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Where to grow your money

Knowing where to put your money has always been a sensitive topic. These turbulent times cause a lot of uncertainties to the point that most people would rather cave in to their comfort zones than make a risk in investing their money in a shoestring budget. Investing has always been about learning to make risks to gain bigger profits. Most often than not, investments that are high risk, have high returns while investments that are low risk, have low returns. On the other hand, some investments guarantee returns, others do not.

Investing is not for the faint-hearted. If you have the stomach for it, then proceed with the next steps. One of the first few things that you need to do is to determine your financial and personal goals. Is it a long-term or a short-term goal? When exactly do you need the money? Do you want a high return or a low return? How much risk are you willing to take? Once you are clear with your financial and personal objectives, the next step is to determine the type of investment you should take.

commodities and investments

Where to Invest
There are different types of investments that you can make to grow your money and to hopefully achieve your projected return. It is important that you know the pros and cons of each type before you plunge in. Here are the most common types of investments:

Stocks are also known as shares and cant be compared to forex market, because owning a stock allows you to share ownership of a company or allows you to own some part of the company. The more stocks you own, the more ownership you have. Investors who own stocks of a certain company gain profits through dividends. Dividends are basically the profits of the company that are divided among stock owners. So the more stocks you have, the more dividends you will receive if the company is profiting.

There are two types of stocks, the common stock and the preferred stock. Common stocks have higher risks and higher returns than preferred stocks. Common stocks provide the highest returns, but in cases of company bankruptcy or loss, common stock owners are the last one to receive money. The creditors, bondholders, and preferred shareholders will be the first ones to receive money when the company folds; on the other hand, the common stock shareholders come last. Preferred stocks do not have the same investment returns and rights as common stocks. Preferred stocks receive a fixed, guaranteed dividend all the time. If you are not so much of a risk taker, you can invest in preferred stocks.

Bonds are issued out by the government and corporations to those who would like to lend their money for a profit. Bonds, also known as securities, are said to be risk-free investments making them a low return investment in general.

Mutual Funds
When you invest in mutual funds, you allow commercial entities or other people to invest your money for you in various stock options. These commercial entities are normally financial experts and they basically collect money from various investors and individuals so that they could invest the money and gain profit from it. The returns that you will receive are shared on the basis of your individual contribution in the total sum. Mutual funds are known to be less risky compared with stock markets simply because you are sure your money is being invested by professionals or experts.

What is Forex Market?

Foreign Exchange market, also known as Forex Market, is the biggest and most liquid market in the world. It is basically a financial market where people trade currency or money to gain profits. Unlike bonds and stocks, your profits are not in the form of dividends, but in the form of money. For people who are looking for ways to make money, trading in forex market can be a good investment.

On other hand, trading in online forex market is a major decision. Due to the nature and scale of this market, trading in this market entails great deal of knowledge and experience. Forex market operates 7 days a week, 24-hours a day; it doesn’t stop for anybody. Unlike bonds and stocks, it doesn’t have a centralized location where you can do your trade. The whole market is electronically driven, which makes it accessible to individuals, companies, banks, etc., anytime, anywhere. Hence, it is considered as an Over-The-Counter (OTC) market.

The basic idea behind a forex market training course is to buy currency of one country and trade it or exchange it with another country’s currency. To gain a profit in this market, you have to buy a currency at a low exchange rate and sell it when its exchange rate hikes up. This sounds simple enough, but knowing what currency to buy, when to buy, and when to sell is the difficult and tricky part. It is a general fact that currencies don’t have fixed exchanged rates; in fact, they fluctuate all the time due to numerous reasons.

Forex trading

Before you start trading in the forex market, there are a couple of things that you should know:

1. Currencies are always traded in pairs. Currencies are normally represented by three letters: US Dollar (USD), Japanese Yen (JPY), Euro (EUR), etc. The four most common pairs exchanged in the market are Euro against US Dollar (EUR/USD), US Dollar against Japanese Yen (USD/JPY), British Pound against US Dollar (GBP/USD), and US Dollar against Swiss Franc (USD/CHF). These four pairs are known as the “blue chips” of the foreign market.

