Developing a Financial Game Plan

This is a post from gizmodo that I really like, provided by State Farm. It's an infographic/guide that gets us started on managing our money. It's swell.

Want to know why Chandrababu Naidu was voted out in the earlier election? Read this!

http://www.monbiot.com/2004/05/18/this-is-what-we-paid-for/

Phoneswappr - Transfer contacts from one phone to another!

This is undoubtedly a great app!

They managed to identify a common yet difficult problem and offered a simple solution for it.

What am I talking about?

Remember the pressing thought in your mind whenever you get a new phone?

Although you are excited you are also dreading that you might end up losing a few contacts while trying to migrate them from your incumbent phone to your new and swanky device.

But this puts an end to your misery.

You can also install it from here.

Here are the top things I like about Phoneswappr:

a) Easy to install.
b) No ads
c) Very efficient. I could use this to transfer my contacts in a matter of five minutes.
d) Platform independent. Doesn't matter if your old phone is a Blackberry and your new phone is an I Phone. This works across operating platforms.

How does it work?

a) Download the app into your old phone.
b) The app enables you to upload your contacts into their secure cloud. (The contacts will be available on the cloud only for seven days after you upload it. So better download them into your new phone quickly!)
c) After you upload your contacts, you get a pass code
d) Download the app in your new phone
e) Insert the pass code
f) Download the contacts into your new phone

That is it!

And not even one contact is missed or garbled.

Even the Bat agrees!

What You Pay and What You Get

I'd like to apply the wise advice, "Price is what you pay; value is what you get", regarding the annual frenzy to buy the latest thing. In this case, an iPhone.

The price to acquire the iPhone is different for each individuals. The people who wait in line the week before pay the highest in price acquisition. There is a loss of income for the week decided not to work, so you factor in the opportunity cost, in addition to the price that you pay, and the total of the phone plan/contract if you'd like to include it. It becomes one expensive phone.

What do you get in value for the expensive purchase? You get a depreciating asset at a rate of:

• Two weeks after a new launch, old iPhones depreciate about 11%.
• Four weeks after launch, they depreciate about 15%.
• Six weeks after launch, they depreciate about 18%.
• By week seven, they lose about 21% of their value.

Can you buy an investment to balance the loss in 7 or more weeks? Probably not.
It's important to accept the truth about what you pay in price and get in value. If you position planned purchases as an investment, it will trigger motivation, help us make a decision, and sort the needs and wants.

3 tips to exponentially improve your life

Heard of the Pareto principle?

(Source of image: Here)

It says that 20% of causes are responsible for 80% of effects.

So how do you make small changes that can result in big differences?

Well, here are three to begin with:

• Always be on time: Respect time. Be ahead of time. But never be late. Apply this to everything you do. And you will always have more than enough time on your hands!

• Never procrastinate: You got to do what you got to do! So just do it! Keep at it. Just like I pushed myself to write this article :P

• Make people happy: Friends or Family. Acquaintances or Strangers. Smile at them. Help them out. Make small talk. Make them feel good about themselves. But just spread happiness.

Why don't you try these out?  And share your stories with me!

How Equipment Loans can help your Business Thrive

Image via gettyimages

Different companies enjoy common benefits from capital equipment. Machinery has direct and indirect effects on your bottom line. A new oven and forklift each make your business more productive. Meanwhile, interest and depreciation expense are tax write offs that indirectly improve business profits.

However, your business may not qualify for a general purpose loan to buy much needed equipment. Some obstacles include:

● Lack of operating history: 2 years of profitable operations are preferred by most lenders.

● Little or Poor Credit: A strong payment history under your business tax id may be required. Sole Props must rely on strong personal credit, which puts other assets more at risk.

● Collateral: Many small businesses lack quality collateral coverage. A 1to1 ratio of collateral to loan amount is often needed. Lenders would prefer to not take tables, chairs and food supplies. Heavy machinery and financial assets are examples of higher quality collateral.

Delaying the purchase of new equipment is often not practical, either. Your restaurant may need to quickly boost capacity for lucrative events. Companies need to keep pace with competitors who adapt new technologies. In other cases, manufacturers must replace machinery to maintain production.

So, how can you buy capital equipment with minimal credit, business history or collateral?

