Ilyce Glink

1 week ago | slate.com | Ilyce Glink

Pay Dirt Pay Dirt is Slate’s money advice column. Have a question? Send it to Kristin and Ilyce here. (It’s anonymous!) Dear Pay Dirt,  I’m in a career where appearance matters a lot. Like the other people I know in my field, I budget for this. But recently my boyfriend and I were talking about combining finances in marriage, and when he saw the numbers, he freaked out. To me, this stuff is the price of this career. I love the other parts of my job, and I’ve worked hard to get here.

1 week ago | slate.com | Ilyce Glink

Pay Dirt is Slate’s money advice column. Have a question? Send it to Kristin and Ilyce here. (It’s anonymous!) Dear Pay Dirt,  My husband and I just got back from taking the kids to visit my parents who live out of state. While we were gone, we left his mother “Linda” to housesit rather than board our dog.

1 week ago | arcamax.com | Ilyce Glink |Samuel J. Tamkin

Q: I am 85 years old and my wife is a tad younger. A couple of years ago we paid off our mortgage with a home equity line of credit (HELOC). The loan amount was around $100,000. The HELOC loan is interest only with a payment of around $400 per month. We had been paying around $700. Our loan is a variable rate loan, and the payments have continued to go up and now are around what we were paying with our old loan. Can you suggest any way of lowering our monthly outlay?

1 week ago | arcamax.com | Ilyce Glink |Samuel J. Tamkin

Q: We rent a unit in a development that used to charge us $100 per month for the amenities. They recently raised the fee to $300 — a huge increase. Needless to say, homeowners like us, who rent strictly under association rental guidelines, are stunned by this impossible increase and all our requests to reconsider these draconian increases fell on deaf ears of an inconsiderate board. Can a board force a tenant to pay for the fee even if he does not want them?

1 week ago | slate.com | Ilyce Glink

Pay Dirt is Slate’s money advice column. Have a question? Send it to Kristin and Ilyce here. (It’s anonymous!) Dear Pay Dirt,  My partner and I have been together for three years, and I love him very much. We want to move in together. But I’m facing an impossible dilemma. My current one-bedroom is amazing—great light, clean, no weird fees. Because I’ve lived here for so long, I pay roughly 70 percent of the average one-bedroom rent in our area.