Who’s the “girl” that’s always there for you when things go sour for you with everyone else? The answer is not your life partner or your mother, but it’s your home – she’s been there for you no matter what happened, does a good job at keeping you safe and sound, as well as “comforting” you in times of trouble. Aside from acting as a place for you to crash and relax, what else can your house do for you? For those that don’t know, you can use it to pull off a home equity loan. What’s so good about this type of loan anyway? Well for starters, home equity loan rates are considered to be one of the lowest there is today, because of the loan collateral you’ll have to put up to apply for one.

And you know what that is, don’t you, old chum? That’s your house – there is a “condition” that needs to be met, in order to harvest the cheap home equity loan rates, naturally. These rates will be dependent on the equity of your house, and the lending companies will take it as one of the biggest factors for the determination of your worthiness. I’m sure that you understand what that means, if not, don’t break a sweat; let me explain. Equity is in some sense the “value” of your house. It’s computed by simple math, and the formula that’s used here is: how much of the house you’ve paid for so far, minus the amount you haven’t paid for yet.

It’s a simple formula, and yet there are many out there that don’t fully understand the whole thing. For every simpleton and dim-witted friend of mine out there, I’ll give an example, in hopes that you ALL understand it better. Here it is: you own a house, and so far you paid for $300,000 for it. But you still have a remainder of $100,000 to pay. To solve for the equity of your abode, you take $100,000 from $300,000, which gives you $200,000. Therefore, the equity of your house is 200 grand – I hope this I perfectly clear to all readers.

This isn’t the only determining factor when it comes down to knowing the home equity loan rates you’ll get, hell no. The knowledge you have on the entire matter and process on how all of this works will be your “best friend” when it comes to talking down the rates. In order to get the best rates possible, you’ll have to go to a number of different financial institutions dealing this type of service. Having good negotiation skills would also be an edge. There’s a lot to take into consideration before applying for this type of loan, like whether or not the value of your shack can get you approved for the loan in the first place.

Also, you’d most definitely want to be sure whether or not you’re actually capable of paying off the debt when you actually do get approved. This is one of the most important things you should think about. Having defaults with your payments can spell trouble for you. Ask other people that have taken out one for themselves – you might find one that has lost his home because of his incapability to pay.