Bellingham Reverse Mortgage Loans
Many Seniors today are using a Bellingham reverse mortgage to enhance their retirement. The Home Equity Conversion Mortgage or (HECM) is the government insured mortgage provided by private lenders and insured by the Federal Housing Administration.A reverse mortgage may be a good option for you if you would like to:
- Live independently in your own home and maintain ownership
- Make home improvements and other enhancements
- Eliminate the monthly principal and interest payment on your mortgage
- Have more liquidity with a line of credit
The question that most people ask is how exactly does this all work.
You may qualify if:
- One homeowner is at least 62 years’ old
- The home is your primary residence
- The loan proceeds are enough to pay off your existing loan and closing costs
- Pass Financial Assessment in underwriting
Reverse Mortgages Broker Bellingham WA
The best way to find out if a Bellingham reverse mortgage is right for you is to begin with education. Our President, John Barlow, has written an informative book called “Understanding Reverse Mortgages”. He discusses all of the ins and outs of this product and shows three examples of clients using a Bellingham reverse mortgage who have different situations. You can find the book here on Amazon, www.amazon.com/author/jbarlow. The next phase is to give us a call to see what your loan proceeds will be and which advantages apply to you. The loan amount will be determined by the appraised value or max claim amount, age of the youngest borrower or a non-borrowing spouse, and the expected interest rate.Reverse Mortgage Bellingham WA
Sound Financial Mortgage LLC believes in supplying our customers with a solid education, outstanding service, and a wide variety of product options to meet your needs. We believe in honesty and integrity and we will always work to maintain your trust. If you are interested in learning more about Bellingham reverse mortgages, we would be honored if you would consider Sound Financial Mortgage LLC as one of your Bellingham reverse mortgage brokers.Contact us if:
- You would like to speak with a professional serving Bellingham
- To receive personalized Bellingham reverse mortgage information
- Like to learn more about how it works and if it is right for you
- To find out more information about reverse mortgages
- If you are interested in learning more about the advantages vs. disadvantages
- If you would like more information on reverse mortgage counseling
- To determine eligibility requirements and how much you may qualify to receive
Bellingham Tidbits
For thousands of years, Native Indians had lived in the Bellingham Bay region. The Lummi are a coastal people who spoke Salish and lived on the San Juan Islands, next to Whatcom Creek and around the mouth of the Nooksack River.In 1852, coal was discovered in the area by the first white settler in the Bellingham region and the mining of coal started. The name was the Sehome Mine. In 1856, Captain George Pickett was sent by the US Army to build a fort on the Bellingham Bay to provide protection for the Sehome Mine against northern Indian raiders. Although the mine closed in 1878, it ran successfully for 20 years.
Some tribal leaders and a Lummi Chief signed the Treaty of Point Elliot in 1855. In exchange for a 15,000 acre reservation on the peninsula between Lummi Bay and Bellingham Bay, this treaty ceded the majority of the original lands the tribe owned to the US.
Some prospectors discovered gold in British Columbia on the Fraser River in 1858. Whatcom was a shortcut to the gold from the ocean. Construction of the Whatcom Trail to Canada began. However, the gold fields were finished by the time the trail was finished. The Bellingham Bay gold boom disappeared as quickly as it had arrived.
Two California investors arrive in Olympia from Portland. Although they found out about a better opportunity, they had originally gone to Portland to begin a fishing company. The opportunity was to supply lumber to rebuild San Francisco after fire almost destroyed the city. The men went upriver in search of a waterfall to build a sawmill that was powered by water.
The two men met the Lummi chief in Olympia. The chief directed them to the Whatcom falls. The men kept traveling north after hiring two Lummi guides. They found numerous massive cedar and Douglas fir trees next to some powerful streams to power their sawmill.
However, the prices for lumber had dropped because San Francisco was well on the way of being reconstructed by the time their mill was constructed. In 1873, this first Whatcom mill was destroyed by fire. Heirs of the two men gave the location to some people from Kansas who promised to build 50 houses, a school, a church, and a wharf in addition to rebuilding the mill. The first large shipment of lumber was delivered to San Francisco in 1883 and a small settlement was established. However, the settlement was abandoned in 1885.
The leading industry in the Bellingham Bay region was still the lumber industry. In 1895, the largest logs were transported to Bellingham Bay from the inland mills by logging railway lines that were powered by steam.
In 1892, on the upper end of Lake Whatcom at Blue Canyon, another mine opened. Up until 1917, the Blue Canyon mine operated successfully. During the 1800s, it was determined that for the Bellingham Bay region to prosper, it needed a railroad. The hope was that one of the Bay communities would be the terminus of a transcontinental railroad. However, Tacoma was selected to be the terminus in 1873. Around Bellingham Bay, real estate speculation was being promoted by the Bellingham Bay Improvement Company hoping that Fairhaven would be the western headquarters of the transcontinental Great Northern Railroad during the 1880s.
There were four communities on Bellingham Bay by 1890: Fairhaven, Bellingham, Sehome, and Whatcom. It soon became clear that the best way to prosper would be consolidation. Bellingham was the name that was selected for this new community. It wasn't long before the new community was ready to face the 1900s. Bellingham's largest employers between 1900 and 1945 were the Puget Sound Canning Company, the Bellingham Canning Company, and the Pacific/American Fisheries.
Bellingham was booming during the early 1900s. Railroad speculators built several imposing and ornate buildings in downtown Fairhaven. Merchants and bankers built office buildings and homes in Sehome. The streets of the Bellingham Bay communities started looking more respectable and established as the lumber mills and the canneries prospered.
Timber supplies and salmon stocks were depleted by the middle 1950s. Extractive industries such as coal, fisheries, and lumber no longer formed the center of the identity and economy in Bellingham. The canneries, shingle mills, and sawmills had closed. There were no more commercial fisheries on the waterfront. Built around businesses that served cannery and mill workers, the downtown core declined as well.
The community and neighborhood elected to try and save the community they loved. Fairhaven had many old, beautiful buildings since it had been the location of the speculative frenzy during the 1890s, when people believed that it would become the terminus of a transcontinental railroad. People in the neighborhood had become very suspicious of improvements that required them to destroy the very thing that had made it unique. The imposing Fairhaven Hotel had been demolished and replaced by a filling station in 1953. The remainder of the nation started coming around to this philosophy by the 1970s. These days, Bellingham is full of theaters, concerts, restaurants, and shops that draw people from all over the area.
