2009 May | nil2million.com

Posted by Nash

Of all the no-no’s for credit card – this is the biggest no-no of all. If you check out the internet, you’ll find that most people when they talk about the don’ts about credit card – this topic would normally be high on the list.

You should never pay the minimum amount, but instead you should pay more than that. Would be best if you settle in full every month.

Why we shouldn’t pay the minimum amount? The number one reason is because the interest rate charged for credit cards is high. And if you pay only the minimum amount, it will take a long time to settle your debt AND you’ll end up paying a bomb on the total interest charge.

I’ve put up a table of values below and explanation for it. It can get quite technical – but if you need more info, please feel free to ask me in the “comments” section of this post.

Ok, here we go.

For example, let’s say there’s this guy name Mike who have 10,000 dollars of credit card debt. Let’s assume that the credit card interest is 15% per annum. and his monthly payment must at least be 50 dollars.

This example is typical to a lot of credit card schemes out there.

He can choose to pay a minimum amount of 2%, 5%, 10%, 20%, 50% and 100% of his credit card debt balance every month.

For example, if he chooses 2%, his first payment is 200 dollars (=10,000 x 2%). If 5%, his first payment is 500 dollars (=10,000 x 5%)

No	% of Payment Over Current Debt	Time Needed to Clear Off Debt	Total Amount Paid	Total Interest Paid	Total Interest Paid / Original Debt Amount
1	2%	22 years	23,993	13,993	140%
2	5%	7 years	13,158	3,158	32%
3	10%	3 years 8 mths	11,395	1,395	14%
4	20%	1 year 11 mths	10,660	660	7%
5	50%	9 mths	10,256	256	3%
6	100%	1 mth	10,125	125	1%

WHAT DOES ALL THIS MEAN?

Ok, don’t panic.

Let’s look at no 1. Mike has 10,000 in credit card debt and he will be paying 2% of his outstanding debt every month. It will take him 22 years (!) to clear off the debt. In paying his debt, he would have paid 13,993 dollars in interest, which is 140% of his original loan. The interest for his debt is greater than the original debt itself!

So on and so forth for No 2 to No 6.

Compare No 1 with No 3. The only difference is that instead of paying 2% of total debt every month, Mike will pay 10% of total debt. But look at the the time he needs to settle his debt – 22 years as compared 3 years 8 months! There’s also a big difference in the interest charged – from 13,993 dollars to 1,395 dollars.

What the table tries to show is – always try to pay more and try your best to NOT pay the minimum. As there is BIG difference in how long it takes to settle the debt and the total interest charged.

So, the moral of the story is - “the more I pay, the more I save – time & money”

If you want to know more, please feel free to ask in the comments section. I’ll be happy to help

Collection of Articles On Personal Finance (Carnivals):

…

Thanks for visiting nil2million.com. If you enjoyed this post, you can get a free regular updates on the RSS Feed, or you can have us delivered future posts directly to your email.

Don’t worry, we don’t like spam too. So we won’t send those to you and we won’t share your email with others too.

…

Categories : Credit Card, Personal finance

Posted by Nash

Source: www.mint.com

Credit to: GE Miller

If you’re in US, this bill may have an effect on you.

Last Friday, President Obama is expected to sign the “Credit Cardholders Bill of Rights”.

How would this effect you?

If you’re a student:

For a student that doesn’t have a co-signer, the maximum amount of credit extended will be 20% of your annual gross income or 500 dollars. The total amount of credit for you will be limited to 30% of your annual gross income. If you have no proof of annual income, you can’t get a credit card.

I think it’s good to limit credit to students as students can sometimes develop bad financial habit like living on debts. This habit if developed during student years can continue to the working life.

For minors:

For those under age of 21, parents or another responsible adult will need to sign on taking responsibility for the debt, unless if the minor can prove that he can pay off the debt on his own. No credit card for those under age of 18, unless the parents or guardians are the primary account holder.

Another good ruling, to prevent minors to develop bad financial habit.

For everyone:

Changes are made on:

Existing balance
Payment
Bill receipt
Terms disclosure
Credit scores
Fees – payment fees, double billing fees, interest fees, over-limit fees
Rate increase limitation – promotional rates, new accounts, rate changes and gift cards

For more information – please refer to the published article here.