2. Learn to read the forex chart. You can’t thrive in the day forex market if you don’t know how to read a forex chart. A forex chart shows graphical representations of the currencies’ price movements over a specific period of time. This is a tool that you can use to help you determine future price movements of a particular currency so that you would know what to buy, when to buy, and when to sell. A forex chart also gives you an idea on how other people view the facts and how they’ve been reacting to it. On the other hand, it is not the only indicator of a currency’s future exchange rate.

3. You only need three things to get started. It’s very easy to join this market; you just need a high speed internet, a funded forex account, and a trading system.

Some pointers

In the forex market, you’ll tread through series of turbulent and dangerous waters. Since currencies fluctuate all the time, one minute you’re winning, the next minute you’re losing. This is a game of uncertainty; so if you don’t have the heart for it, then perhaps it is not for you. It is also important that you keep track of the news because current events in a country affect the country’s currency exchange rate. Watch out for disasters, economic downturns (e.g. high unemployment rates, financial crisis, etc.), government scenarios (e.g. political instabilities, elections, etc.), and so on and so forth since these are major indicators of a country’s current state.

Tips on money management Debt Reduction

Finding yourself in a financial mess is a frightening personal discovery. Normally, people don’t really realize that they are in such a jam until they’ve reached the breaking point. Whether you’re already at the breaking point or not, unfortunately shrugging it off or running away from it won’t make it go away. It actually takes a long time to get in debt, even years. Hence, getting out of debt can never be fast-tracked.

There are no short cuts in addressing such a problem and this is where money management debt reduction or debt consolidation loans comes in. Majority of the people who are in debt are the ones who don’t realize where they’ve gone wrong. They are the ones who spend their money impulsively without thinking of the repercussions of their spending habits to their financial commitments and other responsibilities. However, if you are in debt, don’t despair; the good thing is you’ve come to realize it which is the first step to solving such a problem. The first thing to do is to manage your money in such a way that it will reduce your debt and hopefully get out of debt as soon as possible.

Your Money Management Debt Reduction Plan
There are a couple of steps that you can do to reduce your debt. If you could take these steps religiously, then you could be off to a new and financially healthy life in the future.

1. Assess yourself.

The first step to money management debt is to face the music. Find out how much debt you really have. Once you already have a clear picture of the gravity of the situation, you will be more pumped up to do something about it. Of course, you have to find out where you’ve gone wrong and you can do this by looking at your spending habits for the past months and past years. Check out which of the expenses you made were not really necessary; your goal is to find out your biggest source of unnecessary expenses like cigarettes, dinner dates, gas, etc., so you could see if you could do something about them. One of the main reasons why people get into such financial problems is their spending habits so it’s very important that you take extra measures to correct your spending habits.

2. Create a monthly budget and mean it.
Having a budget is one thing, sticking to it is another. It’s very hard to stick to a budget, but it’s not impossible as long as you keep it realistic. Money management is basically about planning, monitoring, and controlling. When you do your budget, compute for your monthly income and your monthly fixed expenses like rent, food, travel allowance, etc. With this, you will see if you are really earning enough to cover all of your basic or fixed expenses. If not, then perhaps you should find other sources of income like doing freelance work, selling some of your stuff that you’re not using, or getting a second job. Don’t forget to count in your miscellaneous expenses. When computing for your miscellaneous expenses look back on your past buying behaviors and clarify within yourself which expenses you can do without. In doing this, be honest with yourself. Money management debt reduction in really is a lifestyle changer; the main thing to remember is to not spend more than what you are making.

Of course, don’t forget about your main goal when you make your budget and that is to reduce your debt. Factor in your loan or debt payment schedules per month to your budget so that you’re sure that you’re able to pay them on time and save yourself from the late finance charges and other fees.

3. Be a smart credit card holder.
If you have credit card loans or debts, what you can do is to learn more about your credit card services. Find out which credit cards have the lowest interest rates; some credit card offer 0% introductory rates for a certain period of time. One of the things that you can do is to transfer your outstanding balance from one credit card to another credit card that has lower interest rates. Make an effort to pay more than your minimum amount due because when you’re only paying the minimum amount due, realistically you’re not really paying for the capital that you used or your debt. Also, prioritize paying your credit cards that have the highest interest rates.

If you’re biggest culprit is your credit card, then perhaps you should consider not using your credit cards. At least until you’ve paid your outstanding balance fully and until you’re very sure that you can manage and control your credit card habits for good.

