A home is yours forever. As long as you can afford the mortgage and taxes, you don't ever have to move. There's no landlord to terminate your lease, raise your rent or deny you permission to make changes to the property. Homeownership also forces you to save. If you have a traditional 30-year or 15-year mortgage, a small portion of each monthly payment reduces your indebtedness. And the amount that goes toward amortizing the loan increases over time. This can be very useful for people who lack the discipline to save on their own.

Many programs offer to bail you out of an impending mortgage rate increase. Do any really help? Major considerations: Often, these programs require counseling sessions, which may take too long if you're in a loan due to reset soon. Some have special requirements, which may disqualify you. You first may have to negotiate with your lender, who may or may not help. The loan terms for which you qualify may be unattractive. Also, investment property or non-owner-occupied property may be excluded.

World climate has ice ages, and baseball had a Dead Ball Era. Mortgages have their defining epochs, too. In 2003, when mortgage rates dropped below 5.5 percent for a time, it was the Year of the Refinance. The years 2004 through 2006 constituted the Era of the Exotic Mortgage, when homebuyers were eager to get any type of loan so they could grab houses before prices were out of reach. Then came 2007, the Year of Reckoning, when home prices went down and the foreclosure rate went up. And 2008 will be the Year of the Refinance again, but for different reasons than those that drove the refi boom of 2003. Five years ago, low rates spurred people to refinance. In 2008, homeowners will refi because their adjustable-rate mortgages will hit their reset dates, sending rates skyward.

Reverse mortgages used to be a way for homeowners to get extra cash during retirement. Now they're also being used for a more-pressing purpose: helping people who are struggling to meet payments on high-interest-rate loans to keep their homes. The strategy, which is relatively novel but gaining popularity among legal-aid attorneys and housing advocates around the country, calls for persuading lenders to take the cash generated by a reverse mortgage in lieu of foreclosing on older homeowners.

After a year of falling house prices in numerous parts of the country and a meltdown in the mortgage market that affected borrowers regardless of their ZIP code, many hope that housing markets will finally start to get better. But if there's any improvement in 2008, it may be relatively modest. It's difficult to get a consensus on exactly when housing will turn the corner. Local markets will certainly vary, but at the least it's likely that some of the same problems that plagued 2007 will carry over into next year. At best, market conditions could start to stabilize, with home sales regaining strength. If more buyers get back into the market, some of the huge inventories of new and existing homes for sale can begin to be worked off.

These charities make no-interest loans to students. Many religious and ethnic organizations also offer no- or low-interest education loans. Central Scholarship Bureau Makes about 120 loans annually of up to $15,000 over four years to meritorious students from central Maryland whose families have adjusted gross incomes of less than $75,000. Rolling deadlines

Don't rule out the college of your freshman's dreams because you think it's too expensive. Experts say marketing a four-year college education resembles marketing airline tickets: Schools charge full price to those students who can afford to pay, then offer discounted "fares" to everyone else to fill their classrooms.

When the U.S. House of Representatives recently voted to halve interest rates on some student loans, it left out an entire class of borrowers: graduate students. Twentysomethings considering going to grad school should also know that there is less federal grant money available than for undergraduates.

Students are relying more and more on private lenders to fund their college educations. Last year, private college loans totaled $17.3 billion and accounted for one out of every five dollars borrowed for college, according to the College Board. A decade ago, private lenders provided only 4 percent of college loan money. Soaring college costs are driving the trend. When Sharlyne Woodbury was accepted to Northeastern University, she scrambled to scrape together cash for tuition and fees. Government loans helped, but because they have borrowing caps, her financial aid adviser recommended supplementing federal aid with private loans.

The homework begins for today's college students long before they set foot in a university lecture hall. The late nights start with poring over an increasing array of student- loan options. "A big part of getting to college and staying in college is figuring out who offers the best interest rate, who offers the best loan-repayment program, who has the best customer service when you ask them questions," says Joshua Chaisson, a senior at the University of Southern Maine who estimates that he will graduate with $14,000 in loan debt. Bruce Gunther, a history teacher who attended a seminar on student loans at Franklin and Marshall College, where his son is a sophomore, says: "We've refinanced our home twice, and that is a piece of cake compared to the student-loan process." Indeed, perhaps the only simple fact about student loans is that rates have jumped. As of July 1, interest rates on existing federal Stafford loans increased to 6.54 percent from 4.7 percent, and they rise to 7.14 percent when a student enters the repayment period. All new Stafford loans now carry a fixed rate of 6.8 percent, and rates on new plus loans for parents have also jumped.