Financial tips

How Smart Phones Can Help Manage Finances

May 7, 2012
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How Smart Phones Can Help Manage Finances

Last month, my wife and I had dinner with our friends who came down from San Francisco. We talked about a lot of things, including new technologies. My friend mentioned how important Blackberry was for him because he’s able to accomplish so many tasks with such a handy device. I also commented about my iPhone. Then it hit me. What could happen to the world without these smart phones? I don’t want to exaggerate things, but I think it’s time we admit to ourselves we owe so many things to these diminutive devices. For me, one of their biggest uses is helping you manage finances well, wherever you are at. You can keep track of your expenses We have Mint app installed on both our iPhone, she likes it very much. After all, she can keep track of her expenses. The app allows her to send alerts whenever she needs to pay some bills, as well as schedule them beforehand (such as monthly, daily, or weekly). I also liked it because we can both keep track of our credit cards and my investments on the go. Some of my friends are also using other apps such as Yodlee and Easy Bills. They

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Saving Money or Earning Money Where to Put your Priority?

April 30, 2012
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Saving Money or Earning Money Where to Put your Priority?

Many times this question arises in our mind that which is good, saving more money or, earning more money? First of all, this is not a competition between the two. In-fact to reach financial independence, you need to practice both efficiently. The problem comes when you are choosing one over the other (or, giving priority on one over the other) due to limited time at hand. Let’s see what are the main time-taking tasks involve in a typical saving money venture. Creating budget Tracking every penny Analyzing spending pattern to figure out cost saving opportunity Family education and encouragement Having a lot of manual labor to cut cost Its true there are certain money-saving activities that can be performed without spending much time, for example, buying a generic store brand instead of name brands does not take any extra time, but saves some money. Still, th overall money-saving exercise is in-deed time taking. Now let’s see what are the various tasks involved in earning more money which take time to accomplish. Gather skills, take training, educate yourself Involve in side income venture Take a second job Working perhaps longer hours at work for a raise/over-time. Clearly it’s often a  raise against

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Waiting for the Ultimate and Best Search Engine

April 29, 2012
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Waiting for the Ultimate and Best Search Engine

Welcome reader! Like all other weeks, today I will have another round of personal conversation with you. Strictly non personal finance. Today I wish to talk about search engines and our, bloggers, struggle to appear at the top of search results. Readers who are not yet familiar with the concept of SEO (Search Engine Optimization), SEO is a technique which puts a particular site ahead of other sites in a search result. SEO technique essentially means cracking the algorithms that search engines like Google, Bing or yahoo use to rank search results. There are serious flaws in today’s search algorithms, better article often get placed after not-so-better articles. Throughout this article I would give reference to a search term “Best credit cards”. I would mostly mention Google, but it implies all search engines, not just Google. Searching Google for “Best credit card” brought me a 2008 and a 2009 article on the front page. They were from reputed financial newspapers, but their coverage is now outdated and the searchers will not get any benefit reading them in 2012. There are millions of other search terms for which search engines pull up totally irrelevant result. There is only one possible reason I could think of. Improper/inaccurate search algorithm. Most of the

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How to Get a Great Mortgage

April 28, 2012
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How to Get a Great Mortgage

You’re finally starting to gain your footing after a slippery financial recession, and now is a great time to take advantage of interest rates on home loans. However, before you seize the economic opportunity to own your own home, there are a few things you should know about mortgage rates first. Stay ahead of the game with these tips on how to find the best home loan for your financial situation. 1. Clean up your credit. You should begin doing this before you even step foot in a lender’s office. Paying your bills on time is essential to building a good credit score, as well as making sure not to open up any new accounts for credit cards in the months prior to applying for a loan (this could drive your credit score down). If you haven’t checked your credit report in a while, it is time to do so. Dispute discrepancies on it as soon as possible, since these can impact your overall score. In order to qualify for a great mortgage rate, you should have a score of at least 700. 2. Save up! Everyone knows that saving money is a critical step to home ownership. But did you know that you can actually keep more of it

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How to Start with Managing Personal Finance

April 25, 2012
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How to Start with Managing Personal Finance

If you ask a wealthy person how much money he/she needs the reply would be – Just a little bit more – We never find there is enough money. Problem is, having money does not end financial concerns. Managing your money effectively, does! Money management skills and good financial practices are needed no matter how much or how little money you have. While it’s difficult to think about planning for the future when pay-day is a week away and your wallet and bank accounts are empty, it pays later if you plan and learn to manage your money carefully. Note: Using the image without first contacting us is prohibited. Managing finance will help you: • Know what you want to do with money. • Know where your money goes. • Know how to save money for your goals. • Plan your spending in advance. • Know exactly where you need to put control. • Organize your financial records. people get caught up in thinking they have to do all these things the right way making managing personal finance too complicated to start with. Getting started is perhaps the most tricky and complicated part of the journey. In reality, actually you can

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Bonds are Paramount Being in your Portfolio; Even with Room for Volatility

April 16, 2012
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Bonds are Paramount Being in your Portfolio; Even with Room for Volatility