Categories : Links, Personal finance

Posted by Nash

Ever heard of the saying – nothing comes for free? Well, to be honest, there’s nothing wrong about free sites, but if what you want is to make money, free sites are not the best place for it.

Online paid survey is a popular choice to make money online. It’s easy, fast and you can get some money out of it by having as little as a few hours of work.

When something is popular, you should be careful of the scams.

So what can scam do to you? Well, they can ask you to join in their program which you got to pay some money, and poof! nothing happens – except you losing your money. Some scammers also use your details to sell it to marketers and you’ll end up having spam emails to your mailbox, which everyone just hates that.

So, before you join into any of the online paid survey here are some tips for you to avoid being scammed:

Tip No 1: Check the support from the paid survey website

This is one useful test to do. In the “contact us” from the website, check out the email or phone number that you can contact them. You can post a simple question to the email and see how fast they respond and how is the quality of the respond. If they don’t respond at all then you should be worried.

What happens if they don’t even have a “contact us” page? Then you really should be worried.

Tip No 2: If it’s too good to be true, then it probably is

Ever get into those websites that promises you to earn thousands per month doing online survey? And you’re telling yourself are they for real? Well, most of the time they probably are. As online surveys gives small pay outs when they are completed usually in the tens of dollars – now how many surveys can you do to actually get thousands of dollars?

Tip No 3: Check out the company profile

A genuine paid survey profile normally have a good write up on the profile. Not just a one-liner. And they would also mention how many years they’ve been around. This is important – coz you don’t want to end up getting involved in a fly-by-night kinda websites.

Tip No 4: Be careful of free sites

Ever heard of the saying – nothing comes for free? Well, to be honest, there’s nothing wrong about free sites, but if what you want is to make money, free sites are not the best place for it. You may get into mystery shopping or something like that but you don’t normally get good money from it.

Tip No 5: Avoid mystery shopping

As I mentioned in Tip No 4, mystery shopping is just what it is – a mystery gift or a shopping voucher. Why is it called mystery? Coz if you know what it is upfront, you probably won’t be interested. So, if you got into a website that promises more mystery gifts than real money, you should give that website a skip.

Tip No 6: Visit forums on scam to check out the paid survey website.

Forums on scam such as www.scam.com provide a lot of reviews on websites and story from people on how they got scammed. Check out the paid survey website on these forum. If something bad comes out from it, then avoid the website.

Tip No 7: Look for reviews

Some genuine paid survey website will have good independent reviews about them. What you shouldn’t do is to read the review directly from the paid survey website – coz it can just be another marketing gimmick. Just search at google and type “<website name> review” and you might get something from the search.

Tip No 8: Where is the location of the company?

Sometimes the scam website gives a big list of the companies that wants you to do the survey. Just make a random check on these companies on whether they actually exist and whether they are really a big companies, or just small companies. Remember, normally the big company pays you money for the survey. Small companies give you mystery gift (in which you probably wont like or use anyway).

Tip No 9: Be careful of pop ups

Try to avoid paid survey websites that suddenly jumps to you out of nowhere – a typical pop-up kinda thing. That’s because most pop-ups can lead to scams. Some are good no doubt – but it’s rare.

Tip No 10: Trust your instinct

After reading and looking and checking out the paid survey website – how do you feel about it? Is the website something you are comfortable with? Coz if you get into their program, you’ll be using the website for a lot of times. If you gut feeling tells you something can be wrong – maybe it’s time to take a step back and think again. After all, you gotta trust your gut feelings.

What next?

There are some paid survey websites that you can try below. I’ve checked it out and it looks ok to me.

I found a cool Paid Survey video on YouTube for you to check it out:

Categories : Make money online, Make money tips, Online Paid Surveys

Posted by Nash

Of course, some shops come with a net price and however good you are, you just can’t get a bargain for it. I mean, have you ever tried to bargain at McDonald’s to get a cheaper Big Mac?

Something light & easy for you to read

Everywhere you go people are talking about recession. I thought the economy is getting better, but now they say that it may turn to the worse. Is the economy getting better or not? I don’t know. I don’t think anyone really knows.

