The Resourceful Renovator: A Gallery of Ideas for Reusing Building Materials

Banks and mortgage lenders are cutting off more home-equity lines of credit, crimping homeowners’ plans for homeowner improvements. Borrowing against home equity has been a major source of funds fueling the renovation boom of recent years. But big lenders, including Bank of America, Citibank, Countrywide Financial, Washington Mutual Bank and USAA, collectively have told hundreds of thousands of customers this year that their home-equity lines have been frozen. Lenders typically include language in their agreements that allows them to cap or cut off a credit line if home values decline, or if a borrower fails to make payments on time.

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