home equity

  • Home Equity Debt Consolidation Raleigh NC: Why the Blended Rate Changes Everything

    ByKevin Martini

    Home equity debt consolidation Raleigh NC starts with a number most Wake County homeowners have never calculated: their blended interest rate across all debt. A homeowner carrying $350,000 at 3.5% and $20,000 in credit cards at 20% does not have a 3.5% debt position — they have a 4.39% blended rate, and the 20% card balance is driving it upward every month. The conventional advice to use a HELOC to protect the low first mortgage rate ignores three compounding risks: a variable rate tied to prime, an interest-only draw period that builds zero principal, and revolving access that makes re-accumulating debt easy. Kevin Martini and Logan Martini of Martini Mortgage Group model the blended rate math for each specific homeowner before recommending any structure — because the structure that wins on total cost over a real time horizon is the only recommendation that meets the Martini fiduciary standard.

  • Using Home Equity to Pay Off Debt Raleigh NC: What the Math Actually Shows

    ByKevin Martini

    Using home equity to pay off debt Raleigh NC reduces the interest rate on existing balances — credit cards currently average near 20% APR while home equity products in North Carolina run between 7% and 8.5% for qualified borrowers in 2026. But a 20% debt paid aggressively over four years can produce less total interest than an 8% home equity loan stretched over fifteen years, which is the calculation most articles skip entirely. For Wake County homeowners holding mortgage rates below 4%, a cash-out refinance replaces the entire existing mortgage at today’s rate — currently 6.5% to 7% — which frequently erodes the consolidation savings before they materialize. Kevin Martini and Logan Martini of Martini Mortgage Group model four numbers before recommending any structure: total interest on the existing payoff trajectory, total interest under the proposed product, the impact on the existing mortgage rate, and the debt-to-income ratio before and after