Whether the economy is getting better or not, it’s always good to be prepared. And a good way to do that is to trim down your monthly expenses.

Tip no 1: Make a budget

I mean, really sit down and make a budget. Not something that you promise to remember, but something that you’ve actually written down or make some calculation for it. Making a budget is like having a new year resolution. If you don’t write it down, you may end up not doing it.

I’ve uploaded a Monthly Budget Template for Microsoft Excel. Please feel free to check it out.

Tip No 2: Make your own cup of coffee

Now, this is quite true for those working in the city. It’s very easy for us to go to the nearest Starbucks or Cafe Nero and get a good cup of cafe latte. Can’t blame you coz it tastes really yummy. I was guilty of that too. Until I found out that it’s draining my money away, and that money can be used for savings or to pay for my debt.

I make my own coffee now. Got a nice coffeemaker that does the job. Oh, it doesn’t taste as yummy as the cafe latte from Starbucks, but I’ll survive.

Tip No 3: Borrow movies (or if you’re in Malaysia, you know what to do)

The trip to the cinema can have a more hidden cost than just your movie ticket and popcorns. Well, you need to put in oil and parking fees and maybe a stroll to the mall and stuff. Would be a lot cheaper if you borrow your movies.

Tip No 4: Cut down on your paid subscriptions

Your pay-per-view or satellite channel network can cost a lot. Do you really need to have 200+ channels? Do you actually have the time to watch all that? Of course if you’re a guy, sports channel is a must. Or if you’re a gal – you don’t wanna miss your Oprah shows. But I’m sure you can cut down on the animal planet channel?

Tip No 5: Cut down or quite smoking

This is good for two reason. You can save money from it and being able to live longer is always a good thing yes? I’ve read somewhere before and it was mentioned that if you sum up all the money used for smoking for 20 years is enough for you to buy a car! (well, I’m not too sure whether it’s a big car or a run-down car, but you got the message).

Ok, ok, no more about smoking. I’m not nagging, I’m just being concern

Tip No 6: Eat your meals at home

This is another one that can trim down your expense. Eating out can actually put a big hole to your pocket. Well, assuming that you can cook (or you can have someone to cook for you) and it taste good, that can really save some money

Tip No 7: Bargain!

Always try to bargain before you want to buy something. Sometimes the shop owner would give you that. Well, it doesn’t hurt to try right? Of course, some shops come with a net price and however good you are, you just can’t get a bargain for it. I mean, have you ever tried to bargain at McDonald’s to get a cheaper Big Mac?

To summarize. If you look at it and try to think of it, there will always be some ways for you to trim down your expenses. At the end of the day, it’s whether we would like to do it and whether we can create that habit in us.

All the best!

Categories : Personal finance

Posted by Nash

You want to make money online the simplest way? Then this is for you.

This is one of my earliest way on making money online and I’m still doing it from time to time. Paid Surveys. Everyone can do it. Undergrads, school-leavers, full-time moms – everyone.

Well, I got to warn you early – it’s not gonna make you a rich. You won’t be getting crazy money, but you’ll get some money. I haven’t seen anyone making a career out of it just yet, so don’t quit your job just yet!

I’ve seen many students do this and they got some money for them to enjoy over the weekend and stuff. And I’ve also seen full-time moms who makes some income from this.

Paid survey is very useful for someone who wants to make some money from the net, but don’t want to spend time to learn the other more complicated way to make money such as blogging or affiliate/online marketing. You need time to get the skills to do those things but if you’re good at it, you can make crazy money.

I’ve found a paid surveys video from YouTube for you to check out:

Some websites for paid surveys to get you started:

To participate in a poll on Online Paid Survey, please click here

So, click on one of the links above and start making money!

All the best!

Categories : Make money online, Make money tips, Online Paid Surveys

Posted by Nash

Goals determine what you’re going to be

Julius Erving

What is a financial goal?

It’s just something that you wanna get in the future and for you to have it, you have to do something about it today.

For example, you wanna get that red, flashing beaming car? Or you wanna go to a romantic holiday in Paris with your loved one? Or, the all-time popular reason – to save money for your children’s education or to set enough money for your retirement. Whatever you want that involves having some money for you to use in the future – that’s a financial goal.

Yup. Got it. Great!

