11–20 of 46 posts
Scott Adams coined the term confusopoly to the business practise of making things so complex it is hard to work out what is really going on: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/confusopoly This is a classic example along with cell phone carriers and retailers (try to work out special offers).
A feature I'd love to see is should I refinance or not. I've currently got a convoluted system of spreadsheets which I have to update every time I want to recheck against current rates. I'd basically like it to tell me in which scenarios it would make sense to refinance. I input things like amount of principle still outstanding, my current rate and term, how far I am into that loan, when I plan on selling, what the r…
One thing that might have sold me on what you're doing behind-the-scenes: if there was a "dumb calculator" result you could have compared your numbers to in the results screen.
(Apologies if I missed you doing exactly that).
I can tell you it's so true that it's really hard to figure out what's going on. Everybody will tell you different things, different banks and even friends and family.
I couldn't stand it, so I sat down and researched the mortgage calculator formula. It's actually pretty easy:
http://www.hughchou.org/calc/formula.html
I implemented this in javascript and was able to see my monthly payments and project my loan amounts over the years. This gave me a great way to fiddle with lots of parameters and instantly see differences. I was able to graph the results and see exactly where I broke even on different investments, etc, and completely decide, without persuasion, what kind of loan I wanted.
Most loan calculators suck. They don't really let you play around with the parameters, or they aren't clear on what they are including.
I'm happy to see this company because I'm all for opening up this kind of "fiddling" to people who can't program. I feel bad for people who are confused but don't have the skills to sit down and really figure it out. I wish you luck and I hope you better people lives with this.
EDIT: I played around with your tool a little bit. Here's where I think you guys should go: financial advice. Don't force people to tell you what down payment they need. If they don't enter one, suggest a few different amounts and show the difference it makes. If they don't specify a 15 or 30 year loan, show them the differences (pros and cons) and let them decide. In some cases, persuade people to make good financial decisions. You should rarely get a loan without any down payment. Tell people that.
So: I used your thingy as soon as I saw the TC announcement, and while I believe you when you say that there's substantial modeling happening behind the scenes, I didn't perceive any of that. My end-user experience with your offering was of a very, very usable... financial calculator. One thing that might have sold me on what you're doing behind-the-scenes: if there was a "dumb calculator" result you could have compa…
I just bought a house. We closed last Thursday and are moving in on Saturday. I can tell you it's so true that it's really hard to figure out what's going on. Everybody will tell you different things, different banks and even friends and family. I couldn't stand it, so I sat down and researched the mortgage calculator formula. It's actually pretty easy: http://www.hughchou.org/calc/formula.html I implemented this in…
So: I used your thingy as soon as I saw the TC announcement, and while I believe you when you say that there's substantial modeling happening behind the scenes, I didn't perceive any of that. My end-user experience with your offering was of a very, very usable... financial calculator. One thing that might have sold me on what you're doing behind-the-scenes: if there was a "dumb calculator" result you could have compa…
thanks for the feedback. we've been trying really hard to simplify the application as much as possible. however it looks like there is an 'advanced' group of users that wants a lot more detail (which we have a-plenty). we have been thinking about letting people play with the raw models > is this something you would be interested in?
I recently bought a house and used this[1] mortgage calculator, which was the best one I found. I liked how you can pivot from calculating on monthly income, purchase price, or a total monthly payment. An easy way to play with the numbers. Of course, since it's a simple calculator, it does require more manual input. I will say, though, it might be nice to have a manual mode with places you can input all those numbers a broker will throw at you.
[1] http://www.mortgageloan.com/calculator/mortgage-qualifying-c...
"Just so you know we are not cherry picking this is the highest rank Google return for home affordability." This is by definition cherry picking. The highest rank Google return doesn't say very much about the quality of the tool. It would be better (at least more honest) to simply show the best tools out there and compare your solution to theirs.