Q. I am soon to be divorced. My ex-wife has only worked part time for the past year. The judge is leaning towards giving her the house which still has a note on it. The judge is also leaning towards having my ex-wife buy my share of the house over a four year period when my name would stay on the note. Can I finance another house during these four years or would this be difficult since it would then appear that I have two mortgages?

A. As long is your name is on the loan you're fully responsible for the payments. If your ex-wife makes the payments, that's fine. If she doesn't pay, they'll come after you. The lender wants the money and doesn't really care which party it comes from. The only way to get your name off the mortgage is to have your ex-wife refinance into her name only.

If you try to buy another place to live, lenders will consider you to be buying a second home. That may limit the amount you can borrow and require you to pay a higher interest rate, which everyone must do when buying a second home.