If a review of your net worth suggests that something needs to be done to improve your financial situation, the best way to understand the problem is to compare what you earn to what you spend. This is called a cash flow analysis. It gets to the basic question of how much of your income is spent on debt service, consumption, and savings. (more…)

In light of the present liquidity crisis and credit issues, debt help is something that everybody seems to be in need of. There are many debt solutions that are being offered to deal with the prevailing problems. One of these is the Individual Voluntary Agreement which is one of the alternatives to bankruptcy. (more…)

Credit cards have kind of a bad rep in certain circles these days. It seems you’re always hearing from one person or another all about how evil they are - how they do nothing but drive people into debt and give them more to worry about while the credit card company makes a bundle off of interest, late fees, and surcharges. However, for smart spenders who are responsible with credit, nothing could be further from the truth. (more…)

In contrast to residential or independent financial services, commercial financial services focus on serving those who are in private companies, government agencies and non-profit organizations. There are many different types of commercial financial services available, and if you’re a new business owner you may feel overwhelmed by all of the options. (more…)

One of the first principles of frugal living is to live under your means. If followed this principle can be a foundation on which to build other principles. The problem is that most people are not sure how to actually do it, they need a specific plan.

To achieve this goal a family or individual can use the 70/30 Rule as their plan. The 70/30 Rule (more…)

Are you constantly getting turned down for loans because of your low FICO score? How are some people constantly increasing their credit score while others are always stuck with a score in the low 600s ? People with high credit scores understand the credit borrowing system and know the ins and outs of how to get their scores higher. Now lets take a look at how they do it and how you can also do it. (more…)

Raising your credit score can often seem like a truly impossible task. I mean in order to get anything these days you need to have a decent credit score. Even some jobs now run your credit to see how responsible of a person you are before extending a job offer to you. Sometimes the hardest thing to learn is how to actually raise your credit score so that you will be able to get a loan or get approved for anything credit based. I’m here to tell you it’s not all that difficult, (more…)

Working as a Real Estate agent I noticed that most people who wanted to buy a house were really not ready to do so. Almost always (with few exceptions) they expected the agent to do everything for them. What they didn’t understand was that being the biggest investment of their lives, they needed to be more in control of the process instead of relying on other people to do all the work for them.

Over the years I realized that there were 5 mistakes that most buyers were making when purchasing a house. (more…)

There are many ways to save money when you are getting your groceries from an online grocery store. You will be able to save more money by shopping online and following a few tips that will come in handy. Shopping at online grocery stores will enable you the convenience that you require while allowing you more time to do other things in your life that was formerly taken up with grocery shopping. (more…)

Money on the sidelines

Many investors tend to follow a peculiar habit of having most of their money in equities when markets are near top conditions, but having little exposure when markets are at their lows. With the S&P 500 having declined substantially in 2008, there was a huge amount of money waiting on the sidelines. As at 26 November 2008, the U.S. Money Market Fund was increased to US$3.7 trillion, which amounts to 35% of the total U.S. market capitalization. It have since reduced to about 30% today resulting in a sudden surge in worldwide indices and equity prices recently. (more…)