Author: Money Mechanics

Refinancing replaces your current mortgage with a new loan, often to lower your interest rate, shorten your loan term or lock in a fixed rate. Some homeowners also choose a cash-out refinance, which lets you tap your home’s equity and receive a lump sum for larger expenses.As housing markets shift and personal finances evolve, many homeowners periodically reassess whether their mortgage still fits their needs. Changes in income, home equity, debt levels or long-term plans can all create opportunities, or reasons to consider refinancing.Still, refinancing isn’t automatically a win. Closing costs, extended loan terms and aggressive lender offers can quietly…

Key Takeaways From antebellum mansions in Natchez, Mississippi, to the battlefields of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, these five towns surround you with history.Each destination boasts a profound cultural heritage, as well as relatively low living costs, making them suitable for retirees and history enthusiasts alike. While tourist accommodations in cities like Boston command premium prices due to their colonial charms, dozens of other American locales offer equally compelling heritage, such as Revolutionary War battlefields, Spanish missions, and antebellum architecture, all at a fraction of the cost. Using Zillow’s Home Value Index and the Economic Research Institute’s cost-of-living data, we found five places…

Stock splits have seen a renaissance in recent years. Historically, forward stock splits suggest a company is firing on all cylinders. Both Netflix and ServiceNow have a record of consistent growth and the support of Wall Street. 10 stocks we like better than Netflix › Stock splits have enjoyed a renaissance in recent years, thanks in part to higher corporate profits and soaring stock prices. It’s worth noting that while the practice was widespread in the late 1990s, it had fallen by the wayside before finding its way back into the limelight. Companies generally choose this path after years or…

The miners’ recently-finished Q4’25 will soon prove their greatest quarter ever fundamentally! Their coming reported earnings are going to skyrocket to epic records, mostly due to astonishing record gold prices. But stable mining costs and production will also contribute to phenomenal results. Such crazy-strong fundamentals will drive down gold-stock valuations, making them great buys on any material gold weakness. With Q4’25 in the books, another quarterly earnings season draws near. Analyzing gold miners’ latest operational and financial results illuminates their current underlying fundamentals. Digesting them is very important for speculators and investors, temporarily dispelling the shrouds of herd sentiment usually…

Mortgage rates fell sharply on Friday, a day after President Donald Trump said on social media that he is instructing mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to buy $200 billion in mortgage bonds. “This will drive Mortgage Rates DOWN, monthly payments DOWN, and make the cost of owning a home more affordable,” he said in the Truth Social post.The rate on a 30-year mortgage dropped 22 basis points to 5.99%, matching the low from Feb. 2, 2023, according to Mortgage News Daily. Fannie Mae and Freddie, which are in government conservatorship, do not originate home loans. They buy loans…

Kyle Kucharski/ZDNETFollow ZDNET: Add us as a preferred source on Google.It’s the new year, and with it comes CES 2026, the tech industry’s first major showcase of the year. This is the time when the biggest names show off what they have in store. Laptops are a major focus at the event, and this year’s offerings range from polished updates to bold, innovative designs that push the boundaries of personal computing.Also: CES 2026 from Las Vegas: Latest updates on TVs, Smart Glasses, Robots, and moreWith so many new models at the event, I won’t be able to cover everything in detail, but…

Key Takeaways Large towns (population over 100,000) give you access to cultural attractions, health care, and recreation without big-city inconveniences, like sprawl, traffic, and a high cost of living.Spanning the Midwest, New England, the Southwest, and the Rockies, our four favorite large towns offer affordability, a rich local culture, strong health care networks, and year-round recreation.Toledo, Ohio, may be best if you want both urban and green spaces, while Springfield, Massachusetts, is attractive if you love to travel. Albuquerque, New Mexico, can be a good choice if you prioritize access to health care, and Pueblo, Colorado, may be attractive if you’re…

(Investing) – HOUSTON – U.S. oil producers already reeling from low oil prices are facing renewed pressures, as President Donald Trump pushes them to boost output in Venezuela – a move that would weaken the oil market, cut revenues and hurt industry at home. Trump has enacted policies that he says would unleash American energy and lower prices at the pump – a promise that would help U.S. consumers but squeeze oil industry revenues. It’s hard to do both – because lower profits mean oil companies drill less, not more. Trump has asked U.S. oil companies to fix Venezuela’s oil industry…

This WeekToday was supposed to be the big day for markets this week. We had the December jobs report and there was speculation the Supreme Court could make its decision on the IEEPA tariffs (it didn’t).The jobs report was not good, but not bad. On the plus side, the unemployment rate fell back to 4.4% from 4.5%. And while the economy added more than 50,000 jobs in December, that was below expectations for +70k. To top it off, the previous two months were revised down by a combined 76,000 jobs.Still, that was good enough to push down odds of a…

Key Takeaways Gaming and social media hubs are taking steps to identify young users and limit their access to mature content or ability to interact with adults.Privacy advocates have raised concerns about age verification tools, while platforms say they’re mindful of such issues. Earlier this week, Roblox began requiring an age-verification process for users to keep chatting with each other. The move made the gaming hub the latest tech platform to retool its approach to keeping young users safe. Meta (META) is now shielding teens from PG-13-esque Instagram content, while OpenAI is altering how ChatGPT interacts with minors, the companies…