned properties to have piled up on the market, representing around a third of all properties for sale in the U.S.

That’s bad news for anyone who lives nearby and wants to sell their home. While foreclosure sales are booming in many areas, those properties are commanding deep discounts and pulling down neighboring property values. “It has a pretty significant impact in terms of pricing,” said Rick Sharga, RealtyTrac’s vice president for marketing.

RealtyTrac monitors default notices, auction sale notices and bank repossessions. More than 250,000 properties were repossessed by lenders nationwide in the third quarter, 81,000 of which were taken back last month.

Six states — California, Florida, Arizona, Ohio, Michigan and Nevada — accounted for more than 60 percent of all foreclosure activity in the quarter, with California alone making up more than a quarter of all U.S. foreclosure filings.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Seniors Benefit From New Higher Loan Limits
• Reverse Mortgages Are a Bright Spot in a Weak Economy
• Seniors: How to Get Cash Tax-Free and Payment-Free
• Another Great Article Explaining Reverse Mortgages
• Reverse Mortgages — Much Better Than Most People Think

The following article from the New York Times gets right to the heart of the matter - having enough of a nest egg to make your retirement years comfortable and secure. For those who don’t, a reverse mortgage is one of your best possible options.

Retirees Filling the Front Line in Market Fears

By JOHN LELAND and LOUIS UCHITELLE
Published: September 22, 2008
Older Americans with investments are among the hardest hit by the turmoil in the financial markets and have the least opportunity to recover.

John Ricksen for The New York Times

Robert Waskover, 79, of Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., said that gasoline costs and less income from his business have hurt him.

Dilip Vishwanat for The New York Times

Mary O’Connell, 76, of St. Peters, Mo., has no pension and counts on income from four stocks.

As companies have switched from fixed pensions to 401(k) accounts, retirees risk losing big chunks of their wealth and income in a single day’s trading, as many have in the last month.

“There’s a terrified older population out there,” said Alicia H. Munnell, director of the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College. “If you’re 45 and the market goes down, it bothers you, but it comes back. But if you’re retired or about to retire, you might have to sell your assets before they have a chance to recover. And people don’t have the luxury of being in bonds because they don’t yield enough for how long we live.”

Today’s retirees have less money in savings, longer life expectancies and greater exposure to market risk than any retirees since World War II. Even before the last week of turmoil, 39 percent of retirees said they expected to outlive their savings, up from 29 percent in 2007, according to a survey by the Employee Benefit Research Institute, an industry-sponsored group in Washington.

“This really highlights the new world of retirement,” said Richard Johnson, a principal research associate at the Urban Institute in Washington. “It’s a much riskier world for retirees, because people don’t have defined-benefit plans. They have pots of money and they have to worry about making it last.”

Possibly Related Posts:

• Seniors Benefit From New Higher Loan Limits
• Reverse Mortgages Are a Bright Spot in a Weak Economy
• Seniors: How to Get Cash Tax-Free and Payment-Free
• Another Great Article Explaining Reverse Mortgages
• Reverse Mortgages — Much Better Than Most People Think

How Foreclosure Works (To know how this applies to you personally click HERE!)

When a person borrows money to buy real estate, such as a house or condominium, the loan is called a mortgage and requires monthly payments. In general if the property owner falls behind in making those payments, the lender can step in and sell the house at auction to settle the debt. Doing so is known as foreclosing on a property.

In most counties in the United States these auctions take place every month.

In most States the law allows lenders to conduct an auction without having to go before a judge on one condition: The lender must give the borrower - and the public - proper, legal notice of its plans to foreclose. Proper notification means advertising in the county’s official legal newspaper. The lender must advertise its intent to foreclose once a week for the four consecutive weeks leading up to the sale date. To auction off a property the first Tuesday of March, for example, a lender must have published a foreclosure notice during each of the four weeks of February.

How to Use the Information

• Property Owners: Protect Your Interests
During the weeks leading up to the courthouse auction date, many property owners are able to work things out with their lenders, seek bankruptcy protection or line up other arrangements to prevent the bank from selling off their homes.

Read the rest of this entry »

Possibly Related Posts:

• Seniors Benefit From New Higher Loan Limits
• Reverse Mortgages Are a Bright Spot in a Weak Economy
• Seniors: How to Get Cash Tax-Free and Payment-Free
• Another Great Article Explaining Reverse Mortgages
• Reverse Mortgages — Much Better Than Most People Think

YES!
But, this is very much a legal issue and you must get professional advice. Another post on this site, located here, explains Foreclosure. Educate yourself by reading it carefully. Then, it is important that you talk to an attorney, if you can afford one. You should also talk to a Reverse Mortgage Professional. (Please keep in mind that although your attorney may be a wealth of information he is likely NOT an expert on Reverse Mortgages. Very few regular mortgage people even understand them! Talking to both kinds of Professionals will give you the safest course.) I recommend The Professionals on this site. They are knowledgeable and will offer assistance at no charge or obligation.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Seniors Benefit From New Higher Loan Limits
• Reverse Mortgages Are a Bright Spot in a Weak Economy
• Seniors: How to Get Cash Tax-Free and Payment-Free
• Another Great Article Explaining Reverse Mortgages
• Reverse Mortgages — Much Better Than Most People Think