January 2019

Buying Your First Home? 5 Steps to Take to Get Ready

by Jeremy

Looking for your first house is an exciting time. Whether you’re moving from your parent’s place, going from an apartment into a home, or you’re newlyweds looking at your first property together as a couple, home-buying is thrilling. If you’re not prepared though, looking at homes can be overwhelming, disappointing, and discouraging. There are steps to take before you look, during the process of viewing homes, and while you put in your offer. All of these steps help to ensure that your home-buying experience goes as smoothly as possible. To help you out, here are five steps to take when you’re buying your first home. Determine What Mortgage You Can Afford Before you begin to look at houses, you should … Read more

Should You Save For a House or Save for Retirement When You Have Student Loans?

by Hank Coleman

The student loan debt bubble recently approached the $1.5 trillion mark, with few signs of slowing down. This problem isn’t isolated to recent college grads and 30-somethings, either. Parents and grandparents are on the hook for millions of loans both as current and former students themselves or co-signers of loans. Even more alarming is the fact that 40% of the 65+ year-old borrowers or co-signers are in default on their loans. The personal and societal consequences of student loan debt, combined with the problem of people not saving enough for retirement, inevitably lead to a pretty gloomy outlook for the future of our economy. But it’s not enough to simply talk about these major problems, we need to talk about … Read more

What Are American Depositary Receipts?

by Hank Coleman

American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) are stock in foreign companies that are traded in the U.S., just as you would buy and sell stock in America, and are valued in U.S. currency, thereby also paying money in U.S. dollars. American Depositary Receipts represent the acquisition of American Depository Shares, otherwise known as ADSs. Both ADR and ADS are often used interchangeably. What Are American Depositary Receipts? An ADS shows that you own a piece of equity in a company outside the U.S. Therefore, the certificate supplies individuals in the U.S. with an easy way to invest in overseas companies. Certificates are bought and sold in the same way that stock is traded on Wall Street. A slight variation of an American … Read more

Vacation Rental Property Management – What You Need to Know

by Jennifer Davies

For anyone looking to hire out their property to vacation clients, it can be a daunting and time-consuming task to try and market their rental property, answer client queries and ensure that other aspects of the property are running smoothly. Fortunately, one can easily engage the services of vacation rental property management professionals who will care for everything and ensure that guests are satisfactorily taken care of. Property management is whereby you manage properties by dealing with and working on all aspects needed to run the rental business effectively. This includes managers, office staff, and mechanical teams who are generally used to help in overseeing the various aspects that go into the running of properties, either apartment buildings or individual … Read more

Five of the Most Valuable Modern Patents

by Guest Contributor

Do not forget to follow up from a business conference.

A patent is a legal tool that gives the patent holder exclusive rights to their invention, for a certain period of time. Often, the patent is extremely helpful in building a business, and the entrepreneur can grow the business with the confidence that their idea cannot be stolen while they focus on expanding their market. In some cases, a patent can the most valuable part of the company. There have been many patents over the past century that have launched massive companies. If you are thinking that you might have a great idea that might be worth patenting, take a look at these for some motivation about getting started. The patent application is notoriously difficult, but there are patent attorneys … Read more

5 Tips for Negotiating with Your Creditors

by Guest Contributor

It’s difficult to live a life completely free of debt. Even the super rich will take on debt as leverage in order to grow their wealth quickly. Debt is good as long as it is applied to the right purpose and remains manageable. Unfortunately, for a wide range of reasons, debt can get out of hand. What follows is seemingly relentless chain of calls from creditors demanding you pay up. It’s a conversation everyone dreads especially because the inability to settle the debt may have serious repercussions on one’s credit options in the medium and long term. But creditors aren’t as unyielding and unreasonable as many imagine them to be. You can negotiate more favorable terms. Here are some useful … Read more