So, what do you need to do now?

No.1. Define your financial goals

This is a no-brainer, but I still have to state it in. You can only know what exactlyyou need to do only if you sit down, think about it and put it down on a paper (or your computer, if you’re the techie type). Don’t need to write a research report about it. Just a simple what-you-want would do.

Try to make it clear and put some numbers with it – I want to have 5,000 dollars by end of this year coz I’m really dying to go to Paris – is much better than – I want some money coz I wanna go to a holiday at the end of the year. The clearer your goals are, the more motivated you’ll be at achieving it.

No. 2. Be realistic in defining your financial aim

Yup. This is quite important. If you set your financial objective is to be a millionaire in one-year’s time, but looking into your income now, it may take you 20 years to achieve it, then you’ll know that it’s unrealistic. Sure, you can hit a lottery, but that’s wishful thinking and not planning.

The bad thing about setting a target too high is that you’ll have that nagging feeling in you that tells you it’s impossible and pretty soon that feeling will demotivate you. And when you don’t get it – you’ll get I-told-you-so straight to the face. That’ll be the last time that you set up a financial goal.

Instead, try something that you feel that you have a chance to achieve. Try not to make it too easy, so that you’re out of your comfort zone and is doing more than usual.

3. How long will you take to complete your financial goal?

Some financial targets are short. For example, you wanna keep enough money so that you can buy a new shirt at the end of the month. Some are long – you wanna keep some money from now until you retire so that you can have enough money for your retirement.

Whatever your goal is, you need to figure out how long you will take and to have a deadline for it. Now this is super-important. If you don’t put a deadline – you’ll just drift away and chances are you won’t achieve what you want.

Setting Financial Goals

Courtesy of Blomberg: Your Money

4. Get the financial numbers out

This is the hard part. For example - how much do you need to save every month so that you’ll get five thousand dollars by the end of the month. Or let’s make it harder (!!) – how much you need to save every month so that when you retire, you can spend a thousand dollars every month for the rest of your life.

There’s a monthly budget template for Microsoft Excel for you to use - Personal Monthly Budget

There are other calculators and templates for you to use - please click Calculators & Templates

5. Be prepared to make adjustments to your financial goal

Well, we don’t know the future. For now, saving one thousand every month may be enough to set for your retirement, but in the future, who knows, you might need more than that. Or, Paris isn’t a place you wanna go anymore (coz you just broke up and you’re not having that romantic feeling anymore) but instead you just wanna let loose and go crazy in Las Vegas. Whatever it is, just make the changes as you go along.

To sum it up, financial goals are something that you can set and by following the simple steps above, it can definitely be achieved by you!

Collection of Articles (Carnivals) on personal finance:

…

Thanks for visiting nil2million.com. If you enjoyed this post, you can get a free regular updates on the RSS Feed, or you can have us delivered future posts directly to your email.

Don’t worry, we don’t like spam too. So we won’t send those to you and we won’t share your email with others too.

…

Categories : Make money tips, Personal finance, retirement

Posted by Nash

Everyone can get a little sloppy with cash and it’s smart to notice. But what’s squeezing you is the big stuff you ladle onto your credit cards.

~ Jane Bryan Quinn

Credit card debts! ARGHH! Are you stuck in this financial mess? Don’t worry, you’re not alone. It’s a very big group out there. This is one of the low-down in personal finance and requires smart debt management methods.

My friends and I, we discussed a lot about it. And we agreed on one thing – we need to GET OUT of this mess. It’s like being in the quicksand you know. If you don’t do anything, it’ll sink you dead. If you try to do something, you just might get out of it.

So, what to do? Well my friend, please read on.

CAUTION: The discussion below can get technical and it may be a bit dry. So, if you wanna get a cup of coffee to zest you up before you read on, then, by all means, please do so.

Step 1 - Reduce your credit card debts using the snowball effect

Huh? Don’t worry, it’s the term we’re gonna use for this method. Ever watch a cartoon show where a small snowball is thrown from the top of the hill and it rolls down and gets bigger and ended up to a size of a house? It’s the same principle.

First thing to do - make a budget. List down all the income you’re getting for the month and what you have to spend it on. It can be tough, but trust me, it’s worth it.

