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@hellobeeboston: @LadyDi: @Ajsmommy: @catgirl: @Andrea:
Do you all mind what kind of rates you guys are getting/seeing, and what kind of closing costs, what type of mortgage?
We refinanced about 2 years ago because we are about 2-3 years away from paying off our mortgage. So we changed to a 5 year ARM, and it's 2.95%. But I would run numbers on refinancing again if it makes sense (when including closing costs and how close we are to the end).
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Jumping in on this thread, is anyone in affected areas? Are you planning to change anything about your daily routine, social plans etc.? I'm in NYC, and it's starting to look like community spread - anyone's guess if the known cases are all there is. The kids have activities in three different locations, tickets to a concert Sunday, and a birthday party invite late in March. Which would be good and fine, except my husband has respiratory issues and nearly every cold he gets goes to his chest. I tried to at least put the lid on the concert plans because it's in Manhattan, and he chewed me out for "panicking". And said that if I'm scared of the concert, maybe we should cancel all their activities. IDK... where do I draw the line?
Ugh. I can't believe he thinks I'm overreacting. I could care less if I get this. It's only him I'm worried about.
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@Mama Bird: I'm in a newly affected area
We got our first confirmed case earlier this week. So far the only thing I've done is refill my prescriptions. My company announced today that they're cancelling all non-essential travel and all sales and marketing events through the end of April. It's all anyone is talking about, especially as we start getting more and more information about the activities of patient 0 for our county who just traveled back from Seattle. I'm also 33 weeks pregnant, so at this point I'm most worried about what the situation will look like in 6 weeks...
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@Mama Bird: we are 5 hrs away from Toronto in Ontario where there are 22 cases. All of them are tied to travel and Toronto has probably the largest and busiest airport in all of Canada so kind of expected. They were hit hard by SARS as well. So far, we are carrying on as normal and trying to just follow the public health guidelines. We have no travel plans coming up but I would likely be cancelling if we were leaving Canada. DW has a government job and I work in a private sports injuries clinic but neither of our bosses have said anything, same with daycare (other than the weird exchange yesterday) I believe we had an email from the school board but that’s all.
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@Mama Bird: DH was notified today that someone at his campus (but not building) has a presumptive positive. That employee and 23 others were sent home for self monitoring for 14 days per CDC instruction. DH only goes into the office two days per week anyway so I don't think this will impact him much.
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@Anagram: I've decided to refinance. I purchased in 2018. I'm doing another 30 year loan. Rate is 3.375. Closing costs will be $3490-$2990, which will take about 16.46 months to recover. We plan to be in the house for at least 7 more years, but could really stay there forever if our circumstances never change. So, it makes sense for us to do this. I haven't seen rates for 5 year arms much lower than what you have, so I can't imagine it making sense to refi again if I were you. But hey, holy cow on being almost done with your mortgage! Well done, lady!
And, I'm basically just going to be purchasing a little more at the store when I shop next. When I made my first post, i was in a mild panic and went to the grocery store on my way home from work. I could tell clorox wipes were getting cleared out, but there was still quite a bit available. I bought quite a few, but i love to have those on hand (garage, cars and bathroom cabinets) all the time anyways. I pursue the aisles and see what I want to bulk up on. But I'm not going crazy. I'm already a germ phob, so I avoid crowds anyways. My kids are both home with fevers and coughs, but I don't think its corona virus. Meh.
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@Anagram: We are going to wait so haven't asked for any quotes.
@Mama Bird: Yes, I'm in Westchester so we know people who "should" be in the self quarantine group. And well, let's just say some people aren't being so good at self quarantine. No surprise! We're still doing birthday parties since they go to school with these kids anyway. We have tickets to a show this Saturday and I don't think we will go. I've taken the kids off the school bus and I'm driving them. My husband is no longer allowed to go into the city, but he still goes to their CT office...for now! This could all change in a week.
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@Anagram: We are doing a 30 year conventional loan and locked in our rate at 3.1%. Not sure if I can answer your closing cost question since we’re closing on the house, not refinancing. We locked the rate in last week. Our mortgage guy told us if we waited it might go lower but we didn’t want to risk it going up, 3.1 is a lot lower than we thought we were going to get when we started this process!
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@Mama Bird: we are right across the Hudson and my husband works basically in Times Square and rides public transport in. Basically between his job, our kids’ school, and my school, we are fully exposed. 🤷♀️
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Our daycare closed today because a teacher was diagnosed with coronavirus! She hasn't been at work in a week and they are working with the health department to deep clean the entire facility. Luckily I was already working from home today and tomorrow. I'm surprisingly calm about it, everyone in our house is healthy and no compromised immune systems.
