Associate of Business, Life and Rich Chaser » Finance

Financial Bad Habits

admin — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 05:30:23 +0000

It is easy to get into bad habits with financial matters. Few people have enough money to simply buy what they want without a thought. Most people have to plan their purchases and stay vigilant to keep themselves solvent.

Many people have bad habits of getting too far in debt with credit cards. The cards are easy to get. You can get a handful of Visas and Master Cards, an American Express Card, a Discovery Card, and several cards from retail stores without much effort. You do not have to have much income to get this many cards, either.

None of the card companies seem to consider that you might have to pay payments to the other cards. You may think you have all these cards just for emergencies. However, if you get into bad habits with them, you can end up spending them to their limits. You may reach a point where you cannot even make the minimum monthly payments.

You might be tempted to borrow money from relatives at a time like this, but that would be just another of type of bad habits. Relatives may want to help you for a time. They may allow you to get into the bad habit of going to them each time you need money. Yet, there will come a day when the money will run out, or the situation will get old. The relative will not only discontinue the loans. They might stop speaking to you as well.

When it comes to friends, both borrowing and lending money are bad habits. It puts a strain on the relationship that many friends cannot handle. One friend might forget how much was borrowed. Yet, there may be animosity if a written contract is suggested. You can rarely win when you get into this bad habit.

Many people get into trouble financially because the have the bad habit of not sitting down to make a budget. They have a general idea of where the money should go. They may think they have it all in their brains. It never quite comes together, though, unless you put it on paper (or on a spreadsheet on a computer). Only then will you know you have everything included.

Most utility companies have a certain grace period before they will cut off service. Some people count on this grace period and get into bad habits when it comes to paying their utility bills. If you do this you put yourself in jeopardy of losing your lights or water. You also destroy your credit rating.

Some financial bad habits have to do with the way people manage their checking accounts. One thing people often do is to throw away paperwork they get when making transactions. Of course, there is a time to throw it away. Yet, until it is recorded into your account, you need to keep deposit, ATM, and debit slips to verify that the correct amount was taken out.

Some people even have the bad habits of not reconciling their checking accounts. If they want to do internet banking with a software program like Microsoft Money or Quicken, they can make it very easy on themselves. It is important to be sure that your account has in it what you think it should. For one thing, there is no better way to catch fraud. Taking charge of your money habits can make your life less stressful and more productive.

Lease Financing

admin — Thu, 20 May 2010 05:30:23 +0000

For auto-consumers, crunching the numbers is one of the most difficult and
confusing aspects of leasing.
Take the finance charge on a lease for instance. Most people just don’t
understand how this is calculated on capitalised cost AND residual value
instead of just the capitalised cost. For most, it seems plainly obvious,
just as is the case when purchasing, that a charge should be levied on the
capitalised cost of the vehicle.

Well, no quite! When you lease a car, you’re only using the car over a
specified period of time with the option of buying the car. The residual
value represents the “loan balance” at the end of the lease. If you add it
to the capitalized cost and divide by two, you’ll get the average
capitalized cost outstanding over the lease term. Let us suppose you’re
leasing a car with a capitalized cost of $25,000 and a residual value of
$15,000. You average balance over the lease term, irrespective of how long
it is, is $20,000 ? the sum of the two divided by two -.
Using this sum works because the money factor is the annual interest rate
devided by 24, rather than 12. Continuing with our example and assuming an
interest rate of 6% APR:
$30,000 X (6 per cent / 24) = $75
(Capitalized cost + residual value) X (interest rate / 24) = Monthly
finance charge
This finance charge is added to the depreciation charge to calculate the
monthly payments on your lease.

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Knowing the importance of data

admin — Fri, 07 May 2010 11:32:10 +0000

If you want to find someone who you regard as important people in this world there are many facilities on the Internet that you can exploit to find data on individuals. You are interested to know the data about Bradley Reifler. We suggest you start looking for a social network that will help you to find the data of this man. You must be very lucky if you know the complete data of this man because this man is important people who have great influence in the field of economy and finance. Imagine if you can find out all his biography and friendship relationship with him then you will get a lot of knowledge in the field of economy and finance.