Next - from the list of your expenses, check out the things you can live without, and things you can cut on. For example, fewer trips to the mall or the cinema. I’m sorry, you gotta make some lifestyle adjustment here.

Now, after doing that budget and trimming down your expenses. You should get some balance at the end of the month. You should use this balance to pay to your credit card with the highest interest. Why pay the credit card with the highest interest? Coz it’s the one that is burning up the largest hole in your pocket.

In the next month, you should do the same. Use the balance and keep on paying that credit card until the debt is finished and then move to the next credit card.

Now, here’s the hard part of this method - the balance that you use to pay for the current month cannot be less than the previous month (that’s why it’s called the snowball effect).

And the next hard part is - discipline. This is where a lot of people fail. But it won’t be you. Why? Coz trust me, there are people who can do it and got their credit card mess sorted out. So if they can do it, so can you.

Step 2 - Get a personal loan to pay off your credit card debts

Ever heard fight fire with fire? Well, this is what it’s all about. However, to make it work, you need to get a personal loan with a lower interest rate than your credit card’s interest rate. If you dont know what is your credit card interest rate, give your bank a call and they’ll tell you.

If your credit card interest rate is 18% per year (and it’s quite common), you should take a personal loan with a lower interest than that (I checked the market and found out that the personal loan interest rate is about 10% per year).

Sum up all your credit card debts, and take up a personal loan with that amount and settle all your credit card debts. In one swift move, you have eliminated all your credit card debts! And now, you just got to concentrate on one debt (the personal loan). If you do the math, the monthly amount that you pay for the personal loan will be less than the monthly amount that you pay for your credit cards.

CAUTION! Once you’ve settled your credit card debts - cut out all the cards! The worst thing that can happen is that you’ve taken a personal loan to settle your cards, only to get into the debt again. But now, you got a personal loan AND your credit cards to pay.

Step 3 – Talk to the bank (it’s a smart personal finance move)

I’m sure you’ll probably say “duh!” You’ll be surprised that many people don’t like to talk to the bank about their credit card problems. But trust me, banks are ever willing to help and they might come out with a plan to help you out. It’s a win-win situation for the bank. They want you to pay the money back so they’ll find a way to help you out. A person who is discipline at paying back to the bank is a great customer to the bank and they sure would like to keep him.

I’ve tried this many times when I was clearing off my debts and I always get a good response from the bank. Don’t shy away from the bank - talk to them and they’ll help you out.

Step 4 - Get help from the professional financial advisors

Well, personal finance isn’t a breeze for everyone. If you think you are drowning from your credit card debts - and you just can’t find a way to get out of it - then get professional help. I’m using the word “professional” here coz that’s where you can get helpful, tested and qualified advice.

Who are those professional ones? There are a lot of financial planners or support groups out there. Have a search in google and you’ll find a whole list of them.

To summarize - credit card debts is like being in a quicksand. You must do something to get out of it. At the very least, if you’ve read this post from finish to end then it’s a start.

Do you want another opinion? Got this smashing video from YouTube for you to check:

Credit card debt, bankruptcy & personal finance

by visionvictory.

Collection of Articles (Carnivals) on personal finance:

…

Thanks for visiting nil2million.com. If you enjoyed this post, you can get a free regular updates on the RSS Feed, or you can have us delivered future posts directly to your email.

Don’t worry, we don’t like spam too. So we won’t send those to you and we won’t share your email with others too.

…

Categories : Personal finance

Posted by Fareen

“Should I buy a new car…how about a house?” few friends had asked me this questions recently. With the ‘bargains’ appearing in the market now, it is worth considering. Why not? Buying at a lower price is a good practice. Are all cheap things good buys?

Why do some people become rich and stay rich? Granted, some are born with silver spoon, but there are others who rose from rags to riches. In the realm of personal finance, there must be a way on how to make money and conserve money like them.

We heard it all before, we have enough for our needs, not our wants. Before we do make that purchase decision maybe its worth considering what goes on before that. A prequel of questions if you may.

1. How much money do we really have?

Do we know what we have? Studies show that on the majority, assets tend to be overestimated. Liabilities understated. Do we know what we really have in our hand? Can we commit to what we want and not take it from previous commitments?

