Personal Finance Daily: Get ready for the mortgage interrogation

	Personal Finance Daily MAY 14, 2012 Monday's Personal Finance Stories By MarketWatch Don't miss these top stories: Mortgage borrowers face litany of questions Skip the dorm, buy your kid a condo How to pick a disability insurance plan Car Review: 2012 Range Rover Evoque New fund categories are not automatic buys Have you tried to buy a house or refinance your mortgage lately? It isn't easy. As Amy Hoak writes in her Home Economics column today, lenders are getting ever more demanding when it comes to verifying borrowers' ability to pay. One woman, divorced more than 17 years, was asked to provide her documentation of the divorce. A doctor was told he had to send along his college transcripts. Read Hoak's story to find out why lenders are ramping up their demands, and find out why it might make more sense to buy your child attending college a condo rather than shelling out for a dorm room. While you're at it, check out our tips for choosing a disability insurance plan. After all, about one-third of workers will experience a long-term injury or illness at some point, and your workplace coverage, if you have one, may not be enough to cover your income. —Andrea Coombes , Personal Finance editor How to pick a disability insurance plan Disability insurance isn't on the radar for most Americans, but many workers may come to rue that lack of awareness. One in three employees aged 35 to 65 will be out of work because of injury or illness for three months or more at some point in their career. Read more: How to pick a disability insurance plan. Buried treasure: A $34,500 gold coffin You can't take it with you, but for those who prefer the finer things in life—and, perhaps, in the afterlife—why not a golden coffin? Read more: Buried treasure: A $34,500 gold coffin. Autos: Range Rover's 2012 Evoque If you like the exterior style, and loads of luxury inside — and you're well-to-do — the Evoque sets new standards for a smaller SUV. But there's that nagging question of Range Rover's reliability. Read more: 2012 Range Rover Evoque. REAL ESTATE Mortgage borrowers face litany of questions As a home buyer or a candidate for refinancing, you'd expect to submit recent pay stubs and bank-account statements when applying for a mortgage loan. But a copy of your college transcripts? Or a decade-old divorce decree? Read more: Mortgage borrowers face litany of questions. Skip the dorm, buy your kid a condo Low real-estate prices—and sweet tax breaks—may make buying a condo preferable to student housing. Read more: Skip the dorm, buy your kid a condo. Is now the time to buy your first house? It has been a scary few years for the housing market. But at some point, the nightmare has to end (please?). Is now the time? Should first-time home buyers consider jumping into the market? Read more: Is now the time to buy your first house? Notes on a new economic model Watching the U.S. GOP on the right and assorted Greek communists on the left, it's easy to assume that there are only two directions for Western society to go. We must, it seems, kneel before the golden calf of the free market or chant at the smoke and mirrors of pain-free socialism. Seriously? Those are the choices? Read more: Notes on a new economic model. INVESTING Summer investing tips Wall Street's advice to "sell in May and go away" means getting out of stocks during the market's traditionally weak summer season. But some money managers have other ideas: They see opportunities in select stocks and market sectors. MarketWatch's Jonathan Burton and Wallace Witkowski answer readers' questions about how to play nice with the bears this summer. Read more: Summer investing tips. New fund categories are not automatic buys Investment researcher Morningstar Inc. introduced two new fund categories recently, but that doesn't mean these offerings belong in your portfolio. Read more: New fund categories are not automatic buys. Polishing the Dimon principle Forget the "Dimon principle." Investors should follow the Feynman principle. Read more: Polishing the Dimon principle. How to play nice with the bears of summer Strategists are mixed on what sectors to favor in the summer but most agree the traditionally bearish season should be milder this time around. Read more: How to play nice with the bears of summer. Get the latest news on our mobile site: http://www.marketwatch.com/m MarketWatch has sent you this newsletter because you signed up to receive it. To ensure you receive this newsletter in the future, please add marketwatchmail.com to your list of approved senders. Sent to: kumaresan.selva.blogger@gmail.com Unsubscribe | Subscribe Copyright 2012 MarketWatch, Inc. All rights reserved. MarketWatch, the MarketWatch logo, and BigCharts are registered trademarks of MarketWatch, Inc. By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy (updated 6/26/07). MarketWatch - Attn: Customer Service, 201 California St., San Francisco, CA 94111