Moreover, you are an economics graduate student and you want to learn so much about him before you can become the motivation and inspiration for you to lead your career in the same field. Did you know that in the year 1995 – 2008, he was the Chief Executive in Pali Capital. This is an extraordinary achievement because while he served as a chief executive, the agency is progressing rapidly. Of course, not everyone experiences this kind of living history. Only people whom hard work and tremendous potential that can develop their careers and have increased from year to year.

How To Pay For Your Online Degree

admin — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 05:30:23 +0000

College can be expensive. Just because your degree is completed online does not make it cost any less. Education can be a budget busting proposition so here’s what I found can help!

Apply for student loans. Head to your schools’ counseling office or to your local bank. Look for low interest and long duration payment plans.

The government offers several loans to students going to school. The cap of the loan is generally set by the school you are attending. These are great low interest long term loans that you should seriously consider. Here’s the online info link: http://www.fafsa.ed.gov

All loans must be paid back. However, the terms are very reasonable. The government agencies will determine the type of loan you are offered through several factors, including your income level. Some students are offered subsidized loans, in which the government actually pays the interest of the loan for them. Others are offered unsubsidized loans. Their interest accrues while they are going to school. Generally speaking, government loans are the best type of loan to take out because they are designed to benefit the student and usually offer the most reasonable rates and terms.

There are also grants available. Apply for as many as you can. A grant is a gift of money. You do not need to pay it back. The government offers grants of money to students who fall in the lower brackets of income level. Usually students must maintain a minimum gpa in order to qualify for the grant. The required gpa depends upon how much money a student (or, more often, a student’s family) has. The minimum gpa varies, but is generally in the 2.0-3.0 range. Grants do not have to be paid back. Check out some info as the same site for loans: http://www.fafsa.ed.gov

Some students don’t qualify for government loans. Those who are not United States citizens, men who fail to register for the draft, and students enrolling in unapproved schools are not able to receive funding from government agencies. These students have the option of taking out private loans from individual banks. Bank loans require that the student has established sufficient creditor is co-signing with someone who has. These loans generally have a higher interest rate and less negotiable terms.

Make sure you also check out scholarships. A scholarship is an award based on academic performance, talent, or other factors. It may have certain requirements, but you do not need to pay it back. Students can learn about individual scholarships from their schools’ counseling office (or web site) or from online scholarship databases.

Apply for everything you can in order to see what you qualify for. There is not a grant or scholarship program you should overlook interms of pursuing financing for your education.

Annuity Lead Generation

admin — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 05:30:23 +0000

If you want to generate more annuity leads from your marketing efforts, here are five annuity lead generation tips you should consider:

Your Audience: Whether you are marketing on the Internet, using direct-mail, or creating display ads, marketing to the right audience is crucial. Even the best marketing piece or sales presentation is worthless if it’s presented to people who are not interested!

Do your research. Who is your target audience? What do they read? What are their fears? What are their desires? These are just some of the questions you should ask, and once you have the answer you are on your way to uncovering a hungry market.

Benefits: Although it’s important to know your products thoroughly, it’s equally as important to know the benefits of each feature. Agents are so focused on how an annuity works that they often lose sight of the benefits. It’s what drives your prospect to respond to your offer or sign the application.

A good exercise is to squeeze out as many benefits you can for each feature of your annuity, and write them down. This will not only help you in your annuity lead generation efforts, but it will help you sell more annuities as well.

Do you really want to market a product?: One thing is for certain, if you’re marketing a financial product like an annuity, you can expect small response rates. The reason for this is that your potential prospects have been hit with advertisement after advertisement on the advantages of owning products like annuities. As a result, your prospect is more likely to throw your marketing in the trash, or simply click delete.

An alternative to marketing annuities on the front end is to create what is called a “lead generator”. A lead generator comes in many forms, but the most common is an information product. In this case it would be a booklet, report, or something similar. Do not mistake this for a brochure. A lead generator, written properly, works more like a sophisticated sales letter.