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I'm in Snohomish County, WA, about two blocks from Jackson HS. Through our friends and with some very minor symptoms we were considered "possible contact" but our clinic will not test (to be perfectly honest, they aren't testing anyone who doesn't need to be hooked to a respirator). We no longer have symptoms, but I worry about asymptomatic spread. Snohomish County just issued recommendations for high risk groups to stay home, and to cancel gatherings of over 50 people. My children are Pre-K and younger; out of an abundance of caution we have been home since Thursday of last week. My DH is currently at home on parental leave (we have a 7wo baby), but if that wasn't the case he would be able to WFH.
We have a pantry supply of about 3w right now in case quarantine recommendations get tighter (to be honest, I expect they will). I bumped up our arts and crafts supplies too to give my older two something different to do every day.
We've been getting groceries delivered-- person wears gloves getting the groceries, sets them by the front door, DH has been giving them a wipe down, wait 4 minutes, bring inside. Yes, it's overkill and yes, I'm going to continue doing it. I have to go out tomorrow for school reasons; I will wash hands at my location, then remove clothing and shower when I get home. Oh, and I'm carrying nitrile gloves in the car in case I need to stop for gas-- that rec came from our county health department.
One school district near me is closed for 2 weeks, a local college just shut down for three days. I fully believe that more districts will close soon as their absentee rates among both students and high-risk populations grow.
It's a very weird place to be and I feel like every day I'm walking a fine line between prepared and panicked.
Oh, and we bought bottled water...mostly in case there's a natural disaster like an earthquake, and also because even though most treatment plants are automated it was still recommended by our county health dept to stock a 3-5 day supply.
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@LadyDi: Where are you at that you getting 3.1? Did you have to pay points for it?
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@JennyPenny: ugh. I hope things will either not get really bad, or will blow over in six weeks!
@Andrea: yeah I think the birthday party is no big deal because this is DD's pre-K class! And the show is probably a no-go. I have way too much experience with people dragging themselves to these when sick, because expensive tickets going to waste. No idea what to do about the ballet and music and hockey though. I don't want the kids to miss weeks of practice because I'm paranoid...
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@agold: yes we paid points. I don’t remember the original rate, DH is dealing with the lender. 3.25 or 3.3? We’re paying $1,500 extra at close, which should pay for itself after 5 years and we’ll hopefully be in the house far longer than that.
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@Mama Bird: My husband’s company is sending everyone home to work! We are still going to activities because I feel like it’s no different than going to school. I expect them to close schools soon. They’ve been having the kids bring all their books home every night just in case. Remote learning is being set up.
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@Anagram: just asked dh and our new rate will be 3.1.....it was 3.6
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@Anagram: sounds like you have a great rate already but worth calling and seeing if you could do even better... not sure you can.. We locked in at 3%! Our old rate was 3.75 or something like that..... We are doing another 30 year, but we'e adjusting our payment schedule so it's more like a 25 year, we've been paying on our house for 5 years so it evens out. not sure about closing costs yet, my husband is going to try to get them waived.... the assessment is going to be about $500. We're in our home for the long haul, no plans to move, and if we did it would be after the kids graduate, so at least 15 years.
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@helloperidot: wow, that’s crazy! Interesting to hear what it’s really like in a semi-quarantine. Hope you guys are hanging in there! Is the health department telling you exactly what you have to do or do you just figure it out? I am in California so pretty sure we’re next for more severe measures.
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@JJ2626: I'm in California, too. Do you really think we are next up for extreme measures? What are you doing to prepare? Anything?
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@JJ2626: @agold: Also in CA and feeling like it's imminent.
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Just jumping in here as someone on the front lines of this (I'm an Emergency Doc). I'm in VA where we don't have any cases yet, but I can say we most likely do, we just aren't testing for them.
Yesterday I worked a 12 hour shift at a freestanding ED that people treat like an Urgent Care. I probably saw 10 patients who came in complaining of flu like symptoms, 6 of which expressed concerns about potentially having Covid-19, even though they had no known exposures or travel history. As a side note, unless they are sick and requiring admission tot he hospital, they are not candidates to be tested per current CDC guidelines.
I had two other patients however, who both came in for lower respiratory complaints (cough, fever, fatigue), both with no travel hx or exposure to anyone with Covid-19, but both getting worse at home despite doing all the right things and taking the meds their PCPs had prescribed them. Both got admitted to the hospital.
But here's the difficulty from this EM doctor's perspective. The CDC says they are only a candidate for coronavirus testing if there is no other diagnosis to explain their symptoms. So, I added on flu swabs (not usually recommended in anyone with illness >48 hrs per CDC), and added on RSV testing (most severe illness seen in kids)... so that's 4 tests I otherwise wouldn't have run, just to see if I could blame their illness on something else rather than Covid.