4. Be a smart saver.
Every month, make sure that you save a certain amount of money even if it is just small. If you’re having a hard time controlling yourself from spending the money that you’re supposed to be saving, set up an automatic deposit for your savings account wherein a certain amount of money gets deposited into your savings account on a regular basis. Another way to save is by saving your pennies. Every night, put your loose change in a container; at the end of the year, you would be surprised how much money you’ve saved in it.

Money management entails a change in lifestyle. If you want to reduce your debt and even get out of debt in the future, then sacrifices have to be made.

Investing on a shoestring budget

Investing is a term that can be quite perplexing. For some people, uttering the word can be a little paralyzing because it is such a complex word and that you get bogged down by series of jargons. There are so many words that get attached to it like stocks, bonds, forex trading, mutual funds, venture capital, and the list goes on. Investing generally means “to allot a certain amount of money on something and gain something from it in the future”. You invest money to attain a certain financial goal so that you can buy or pay for certain things like a car, a house, your son’s college tuition fee, etc. Investments can be long-term (e.g. buy a house in 10 years) or short-term (e.g. buy a car in 2 years).

Building Your Budget
The most common misconception is that you need to have big money before you can start investing. If you think that you can’t afford to invest, think again. The truth is you can start investing just by saving your pennies. Start with the simplest form of investing, saving. You can start by getting a piggy bank where you can put your loose change at the end of the day. At the end of the month, take the pennies saved from your piggy bank and use them to open a bank account. Next step is to find a bank that can offer you a good fixed annual return rate. Once you have a bank account, you can easily build the budget to do more complex forms on investments in the future.

Safe Investments

If you have long-term financial goals, you can start investing in safer financial management instruments like treasury bonds. You can start by looking for an investment firm or bank that offers low opening balance, low minimum, and low purchases. In this way, you won’t get discouraged early on in your quest to invest a fortune. Most of the time, the high opening balance is a great deterrent to most people.

Another safe investment is mutual fund. Mutual funds are good investments if you are on a budget. This type of investment can make the most out of your investment dollars since your funds get invested in many companies. Your money gets professionally managed as well.

Buying stocks online
Once you have saved enough money for it, try investing in stocks. Start off by opening an account with an online broker that offers low commission rate. There are a lot of cheap online brokers. Buying and selling stocks online can be a real time-saver as well.


When you already have a couple of stocks and bonds in your account, you will notice that some of them are already paying dividends. Even though these dividends may not be that big since you only own few shares, make an effort to reinvest them. Set up your investment account in such a way that the dividends will be automatically invested into the stocks that created them. Over time, you will see how much they’ve grown. You can also enroll in a direct stock purchase plan which allows you to buy fractional shares of stock for you.

There are so many ways to invest on a shoestring budget. You don’t have always to start big. Just take it one step at a time.

Day forex trading: How to be successful

The share market is behaving in a wild way and we all know it. In this chaotic scenario where one day it is down by 500 points going down to 450 points and actual trading going up by 1000 points, the best strategy is to lie low. Be a gallery viewer as the market goes through an unprecedented turmoil. If making money is our ultimate ambition, how should we operate with this chaotic scenario as the backdrop? The only piece of good news here is, today there are systems available which can help you survive in this kind of tumultuous market scenario. If you learn to manage your trade from professional trading courses you can jump from a novice Forex trader to an expert Forex trader.

Day forex trading

Over and above having the right education and knowledge, to be a successful Forex trader, you also need the mental power to keep your emotions, greed and fear under check. Stock market and the Forex market operate in a similar way that is both are based on demand and supply. When lots of people want a stock, the value rises and when the do not want it, the value falls. There is enormous amount of information available on this matter – in the media, online reports, education lessons and so on, all of which tell you effectively where and when to begin. Make up your mind as to whether indeed you want to become a day trader, and then find out why and what your financial goals are.

Getting a grasp over theoretical knowledge could be easy, but once you try to apply it in the real and also crazy market, things get complex. This is the reason why the right kind of education is so relevant and important; or even taking up an experienced and reputed broker as your mentor. These are the preliminary steps you have to take to become a successful Forex trader.

If you want to get more education in stock or the Forex market access the forex Report, which would open your eyes to the new real world. They even help you find an ace broker to help you out.