Instead of advertising an annuity, you would advertise your lead generator. The key is to use the lead generator as a tool to capture your prospects contact information, and as a result, you build an extremely valuable list that most agents and financial advisors would crawl over broken glass to own.

Systemize: Whether you decide to market an annuity on the front end or use a lead generator, it’s important to systematize your marketing system. Studies show that it can take up to 17 contacts to make a sale. In other words, for every lead you generate, you should have a sequence of follow-ups ready to go.

Test: Another important area you should consider is testing small. Once you decide upon your market and how you want to generate leads, test a small ad or test a small number of names on a well selected list. If your response rates do not provide you with a decent return on investment, you haven’t wasted a lot of money.

Secondly, you can find out where you went wrong in your marketing system and fix it. Once you have a profitable annuity lead generation system put together, you can roll it out on a bigger scale.

A successful annuity lead generation program has the best chance of success when you target the right audience, uncover the benefits of your product, choose the right approach, follow-up regularly, and test small (to get the kinks out).

All About Personal Accounting

admin — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 05:30:23 +0000

If you have a checking account, of course you balance it periodically to account for any differences between what’s in your statement and what you wrote down for checks and deposits.

Many people do it once a month when their statement is mailed to them, but with the advent of online banking, you can do it daily if you’re the sort whose banking tends to get away from them.

You balance your checkbook to note any charges in your checking account that you haven’t recorded in your checkbook. Some of these can include ATM fees, overdraft fees, special transaction fees or low balance fees, if you’re required to keep a minimum balance in your account.

You also balance your checkbook to record any credits that you haven’t noted previously. They might include automatic deposits, or refunds or other electronic deposits. Your checking account might be an interest-bearing account and you want to record any interest that it’s earned.

You also need to discover if you’ve made any errors in your recordkeeping or if the bank has made any errors.

Another form of accounting that we all dread is the filing of annual federal income tax returns. Many people use a CPA to do their returns; others do it themselves. Most forms include the following items:

Income:
Any money you’ve earned from working or owning assets, unless there are specific exemptions from income tax.

Personal Exemptions:
This is a certain amount of income that is excused from tax.

Standard Deduction:
Some personal expenditures or business expenses can be deducted from your income to reduce the taxable amount of income. These expenses include items such as interest paid on your home mortgage, charitable contributions and property taxes.

Taxable Income:
This is the balance of income that’s subject to taxes after personal exemptions and deductions are factored in.

All About Revenue and Receivables

admin — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 05:30:23 +0000

In most businesses, what drives the balance sheet are sales and expenses. In other words, they cause the assets and liabilities in a business.

One of the more complicated accounting items are the accounts receivable.

As a hypothetical situation, imagine a business that offers all its customers a 30-day credit period, which is fairly common in transactions between businesses, (not transactions between a business and individual consumers).

An accounts receivable asset shows how much money customers who bought products on credit still owe the business. It’s a promise of case that the business will receive.

Basically, accounts receivable is the amount of uncollected sales revenue at the end of the accounting period. Cash does not increase until the business actually collects this money from its business customers.

However, the amount of money in accounts receivable is included in the total sales revenue for that same period. The business did make the sales, even if it hasn’t acquired all the money from the sales yet. Sales revenue, then isn’t equal to the amount of cash that the business accumulated.

To get actual cash flow, the accountant must subtract the amount of credit sales not collected from the sales revenue in cash. Then add in the amount of cash that was collected for the credit sales that were made in the preceding reporting period. If the amount of credit sales a business made during the reporting period is greater than what was collected from customers, then the accounts receivable account increased over the period and the business has to subtract from net income that difference.

If the amount they collected during the reporting period is greater than the credit sales made, then the accounts receivable decreased over the reporting period, and the accountant needs to add to net income that difference between the receivables at the beginning of the reporting period and the receivables at the end of the same period.

Annuity Basics

admin — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 05:30:23 +0000

Annuities can be very good things for some of us and a disaster for those of us who have not been made aware of the pitfalls and traps that in turn can easily befall them.
Since most people have or are going to look into annuities as a retirement or and an investment vehicle, make sure it fits into today’s needs and parameters. It has to be right for the times we are in and it needs to be periodically revaluated for tomorrow’s world.

