Access reverse

Seniors Can Get a Loan on Their House Without Paying the Bank Back

By Dan Harris

Nov. 8

For Sondra Sheppard, a reverse mortgage has meant less part-time work as a nanny and tour guide, and more of what she really loves: art.

“The financial freedom lets me step back from other jobs and be an artist again,” says Sheppard, 65, of Silver Spring, Md.

For Audrey Sommerhalter, 73, a reverse mortgage has enabled her to stay in the Long Island, N.Y., home where she’s lived for nearly 50 years. The money, she says, has allowed her to “have a better quality of life & to be able to indulge in things that I had never been able to before.”

By Leonard Wiener

For many of today’s retirees, a home can seem like Fort Knox without the key. Escalating real-estate prices have caused many seniors’ homes to skyrocket in value. But unless they’re willing to sell, it may be an inaccessible gain during a time in their lives when extra income and liquid assets would be most welcome. There is a way to tap those profits–a reverse mortgage. “Many seniors are sitting on home equity they never dreamed of,” says realty expert Tom Kelly, whose recent book, The New Reverse Mortgage Formula, is a guide to what a growing number of elderly homeowners see as a way to have their home and cash in on it, too.