Success in Forex trading: A training course could be your first step

If you are constantly surfing the net for the right Forex strategy and do not know which training course to attend to get the best hands-down knowledge abut this business, you are reading the right article for finding the right answers. The first step to get started with Forex trading is to decide on the amount of investing money and then decide on the most cost-effective training program to help you get started.

Forex trading courses

For people who are in a hurry, online trading training courses could be of help. The next step is to practice the lessons by opening a demo account and trading with virtual money, till you master the art.

There are also home trading courses which offer full customer support. For instance, the Forex Profit is such a trading manual where an specialist and his team can offer support up to 1 year. They help you open demo as well as live accounts.

In Forex trading patience is the most important virtue

I still cannot forget my initial days when I first entered the ‘big and bad’ world of Forex trading. The hurt incurred when you lose your own investment is incomparable. However, online currency trading is like starting a new life, where you put into practice all the learning from Forex trading lessons. Draw from your experience and move on. Though catching up with the essentials of online Forex trading could be simple, but you really ought to develop your skills to an advanced level if you want to remain unscathed doing the Forex business.

Online forex trading

After spending long number of years in Forex, there is one golden lesson that I have learnt and that is, basically it is the trader’s gut feel and intuition which take him to the winning stand. If you are tech savvy it helps – in the sense that you can accurately translate Forex signals helping you take the right decision at the right time. To master the art of Forex trading you need time. This is precisely the reason why and how some traders take their pip to an enviable level and others struggle for weeks and months, and finally give up in frustration. The essence is that online Forex trading requires a lot of patience, a virtue not possessed by many.

Be that as it may, I still wonder why so many people take some of the most uncalculated and foolish risks and lose their precious savings, instead of following the safe and trodden path of Account Forex Online Trading. I joined this profession in 1997 and there is one great lesson that I have learnt which I can share with you today. There is no alternative to having patience in this trade. Only time and patience can teach you the tricks of the trade including when to make the right moves to make your business profitable.

After spending several successful years in the field of Forex trading, today share many of my experiences, tips and techniques on online currency trading with several traders around the world. I do this through my G7 Forex Trading System, which as you perhaps know, has helped scores of traders till now and is one of the most talked about trading manuals that exist in this field. This easy and simple trading manual is a hand-holding tool which takes the beginner through every step of the art of the online Forex trading.

A visit to any site that would expose you to the several customer endorsements where they have expressed their complete delight. They are satisfied with the return on investment and have been able to enrich their Forex pips at an incredibly high level. In fact, quite a lot of my customers have not done any trading for some time now, as they wish to savor the money they earned the hard way.

Tips and advice in debt consolidation loans

Loan debt consolidation will keep your creditors happy and you keep more money in your pocket. Imagine how your wallet would feel with the total of your monthly payments a thousand dollars lower than what you have been paying for the last two years. You would finally have some breathing space. Has it been bothering you big time that now that you finally make your $20 an hour you still struggle to keep gas in your tank to get through the week? Hanging out with the guys from work after office hours would still break the bank? Now you have a solution to your uncomfortable position and it is only a mouse click away. Go to the website of your bank or credit union and see what information you can find on loan debt consolidation.

Loan consolidation

Getting a second mortage is not an option. You might want to check websites from other banks and credit unions too so that you can compare interest rates on debt consolidation loans. Do not automatically assume that your bank has the best offer for all your financial needs. While some banks are more specialized in home loans refinancing, other financial institutions have better deals on interest rates on credit card or the interest rates on their money market accounts are a lot more appealing. The same is the case with debt consolidation loans. Interest rates vary and it is definitely worth it to check and compare what competitors have to offer. So where is the advantage to you, the consumer, you ask? Debt consolidation loans will, in a way, give you back your freedom. The financial institution of your choice will combine all loans and outstanding balances you have which takes away your high monthly payment. They pay all these different creditors and these creditors will no longer bother you.

You will no longer feel restricted to pick up all your phone calls fearing that it might be another debt collector. The bank than gives you one loan for the total amount that they have paid to your creditors and set you up with a new long term loan with a very low monthly payment. Yes, you will be paying a very long time, but your immediate advantage is that every month you will have maybe one thousand dollars more that you can spend without having to use plastic. It will enable you to rent a house that is a lot better or a house in a neighborhood you like more than where you are presently living. You will be able to hang out with the guys from work, and yes, Christmas will be so much better. The difference in monthly payments will make it possible to go on a vacation again in the summer and paying cash for it. Loan refinancing is an immediate debt problem solution for many and you will be able to go to bed at night and start sleeping well!