Precautions to be taken when buying annuities:

1. One should not Buy Annuities With Long Surrender Periods:

People are talked into buying an annuity that locks up their money for an excessive period of time with a surrender period that is longer than another comparable annuity with similar interest rates.

2. Do not fall for First Year Bonus Interest Rates:

Some annuity companies offer you a ‘bonus’ or ‘bonus interest rate’ on your first year deposit into an annuity.

3. Understand exclusion rations and the value of a partial 1035 exchange.

This is a rather complicated subject because there are enormous variables in determining how to properly structure your annuity contract from day one so as to maximize the taxable exclusion ratios when and if you decide to take an annuitization income from your annuities in the future.

4. Do not use small companies with questionable financial ratings

An annuity by definition is a contract guaranteed by an insurance company. Annuity consumers sometimes forget this and buy and annuity without factoring the claims paying ability of the insuring company. This does not only apply to the questions of solvency or bankruptcy but to the more subtle effect it might have ones contract. If an annuity company has financial trouble it most likely will not go bankrupt (even though it is a possibility) because of the various government regulatory groups that monitor annuity companies. But what can happen is the annuity company will lower the rates at which it credits interest to your account in order to make up its losses in other areas of its business.

5. Know the guaranteed cover per person per insurance company

One needs to know if an insurance company goes broke what is the guaranteed cover per person per insurance company is available .One should not invest more than that in the fixed or guaranteed annuities and the variable annuities are not covered. Because if they broke then one may get stuck or spread the amount between different insurance companies.

6. Consider the shortest penalty free surrender date
The next thing you have to consider is getting the shortest possible penalty free surrender date term as possible so long as the interest rate is better than any CD.

Lastly and most importantly get the best professional help, one who will always tell you “like it is” even if its sometimes hard to listen too and even harder sometimes to act upon.

Money- The Paradox Of Money

admin — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 05:30:23 +0000

Money is probably the most commonly word used around the world. Money, without which lot many things cannot be done. If one has no money, one will have trouble even feeding oneself, leave aside shelter etc. What should be our attitude towards money? How much money should we accumulate and how much should we give away. How many morals and principals can be broken to get more money? And why should we earn more money than absolutely essential? There are many questions about money that come in to mind. Because since ages its money and power that has motivated human beings.

For few of us power matters more than money. And paradoxically money always brings power with it. But power may or may not bring in money. For example if you are the most important person of your country but highly principled, you will have total power but very little money. On the other hand some corrupt dictators have accumulated money beyond any imagination.

For few of us there are other pursuits than money and power. A good scientist gets more excitement with his inventions than any amount of money or power. For each of us there is a different motivator. Money seems to be one of the most common motivator. Cutting costs, raising prices and making more profits, this is the mantra of most of the industries and enterprises. Stock market has attracted people since long only because of the probability of making quick money. Why should lotteries become popular? Should not we depend upon our hard earned money? But lottery tickets are bought around the world. Buyers hope that they may get lucky and earn more money than they could otherwise on a single day. Gambling of all types is again driven by money as the only factor. We can list as many activities as we wish that are driven by attraction for money.

Does money and more money and much more money than others give more peace of mind? Does it give more happiness or more contented life? The answer is not yes in most of the cases. Rather more money brings in more problems. Where to invest? Which bank to choose? What about those who are always requesting for donations and loans? How to keep them away? And what to do with money after one has met all the needs? Buy a still bigger mansion or holiday all the year or begin collecting antiques?

Money. If you have less, you want more and if you have more you don’t know what to do? That is the paradox of money.

Playing & Winning The Financial Aid Game

admin — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 05:30:23 +0000

OK, you don’t have a 4.0 GPA, you’re not the senior class president, you can’t throw a football fifty yards, and your SAT scores aren’t generating letters or phone calls from Harvard, Yale or Princeton. So, you’ll never qualify for a college scholarship, right?