But the CDC does not define the extent of testing we (the doctors on the front line of this) need to do to be able to say the patient has an illness not explained by something else, and even the two hospitals I work at both have different capabilities for testing things (big hospital can test for 10+ viruses while small ED can only test 3). Does someone need to get a bronchoscopy where the pulmonologists puts a camera down their lungs and grabs a sample for testing for bacteria before I can consider a patient "ruled out for other causes?" That's an invasive and expensive test.
Should I have called the health department on those two cases to see about testing knowing that we only have 40 tests kits in the entire state?
It kept me up all night.
And after seeing 2 patients positive for flu A, 1 for Flu B, and these 2 with unclear causes, I sure hope I don't get sick myself and sent to quarantine. Not a fun position to be in at 25w1d.
#endrant
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@yellowbeach: omg. you poor girl. you sound tough and truly amazing to be dealing with all of this.
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@yellowbeach: Such a tough and ridiculous spot this is putting you in. I saw a post from a nurse in ca where I live, who cared for one of the confirmed patients here. She got sick and was put on mandatory quarantine, but they won't test her to confirm she has it because she wore proper PPE and therefore "shouldn't have it". for anyone else who reads this and isn't in the medical field, PPE is the mask, gloves, etc that you are required to wear.
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@yellowbeach: I've been in contact with my pedi a couple of times and he's basically said we aren't testing anyone who doesn't need to be on a respirator. It's running rampant in the community (at least here in WA), and at this point there's nothing to do but ride it out. I'm not a big fan of conspiracy but I will say this-- an administration might say "anyone can be tested" but that's not true if doctors are being told not to test and there aren't enough tests to begin with.
@JJ2626 --We are getting most of our recommendations from county health, our city, and the CDC. They have been, for the most part, clear about their recs and how people should be preparing.
One thing I'm surprised we haven't seen at the store level yet is an item quantity limit for customers to ensure there are supplies for everyone while stock is limited. We ordered pedialyte the other day just to have on hand, but I dropped our request down to one box when Shipt said there were only two left in store. I don't need it so badly that I'm going to make someone else go without.
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@yellowbeach: omg that's ridiculous. 40 test kits in the whole state?! They're really letting down the doctors on the front lines. Stay well.
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@helloperidot: I was just at the grocery store and there were limits on Kleenex, hand sanitizer, Lysol wipes and a few other things. We're in an area with pretty close ties to Seattle, so people are nervous.
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@yellowbeach: So frustrating and frightening. I work at a hospital in CA (non clinical) and it’s the same story here. Not enough tests so not testing nearly enough people. We will never contain this without tracking contacts of infected people which we can’t do if we don’t test. I have a degree in epidemiology and I am at my wit’s end with how CDC has handled testing. We are far behind other countries in dealing with it.
I hope you stay healthy! I’m sure it so tough to deal with while pregnant.
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@Anagram: We're closing on our refi next week. We got 3.25% on a 20 year fixed. We were 5 years into a 30 yr fixed at 4.25%, so this is a big improvement. We are able to skip the assessment since we've only owe approx 50% of the value of the house and closing costs are $1350.
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Well well my town now has 2 confirmed cases with 1 person who is a staff in our school district. Schools closed tomorrow and I’m pretty sure will be for the rest of this week!
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Sooo... the US headquarters plus two other locations in the US of the company where DH work are closed until further notice due to virus exposure. Luckily not a location where he works but still.... yikes.
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@graceandjoy: Similar situation here. Schools closed tomorrow to disinfect due to a confirmed case with a child at at least one of our districts’ six schools (they won’t say which)... It wouldn’t surprise me if they close schools for a longer period of time once they figure out who the close contacts/possible exposures are.
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Ok, so just an update... stayed hours late after my shift today fighting to get yet another patient tested. Denied. Our leaders are failing us. The mortality rate is now estimated at about 1% which is 5x that of flu. And it’s projected that up to 50% of Americans will be infected. Don’t do that math unless you want to cry.
Damn I really wish I could drink right now. Back to the grind tomorrow morning for another 12 hour shift fighting to get people tested and getting shot down over and over again.
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@yellowbeach: 1.5 million?! I'm so sorry for what you are having to go through to just get people tested, and I am so grateful for the work you do.
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@yellowbeach: this is the most all pregnancy I have wished I would drink. I’m a ball of anxiety. I wish time would just hurry up because the waiting to see the impact is so hard.
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I'm ignoring my 401K while buying other stocks with our slush fund from our rental income. Maybe that will all come out in the wash? At what I assume to be most of our current ages our retirement plans are still long term investments so we need to ride it out and stay calm. It's so hard though!
We got our first confirmed case earlier this week. So far the only thing I've done is refill my prescriptions. My company announced today that they're cancelling all non-essential travel and all sales and marketing events through the end of April. It's all anyone is talking about, especially as we start getting more and more information about the activities of patient 0 for our county who just traveled back from Seattle. I'm also 33 weeks pregnant, so at this point I'm most worried about what the situation will look like in 6 weeks...
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