Initially when the recession hit and the foreclosure rate went way up some renters were unfairly evicted from their homes with little notice. Unfortunately at the time apparently there weren't any laws protecting renters in such a situation. IN response to this problem congress passed the a new law called the Protecting Tenants at Foreclosure Act (PTFA) It was enacted in 2009. The details of the law are posted online here.
Generally under PTFA if you have a valid lease that existed before the foreclosure then you can stay at least 90 days after foreclosure as long as you pay rent to the new owners.
Some details of the PTFA :
The tenant can not be evicted until the end of their existing lease or at least 90 days. If you have a lease then you to stay till the end of the lease. There is however an exception where if the new owner wants to live in the home they only have to give you 90 days even if you have a lease for longer than that. If there is no lease then you have at least the 90 days.
You must pay the rent to the new owner. There is no free ride.
The lease has to have been agreed before the foreclosure started.
The rent has to be reasonable rate close to fair market.
The renter must not be a direct relative of the mortgage holder and the transaction has to be 'arms length'. So you're not allowed to setup a deal with someone in advance or that negates the intent of the law.
So you can't setup a 99 year lease with your buddy for $1 a month and expect that to fly.
The PTFA was written as a temporary measure and unless its renewed the law will sunset (expire) in 2014.
May 31, 2011
The Fate of Renters During Foreclosure
May 29, 2011
My Salary History
I'm very happy to have a good paying job and to have remained gainfully employed for the past 14 years.
I previously told my own personal financial story in a 4 part series. In part 4 of that I shared how my salary started at around $42,000 a year in 1997 and then grew to over $100,000 by 2009.
Here is the trend in my salary & total W2 earnings over the years:
My W2 earnings are a bit more than my salary due to profit sharing bonuses and stock benefits that I also get from my employer. Those extra benefits are above my normal base salary. The salary is fixed but the bonuses vary based on how well the company does.
I've gotten pretty good raises over the years. Three times in 1999, 2000 and 2008 I received promotions and in those years I got large pay raises. The percentage increase in my pay annually looks like this :
The promotions made a huge difference in the growth of my pay over the years. If you remove those big raises and replace them with a more standard raise level of 3% then my pay would be about 2/3 of what it is today. Similarly if my pay had only grown with the rate of inflation then the $42,700 I made in 1997 would be equivalent to making about $59,800 today. My pay has grown about twice as fast as the rate of inflation.
May 27, 2011
Best of blog posts for week of May 27th
fivecentnickel discusses how to Sell Your Stuff to Amazon
FreeMoneyFinance tells us Why I Like and Use Cash Back Credit Cards
DoughRoller talks about Save Money On Car Insurance Using Progressive Snapshot
Lottery Payouts, Adiminstration and Proceeds by State
Most states have some form of lottery. I occasionally enjoy playing the lottery as a form of entertainment. $1 is not a large price to pay for a little day dreaming about what I would do with my giant jackpot which I fully realize I have virtually no realistic chance of winning. Lotteries are often criticized as being a rip off for the player.
I got data on the lottery payouts and state revenue for 2006 from the National Conference of State Legislature website. Its a few years old but I doubt the numbers have changed radically.
Nationally the average payout in prizes is 64.5% of the bets made. That means for every $1 spent on lottery games the players get back 64.5¢. Administration costs about 4¢ of every dollar. These are the costs spent to advertise the programs, make and sell tickets and pay lottery staff employees, etc. The remaining money left over after the prizes and administration is paid comes out to 31.5¢ of every dollar gambled. This money is kept by the state to use for roads and schools and such.
Here is a table with the % of funds that are paid out in prizes, used for administration and retained in profits by the state.
| Prizes | Admin | Proceed | |
| United States | 64.5% | 4.0% | 31.5% |
| Arizona | 59.2% | 8.6% | 32.1% |
| California | 58.0% | 4.6% | 37.5% |
| Colorado | 64.6% | 7.0% | 28.4% |
| Connecticut | 64.1% | 4.2% | 31.7% |
| Delaware | 55.1% | 1.1% | 43.8% |
| Florida | 63.1% | 3.9% | 33.0% |
| Georgia | 66.0% | 4.4% | 29.7% |
| Idaho | 63.1% | 8.5% | 28.3% |
| Illinois | 63.7% | 3.0% | 33.3% |
| Indiana | 64.9% | 6.3% | 28.8% |
| Iowa | 52.8% | 12.6% | 34.6% |
| Kansas | 61.7% | 10.8% | 27.5% |
| Kentucky | 64.0% | 6.3% | 29.8% |
| Louisiana | 53.6% | 8.8% | 37.6% |
| Maine | 67.6% | 7.5% | 24.9% |
| Maryland | 62.0% | 3.7% | 34.3% |
| Massachusetts | 77.0% | 2.0% | 21.0% |
| Michigan | 64.1% | 3.2% | 32.7% |
| Minnesota | 70.4% | 5.6% | 24.0% |
| Missouri | 66.8% | 4.0% | 29.2% |
| Montana | 55.1% | 19.1% | 25.8% |
| Nebraska | 60.1% | 11.9% | 28.0% |
| New Hampshire | 61.3% | 6.7% | 32.0% |
| New Jersey | 59.2% | 3.9% | 36.9% |
| New Mexico | 61.7% | 13.0% | 25.3% |
| New York | 61.2% | 4.2% | 34.6% |
| North Carolina | 62.3% | 7.5% | 30.1% |
| North Dakota | 52.0% | 16.1% | 31.9% |
| Ohio | 63.0% | 4.6% | 32.4% |
| Oklahoma | 57.2% | 6.9% | 36.0% |
| Oregon | 71.0% | 2.9% | 26.0% |
| Pennsylvania | 64.2% | 2.3% | 33.6% |
| Rhode Island | 78.5% | 0.5% | 21.0% |
| South Carolina | 66.0% | 4.0% | 29.9% |
| South Dakota | 78.1% | 1.3% | 20.6% |
| Tennessee | 66.7% | 5.6% | 27.8% |
| Texas | 64.5% | 5.2% | 30.4% |
| Vermont | 67.3% | 9.8% | 22.9% |
| Virginia | 60.0% | 5.0% | 35.0% |
| Washington | 65.2% | 7.5% | 27.3% |
| West Virginia | 56.4% | 1.5% | 42.1% |
| Wisconsin | 62.0% | 6.1% | 31.8% |
Posts