Not necessarily! There are lots of scholarships, and other kinds of financial aid for which you might qualify. Some colleges may offer you academic grants with a GPA of 3.0 and SAT scores of 1000. Ashland University offers scholarships to twins. Many church affiliated colleges offer grants to students who are members of their religious denomination. And that’s just the beginning.

If you are the son or daughter of a military veteran, if either of your parents work for a major corporation, if your mother or father is a member of a fraternal or civic organization, or if you are preparing for a career in a particular profession, there may be substantial scholarships for which you can apply, even if you’re not a top student or student leader.

Are you good at writing essays? If you are, your writing skills may be the ticket to a scholarship. There is even a scholarship for students who agree to abstain from using tobacco and alcohol while in college.

You may even qualify for a scholarship because of where you live, your last name, your ethnic heritage or race, or a disease or handicapping condition you may have. Get the idea yet? There are all kinds of scholarships, grants, and financial aid programs out there. Some require economic need or have other restrictions, others do not.

You can search through hundreds of thousands of possible scholarships (free!) in more than twenty different data bases. While you’re there, you can sign up for a free email newsletter with articles on college admission, scholarship and financial aid programs, college survival tips, and income opportunities for college students. At another site you’ll find scholarships given by individual college to all enrolled students meeting the listed criteria. Student-athletes may visit one good site to find the information needed to secure an athletic scholarship (or an opportunity to compete in a Division III or other non-scholarship program).

Don’t forget your school counselor, as he or she can be a great source of information about local scholarship sources. In fact, most high school guidance offices maintain a list of locally based scholarships. Parents and students would be well advised to explore the range of scholarships for which they may qualify as early as the ninth or tenth grade so they can plan to meet the requirements of as many as possible.

You should be aware that many private colleges offer substantial scholarships and grants in order to be more competitive with lower cost public institutions and/or attract students who might otherwise enroll elsewhere. These monies are often offered to students with very little or no demonstrated financial need. In fact, many private colleges frequently “rebate” 30%-35% (or more) of their tuition revenue in the form of institutional financial aid. When these funds are factored in, private colleges may ultimately be little or no more expensive for some students to attend than public colleges and universities with lower published fees.

If you can demonstrate financial need, as established by your answers on the FAFSA form at http://fafsa.ed.gov , you may want to apply to at least a few colleges which meet 100% of demonstrated financial need and do so with a reasonable proportion of gift aid to self-help aid (loans and/or work-study funds). Take note that although some relatively small number of colleges will meet the full need of all enrolled students, many more will be far more likely to meet or nearly meet the full need of stronger students.

To position yourself well to be a competitive candidate for scholarships, students should take the most challenging classes available, work diligently to learn as much as possible (not just to get grades), and get involved in co-curricular, community, charitable and/or public service activities. Here’s a good rule of thumb for all students; the more you have to offer the more you’re likely to be offered.

Remember three words – research, research, and research. The more time you spend investigating scholarship opportunities, the more likely you are to find scholarships for which you may be eligible.

Don’t let anyone discourage you. There are lots of people “out there,” including some educators, who are inadvertently spreading their serious misconceptions about who may qualify for financial aid and what is required to do so. Most important of all, do not fail to investigate or apply to a college you like because you think it is too expensive. That is one of the most common and worst mistakes a family can make. Remember, you never know what kinds of scholarships and/or financial aid you might receive.

However, just like you should have “fall back” or “safety” colleges in case you are not admitted to your first choice institutions, you should choose and apply to colleges that will be affordable if you do not receive the financial assistance for which you hope.

Obvious as it may be, I feel obligated to remind you to pay attention to details and deadlines when applying for scholarships because so many students fail to do so. I could hardly believe it when an independent educational counselor who probably earns in the neighborhood of $1,000 for helping a student identify and gain admission to appropriate colleges asked (on an email list serve) how many words above the limit one of her counsulees could go on his college application essay. Don’t make the mistake that she did by assuming there will be no penalty if you “come close” to the requirements or are “only a few days beyond the deadline”. If you don’t pay attention, be prepared to pay for your mistakes. But, do it right and you have a great chance of getting some scholarship and or financial aid help. Good luck.

Associate of Business, Life and Rich Chaser » Finance

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