Ten tips for life insurance buyers

Before you decide on buying life insurance you should definitely do research and know some tips. You have to realize that a certain amount that you or your beneficiary get at a certain time in or after your life and how much your payments are, are not the most important things when it comes to deciding on life insurance. The first thing you have to learn is to distinguish between the different types of life insurance that are available to you.

You can basically put all possible life insurance policies into two different categories. It is important that you look at all the pros and cons of whole life insurance as well as those of term life insurance. If life insurance is important to you at this time in life but might not be as important if you make it to a later stage of life than it could be term life insurance that you are looking for. Many new family men feel safer knowing that their funeral will not be a devastating financial disaster if they come to die unexpectedly. If they do not die within the term of the policy they have lost the payments they have made, but they are still alive. By paying higher premiums you might be able to qualify for a term insurance that will give you the money from the premiums back at the end of the term.

Tips for life insurance

Whole life insurance is based on a very different idea. This life insurance is not for a limited time period and can go on for a very long time. The idea is that you are building up cash. Expectations are that your beneficiary will get a nice sum of money upon your passing. One feature of whole life insurance that is seen by many as a major pro is the cash value possibility. In other words, if you have been paying for whole life insurance since you were twenty and you are looking into buying a house when you are forty five, you might have money for a down payment right there. Keep in mind however that if you take money out of your whole life insurance under the term “cash value” it basically means that you are taking out a loan. And any loan needs to be repaid. Companies who make this feature possible do this because they have an advantage by doing so. In other words they make money on you. You will pay interest on the loan and you either pay the money back to it or if it never comes that far the money will be taken out of the money that goes to your beneficiary, including the interest.

For many the “cash value” term does the trick and helps decide. After all, this is a nice and easy way to have money available when the need appears. This is a possible loan that does not require a credit check. You have to keep in mind however that you pay a lot of money for this possibility every time you pay a premium. If you look at the financial overall of both deals it will become clear that term life is the cheapest form of life insurance.

Advice on credit card debt consolidation

Americans have been building up unbelievable amounts of credit card debt. They work on keeping their credit look nice by creating more and more debt. Usually they start their credit cards at a low or no interest rate. Here, refinancing your home mortgage could help to personal finances. As soon as they encounter a problem paying it off they try to solve it by taken out even another credit card with a possible balance of another few thousand dollars. Soon their credit becomes affect because of the fact that they have too much debt too their name, regardless of the fact that they have been paying every single minimum payment on time. As a result the different credit card companies start to adjust the interest rate, and they are legally allowed to do so.

Credit card debt

Interest rates of zero percent or six or 10 percent get adjusted to twenty three percent. Once one credit card company has taken this step the ball start rolling and the snowball effect becomes an avalanche, and your debt consolidation is in danger. When this is happening to you right now you than you should definitely take the following advice into consideration. Do not try to get another credit card with a six thousand dollar possible balance, especially not if your intention is to take money out so that you can pay all these minimum balances on time for another couple months. That solution would soon become a downfall and it does not solve anything really. The reality is that if you do that you will run into a similar situation a couple months later with just more debt on your hands.

What you really should do is live on rice and beans while trying to make at least the minimum payment while you pay extra all you can to the credit card company who you owe the lowest balance. If you do that you will get rid of your credit card debt eventually. If you are not willing to adjust your life style to such an extreme low like that or you would still not be able to make the minimum payments to all your cards than be advised not to wait too long and take some important steps while you are still in a position that you can take steps so before your credit is completely messed up. Go talk to the financial institution that you like or thrust more than the others and check to see if they will let you qualify for a consolidation loan.

It is always a good idea to go to the bank or credit union where you are making your mortgage payments to because if you have built up equity over the years they will very likely give your application a positive answer. By consolidating your card debt you will still owe the total amount of debt, but it becomes easier to deal with it because you will have to make payments to one creditor only. That payment will be lower than the total of payments you made to all your creditors before you did the card consolidation so you will be able to live a life again.