Yes, it’s true that stocks outperform bonds, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have bonds as a part of your portfolio. Bonds help to hedge your investments and bring higher yields in the future. It’s no secret that diversification is essential for a strong investment portfolio. A good portfolio is going to have bonds, stocks, and cash in varying percentages. These percentages will depend on your individual circumstances and objectives. Risk All investments are connected to you income needs and your tolerance for risk. What is great about bonds is that they pay out semiannually and that can offer you an income stream that you can count on. Having future income that you can depend on is just one of the reasons that bonds should be a part of your portfolio. Too many investors think that bonds are only for the people who are too afraid of risk, and worse, that they are missing the boat on better investments. I say otherwise… Great stocks are going to outperform a bond, that’s just that way it works. But stocks are volatile. The numbers connected to stocks are going to rise and fall. Yes, overall, stocks do better than bonds, but that doesn’t mean that all stocks perform better than bonds individually.

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Monthly Blog Update – March 2012

April 7, 2012
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Welcome readers to March 2012 blog statistics.  Readership continues to increase. I am thankful to you for your constant  encouragement and love towards OCAAT. Traffic update for One Cent at a Time In Terms of traffic, we grew by 10+% in March, as compared to February. In terms of absolute number, traffic increased by over 2000 page views yet, this growth is not anything to brag about. To become one of the A list blogs (my only goal for this blog) I need higher growth rate. The other notable updates related to traffic are 1. Google search traffic was also highest ever in March. OCAAT ranks on Google first page for 20+ key word/phrases. 2. Alexa rank has now gone below 50k, and staying at that mark for about a month. Traffic Data For March 2012 Total Visits – 16,034 Total Unique Visitor – 13,515 Page Views – 23,647 Pages per visit – 1.48 Average Time on Site – 1:48 minutes Bounce Rate – 80.25% New Visits – 80.62% March top 10 Traffic sources were as follows 1. Free Money Finance – 554 visits 2. Google.com– 352 visits (this includes, Google plus, Google reader and Gmail) 3. Yakezie – 312 visits

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How to Handle Your Credit Cards, From Applying to Paying

March 28, 2012
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How to Handle Your Credit Cards, From Applying to Paying

A credit card is the best money earning vehicle for some. At the same time, credit cards are number one reason for debt. The primary difference is knowing how to use credit cards to your advantage. So far in my life I have earned thousands of dollars in cash back and rewards, while I never paid a single penny on credit card interest, fees or penalties. Apart from that I also follow another rule, I avoid store credit cards for their limited rewards and high interest rates. Several things you should know before you get your first credit card. It is your passport to the world of credit. The Credit Card Act of 2009 is one of the first things you should know when you get your card. Contained in the Act are all your rights as a credit card holder, and under what rules credit card companies have to play. Doing Your Homework and Confirming Details The second thing you need to know about your credit card  will be all the benefits that come along with the card. Advertisements and notices become confusing after a while with all the literature you need to understand when holding a credit card. For

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How Rampant is Impulse Buying, Infographics

March 26, 2012
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How Rampant is Impulse Buying, Infographics

Impulse buying is a major weakness among us. When they contacted me for my willingness to have a info-graphic post, I wanted them to write on this topic. I have previously written about my old trusted method of controlling impulse buys. Still at times both SMB and I make impulse purchases. The info-graphic shows the most rampant place where impulse buying happen is your grocery store. Yes, I also felt that way. When we blog about impulse buying, we always talk (and probably think) about major purchases in malls that we make, usually the ones which cost more than a couple of $10 bills. But, even a $2 item can be purchased impulsively. Grocery stores advertise items on sale, you go to that grocers to take advantage of the on-sale items and you end up buying mark-up items as well. Impulse buying happen in every store, minor or major. You wanted to buy a loaf of bread and get fixated to the apple pie kept very next to it, when you end up buying it, isn’t that an impulse buying? Yes it is! Every time, in almost every shopping trip, we purchase impulsively. We do not realize most of the time but

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Bad Financial Habits That You Might Be Not Aware Of

March 23, 2012
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Bad Financial Habits That You Might Be Not Aware Of

The following is a guest post from Henessy Cervano For some people, bankruptcy is for certain. If you are one of them, those overly secure of the thought that they have a regular source of handsome income, so they just keep on spending without keeping track of their expenses. You’re sure to keep falling off the financial ladder… if you continue spending more than you earn, mindlessly making purchases more than you can actually afford. You absolutely don’t have a shot at getting rich… if you keep making  saving a chore for tomorrow, always thinking that you’d always have money to expect anyway. There are a number of bad financial habits and ways of thinking that have driven lots of people into the depths of financial ruin. Some of them seem too harmless that you wouldn’t even realize how much it could lead to your economic demise. This article is written to give you a heads up on these habits and pull you up before you reach that depressing pit called “bankruptcy”. Bad Habit: Endless Generosity Counter-habit: Being practical Some people are either too easy to persuade or just plain show-offs that they keep treating people or lending them money even when they don’t really

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