Equipment loans are an effective solution.

Equipment financing has mutual benefits for the borrower and lender. These include:

Easy Collateral: 

Your new oven or stamping press serves as quality collateral. Lenders feel more secure making loans backed by specific and valuable assets. Equipment loans also help borrowers overcome collateral shortfalls. A new pizza oven or stamping press is quality collateral for the lender.

Borrower liability is lower with equipment loans, as well. If you default, the machine is simply taken by the lender. However, you may be responsible for a difference in loan balance and equipment value at the time.

Best Practice: Make sure to understand all terms of the loan. You should ensure that collateral beyond the equipment is not pledged.

Trade In Options: 

Technology is constantly changing. A recent breakthrough could make your production presses obsolete. Without liquidity, your business may be at a disadvantage to competitors.
Many equipment leases have trade in clauses to keep pace with tech upgrades. For lenders, trade in options improves the retention of borrowers.

Best Practices: Ask the finance company about prepayment penalties if you pay off the loan early. You should know if there are time minimums before equipment can be traded in.

Faster Approvals: 

Specialty finance companies such as Business Loans Direct have close relationships with manufacturers, which may include special financing offers.

Credit is a minimal or non-factor since the lender knows how the loan will be used. Conversely, general purpose loans pose greater risks for banks. Equipment financing limits collateral and repayment risks to the equipment. The result is easier qualifying and faster approvals.

Ask upfront for the approval criteria. Some lenders may still require certain credit levels or financial ratios. You will save time and money knowing in advance what is needed.

Entrepreneurs who anticipate borrowing needs maximize the ROI of their business loans. You should manage capital equipment for it's full potential. As equipment ages or becomes inefficient, the tax and productivity benefits of new machinery can also be appealing.

You can also check the SBA for special equipment financing opportunities.

5 ways to become a star sales person

(Got the image from here!)

Is this your first job in sales? Interested in closing deals right away? Here are a few ways by which you can become a prodigious sales person:

1) Human to Human: Understand that you are selling to a human being and not a company. People buy from other people. So smile at your prospect. Genuinely listen. And be interested in what the other person has to share.

2) Find a common ground with your prospect: Nobody likes a pushy sales person. But everyone likes to find common ground with another person. So once you find what your prospect likes to talk about, you have hit gold mine. Also one must be well read to find common ground. This takes us to my next point. Caveat: If you fake interest, the gold mine can turn into a coal mine.

3) Read: Read as much as possible. Blogs and books. About anything. Don't restrict yourself.

4) Appearance is important: Wear good clothes. Polish your shoes. Apply a classy perfume. Nobody likes to spend time with an unkempt and smelly person.

5) Wish everyone you know on their birthday: Don't you feel good when someone who hasn't spoken to you for an year remembers your birthday?

I personally know someone who does most of this.
His name is Vijayant Dhaka.
And it is inspiring to see him in action!
Follow him @vijayantdhaka

Wanna Be Starting Something

The hardest thing to do is taking that first step. It happens almost every weekend with this blog, when I start with an empty template and not having the slightest idea on what to write about. When it comes to personal finance, budgeting may be the hardest first step. There are so many things needed to be written down that most would probably decide on doing mental accounting.

Humans may be lazy for reasons of energy preservation and by that reason, it may be most logical to break efforts into smaller ones that would be most realistically executed. In budgeting, we have to make a single effort that contribute to starting a budget. That first single effort may be writing our monthly/biweekly/weekly income on top of a piece of paper. You can then build on it on a later day or maybe become motivated to continue and finish it on the same day.

My experience is that once something is started, it builds an emotion inside, a feeling of fixation on wanting to finish it.

Our legacy

Our predecessors left cave paintings, books and photographs.

These are difficult to salvage and can be lost to time.

But now we can turn every moment, intimate and otherwise, into a format that can be easily replicated and can last till an electromagnetic burst over rides machines.

Recently iCloud was hacked and compromising pictures of several important people were leaked.

As always, there were those who tried being humorous:



What if you or I were that celebrity?

Would all the money, fame and power make us so thick skinned that we could easily let this go.

Especially if one is an endearing and talented young female actor who is just learning her chops?

Our legacy will be interesting indeed.