Home with Teresa

The first Farmer's Market will be held June 22 and 23 (Founder’s Day) on Main Street in the old Henderson Furniture Bldg. located on the corner of 7th & Main.
Vendors from all around the state are planning to set up booths in the climate-controlled building. There will be a saddle maker with saddles, a winery booth and possibly someone from Charlie, Texas, with the famous Charlie peaches. But sounds like mainly fruits & vegetables. Who doesn't love them? I hope the community will come out to support this event.

Millions of homeowners were required to get private mortgage insurance (PMI) at the time they purchased their homes, due to having made downpaments of less than 20 percent. The monthly mortgage payment includes as much as $150 that represents the PMI premium.

You can get so accustomed to making that identical mortgage payment every month, some people stay on auto-pilot and continue paying for a policy they’re entitled to cancel.

Typically, if you’ve reached the 20% equity level, you’re eligible. If your mortgage is less than 5 years old, it’s 25%. You also need to have a good track record for making mortgage payments. That means having had no more than one late-payment penalty in the past year; no payments over 30 days late in that same time frame; nor, any notice of default recorded against the property.

If that sounds like you, and if you haven’t gone through the process, there are user-friendly resources to help you get the cancellation process started.

First, you’ll need to confirm your eligibility. The Mortgage Insurance Companies of America (MICA), the trade association for mortgage insurers, sponsors an excellent website (http://www.privatemi.com/cancel/index.cfm) that offers an eligibility calculator, as well as sample letters to send to mortgage servicers that will help you jump start the cancellation process.

If you are eligible to cancel your PMI, your servicer might require an updated appraisal of your home. Don’t rush out and have an appraisal done yourself, though. Mortgage servicers use their own sources to select an appraiser for the job.

If you don’t want to handle the cancellation personally, you can hire someone else to do it for you. PMI cancellation services take over all of the correspondence, escrow account analyses and any disputes with servicers. Figure on spending about $500, including the appraisal. An Internet search for “Cancel PMI” will help you locate a local company.

You’ve worked hard to have accumulated 20% equity in your home. Don’t pay for something you no longer need!

Even if you know you’re not eligible yet, use the eligibility calculator to figure out when you WILL be and keep that date posted prominently somewhere in your records. Or even, for instance, on the refrigerator. It’ll remind you daily of something positive you’re working toward that’ll be worth celebrating when the time comes.

Remember, this Sunday, June 17th is Father's Day.

I feel so blessed in my life to have a wonderful role model in my life as my Dad. He is a man of great character, values, a successful businessman, someoneone you can always count on, a great Dad and a wonderful grandfather, & he was a wonderful husband to my mother.

And now a little history on Father's Day.

he United States is one of the few countries in the world that has an official day on which fathers are honored by their children. On the third Sunday in June, fathers all across the United States are given presents, treated to dinner or otherwise made to feel special.

The origin of Father's Day is not clear. Some say that it began with a church service in West Virginia in 1908. Others say the first Father's Day ceremony was held in Vancouver, Washington.

The president of the Chicago branch of the Lions' Club, Harry Meek, is said to have celebrated the first Father's Day with his organization in 1915; and the day that they chose was the third Sunday in June, the closest date to Meek's own birthday!

Regardless of when the first true Father's Day occurred, the strongest promoter of the holiday was Mrs. Bruce John Dodd of Spokane, Washington. Mrs. Dodd felt that she had an outstanding father. He was a veteran of the Civil War. His wife had died young, and he had raised six children without their mother.

In 1909, Mrs. Dodd approached her own minister and others in Spokane about having a church service dedicated to fathers on June 5, her father's birthday. That date was too soon for her minister to prepare the service, so he spoke a few weeks later on June 19th. From then on, the state of Washington celebrated the third Sunday in June as Father's Day. Children made special desserts, or visited their fathers if they lived apart.

States and organizations began lobbying Congress to declare an annual Father's Day. In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson approved of this idea, but it was not until 1924 when President Calvin Coolidge made it a national event to "establish more intimate relations between fathers and their children and to impress upon fathers the full measure of their obligations." Since then, fathers had been honored and recognized by their families throughout the country on the third Sunday in June.

When children can't visit their fathers or take them out to dinner, they send a greeting card. Traditionally, fathers prefer greeting cards that are not too sentimental. Most greeting cards are whimsical so fathers laugh when they open them. Some give heartfelt thanks for being there whenever the child needed Dad.