Dear Mary: We have been paying on a beautiful piece of property that has a creek running through it. We hope it will be the site of our future retirement home. We got a five-year loan on it, and a balloon payment is due soon. We don't know what to do. We can't get a fixed-rate mortgage on it because it is vacant. Is this just our bank's policy, or is this typical? The bank has explained that our options are: 1. Put a house on the property, and then rent it. 2. Refinance the house that we live in ...

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