(Reriani Communications)--- When refinancing a mortgage, many borrowers focus exclusively on getting a lower interest rate. But interest rates are only part of the picture – there are many other options to consider as well.

True, getting a lower rate is usually the primary goal in refinancing – and the rock-bottom mortgage interest rates over the past year have generated a lot of activity. But refinancing isn’t simply about trading one 30-year mortgage for another with a lower rate – there are a lot of other choices you can make to maximize your savings or tailor your refinance to your own particular circumstances.

For example, the primary goal for most homeowners when refinancing is to lower their monthly mortgage payment. And a lower interest rate is definitely a way to do that. But it’s not the only way. You can also extend the term on your current mortgage – for example, refinancing into another 30-year loan when you have 23 years remaining on your current one. Or stretching it out to a 40-year loan, which many lenders offer.

(Reriani Communications)-- Disgraced financier Bernie Madoff has been treated in North Carolina for injuries consistent with an assault, sources have told ABC's WTVD.

Sources told the station that Madoff was treated at Duke hospital in Durham, N.C. for facial fractures, broken ribs and a collapsed lung. He was discharged earlier in the week, according to the report.

Bernard Madoff is the investment manager who defrauded investors of up to $50 billion in what might be the largest swindle in Wall Street history. Madoff was a Wall Street legend who had been in business for nearly 50 years. According to the story Madoff told others, in 1960, at age 22, he took $5000 earned from his summer job as a Long Island lifeguard and started his own investment firm. His brother Peter joined him in 1970 in what had become a booming business with an impressive list of clients. Madoff's firm grew famous for its reliable annual returns of 10% or more; he served as president of the board of directors of the NASDAQ stock exchange, and he and his wife Ruth were popular socialites in New York and Florida, where they were members of the exclusive Palm Beach Country Club. But it was all too good to be true. On 11 December 2008, FBI agents arrested Madoff at his Manhattan apartment, and the Securities and Exchange Commission said he was charged with "massive fraud" and running a "multi-billion dollar Ponzi scheme." Madoff reportedly admitted to investigators that he had lost $50 billion of investors' cash. Madoff pled guilty to 11 felony counts on 12 March 2009, and was was sentenced to 150 years in prison (the maximum) on 29 June 2009.