2. What if something happens and our lifestyle changes?

Where do we get our money from? Do we work? Are parents paying for our education? What if they are not there anymore, can our decision withstand their absence? Nobody wants the rug being pulled underneath their feet.

3. What is the real cost of what we have bought?

What does it take to really use what we had bought? if its a car, insurance, repairs and fuel should be added to the cost. For houses, the move-in cost, setting up costs, legals fees are among the things that add up before we can live or rent a house out. There should not be any hidden expenses to surprise us.

4. How much money should you have for your future and retirement?

Its no good to have the numbers in your head. Unless you are walking supercomputer (or an actuary) its good to put it down on a spreadsheet. Model the figures for the long term not few months of years. I have mine for 50 years. If 50 years is too long (most will be senile by then) - try 20 years. It does not have to be right the first time. I always refine it as I go along. Do calculate things like how much cash you have (free cash flow) and reserve to cover debt payments (debt service cover ratio) if you do have debts. It does not have to be totally right, whatever the future is, its good to think about the issue before it occurs. Its just good practice.

I had this best tip from my friend in university. I asked him how his family had done well, starting from humble beginnings. What was their secret ? “2 things” he said, “When people spend you save, when people save you spend“.

Collection of Articles (Carnivals) on personal finance:

…

Thanks for visiting nil2million.com. If you enjoyed this post, you can get a free regular updates on the RSS Feed, or you can have us delivered future posts directly to your email.

Don’t worry, we don’t like spam too. So we won’t send those to you and we won’t share your email with others too.

…

Categories : Make money tips, Personal finance

Posted by Nash

I didn’t know it’s that easy to make your 1st 1000 dollars from the net…

In one of the articles that I’ve read recently, I found out something amazing that most people don’t know on how easy it is to make money online!

Do you know that everyone got at least 1000 dollars worth of stuff lying in their home - just waiting to be sold??

Yeah right. Yes, right (really!). Take a look around your place now. I’m sure there’s an old vase that is counting days to the museum. Or, what about that must have CD that everyone wants to buy - except that it was 20 years ago when Michael Jackson was still doing the moonwalk? Better if you have Michael Jackson’s collectibles, as the price of those stuff just shot up in Ebay.

Collect all those things up, and yup, pretty much, it’s 1000 dollars worth of items waiting to cash in to your pocket.

Ok, so where can you sell it? Garage sale is one place. I’ve got some friends who does it every Sunday, and they make some good money to last one week to the next.

But of course, the best place to do it is here. Now. On the internet. Try ebay. You’ll be surprised at the results. Maybe, some people still find your old CD a cool item to get.

“That’s a good idea, but it’ll take too much of my time, and I don’t really trust doing these things through the internet” - I hear you say.

But if you can get pass through those thoughts, would that be something you can consider? After all, having an extra 1000 dollars in these trying times would be a good thing, yes?

Collection of Articles (Carnivals) on personal finance:

…

Thanks for visiting nil2million.com. If you enjoyed this post, you can get a free regular updates on the RSS Feed, or you can have us delivered future posts directly to your email.

Don’t worry, we don’t like spam too. So we won’t send those to you and we won’t share your email with others too.

…

Categories : Online auction

Posted by Nash

In building wealth or making an investment decision that will impact your personal finance, this is an important question to ask.

If your investment yields, say, 7% p.a., how long does it take for it to double up?

Before you run for a calculator and churn out the numbers - you can easily have a rough approximation to it by using the Rule of 72.

Simply divide 72 by the interest rate, and walla! you’ll have a close estimation on how long it takes to double up your investment.

In the example above, your investment will take about 10 years (72 divide by 7 (interest p.a.) to double up.

For those who wants the accurate answer (and those who still wants to run for the calculator), the accurate answer is 10.285. But it’s close enuf‘, yes?

This will be useful if you want a fast answer when you are checking and comparing different investment ideas or stocks to pick.

All the best!

Collection of Articles (Carnivals) on personal finance:

…

Thanks for visiting nil2million.com. If you enjoyed this post, you can get a free regular updates on the RSS Feed, or you can have us delivered future posts directly to your email.

Don’t worry, we don’t like spam too. So we won’t send those to you and we won’t share your email with others too.