Starting "The Ball" Rolling

And just what is "the ball"?  Why, the big orange ball of ING Direct (www.ingdirect.com).  I went online yesterday, filled out all the necessary screens, and clicked "submit" to start our application to refinance our mortgage.

Nothing happened.

So I clicked "submit" again.  Again nothing, save a nice error message telling me to wait and try again, and if the problem persisted, I should call ING Direct.

Now, I hate talking to people on the phone -- always have, likely always will.  I prefer to think in words and text instead of speech.  But we'd put the process off for too long, so I called.  God bless a bank which has customer service people in on a Sunday (even if they're in Los Angeles and likely have far nicer weather than we do here). 

I worked with the gentleman (sadly, I don't remember his name) and in about a half hour we had everything approved, rolling, and moving along.  Our rate is locked in at 3.75% (it dropped since our last post here), and now we just need to get some documents from them, sign them, and send them copies of some of our information (homeowners insurance declaration page, two years' worth of W-2s, and recent paystubs -- very normal-type things).  After that, they process the whole thing, then someone from a title company comes to our house, we sign things, and badda-bing, badda-boom (yeah, I can't believe I used words like "badda-bing" either) we're refinanced.  Our payment will be $225.77 every two weeks, which we'll electronically debit from our Electric Orange checking account at ING Direct.  Couldn't be any simpler.

Not only does this drastically reduce the interest we'll be paying every month, but the amount we absolutely need to have on hand every month to pay the regular bills drops by about $650.  I'm not a big fan of bureaucracy, and I'll be a much happier camper once the whole closing process is done, but I'm just a little giddy that we're just that much closer to our financial goals.

Anyone else refinanced lately, or thinking of refinancing?  Feel free to share in the comments section.  And, as always, if you've got any questions, don't hesitate to ask.