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Using Plastic or How Not To Die financially By Plastic

Have you ever noticed that if you pay your credit cards on time they just keep on increasing your limits.If you start out with a $1500.00 credit limit within 6-9 months you could have a $5000.00 credit limit if you have paid your minimum balance within the 30 day agreed period.

If you are capable of paying off large sums your credit will increase even faster.

If you start collecting cards and increasing your limits it is very easy to max out the cards.

This can cause you to be paying thousands of dollars in interest every year.

So one tip never use more than 80% of the credit on any card at one time.This will cause your credit score to drop.If you need to use a larger percentage get them to increase your line of credit first.
Tell them not to increase your line of credit if you can’t handle credit wisely.

Use only one credit card on a regular basis that way you limit yourself to one payment monthly.

Times New Roman;”>That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t get other cards and work your credit line up to a large amount if you have a good purpose for it.
Some of these credit card companies will let you use your card as a line of credit at very favourable interest rates.You can use this to fund money making schemes by freeing up other cash. Just make sure you aren’t doing this on a wing and a prayer with something that you know nothing about.

For instance I have a card with a $45,000. line of credit on it. I have never used this card for purchases.I have always called and negotiated with them for loans with very low rates of interest, then I would pay large payments on the card paying if off very quickly.

This caused them to increase it again and again and again.For the last few years I have just waited for them to call me.The minute the line of credit is no longer in use they will start calling and if I want some funds for an investment I can negotiate.
Last week they called me. The rate started higher but as I didn’t have an investment in mind I didn’t need any money. The rate quickly dropped to  2.99% for an unlimited period of time, as in forever.

They wanted a 1% upfront fee which I negotiated away. 

What did I do? Since this is 2 .3% below my mortgage rate I took 80% and used it to pay off a large chunk of my mortgage .  This allows me to make larger monthly payments on a chunk of my mortgage while saving 2.3% in interest , which turns into thousands of $ in savings over the next several years and I can get that bit of mortgage knocked off completely in the next 3years
You always have to remember that in doing something like this it is showing on your credit bureau at all times as it is a line of credit and not a mortgage.
Therefore it is imperative to be dead on time with all of your payments. You have to do it in a way that works for you not against you. Therefore be careful about cancelling cards or having your amount of credit reduced.
Cancelling can cause your credit rating or Beacon score to drop somewhat and it can take several months to pick up those extra points. 
Hope this helps.

HOMEOWNER TIPS – Humidifier Maintenance

Whether you have a power humidifier or just a simple pan-type model, you will have to clean your humidifier on a regular basis to ensure proper operation. As water evaporates, it leaves behind mineral deposits that clog the mechanisms in the humidifier, eventually causing it to stop working. You will be able to tell when cleaning is appropriate as the mineral deposits will be noticeable to the eye and to the touch. The sponge drum in a power humidifier will be crusty and stiff instead of soft and pliable. Check at least twice a year and more often in the winter when your humidifier is likely to be working harder.

Homeowner Tips – Hiring A Snow Removal Contractor

Following are some questions to ask when choosing a snow removal contractor:
1. Does the company have insurance (general liability insurance specifically covering snow removal operations)?
2. Is the organization registered with the Better Business Bureau?
3. Are the employees of the company covered by workplace health and safety insurance?
4. How long has the firm been operating?
5. Does the company have solid references in your area?
6. What type of equipment will be used?
7. How will the company communicate with you

Credit Card Guidelines

 

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has issued a new, voluntary code of conduct for credit and debit card companies. If not widely adopted, the code may become government regulations.

The initiative intends to promote fair business practices by creating transparency for merchants and consumers to clearly understand the costs and benefits of the cards. The fees credit card companies charge merchants can vary widely, and this announcement now comes after years of consumer groups and businesses voicing concerns that the disparity of fees can cause unpredictable harm to the bottom line.

The code will be on a sixty-day consultation period where credit card companies and businesses alike will have the opportunity to provide feedback before the code goes into effect.

Source: The Toronto Sun

City Of Toronto Permit Parking Changes

February 3, 2009 –We have received a letter from the City of Toronto indicating that the City has made information regarding properties currently licensed for boulevard parking (i.e. front yard parking, driveway widening, residential/commercial boulevard parking) available on its web site. The City has advised that a license for boulevard parking does not follow the property, and that new property owners need to apply to have the license agreement transferred.

Boulevard parking information on the City’s web site is available at www.toronto.ca/transportation, under “parking”, then “off-street parking”, and then “licensed locations”.

Twelve Good Reasons To Avoid Cottage Country

If your debating spending time at the cottage whether you want to spend hours in traffic and maybe $30-$40 more in gas just to get there well here’s my list of things that are supposed to be enjoyable at the cottage but which actually may not be so.

 1/ Bugs – this is my #1, I don’t know about you but I hate them.  So being honoured with an invitation to fight them off all weekend doesn’t really appeal.  This year Ontario’s

North Country has a record amount of black flies to eat you… a word for the wise.. Stay away. A chance to be eaten by black flies have your blood sucked by mosquitoes, have ants walking across your food, stung by wasps   oh my gosh.

2/ Sand. Charming and romantic in the moment but when you get home it is still there even a week later… it pours out of your shoe, grates between your toes, it’s everywhere, and it’s everywhere.

3/ Unsightly Views and Loud Noises. So tell me what do loud jet skis, and other water contraptions plus ugly blow up toys have to do with communing with nature. Compare this to staying in the city and taking a long walk on one of our city park systems where you may view a rabbit or a fox in the distance, then having din dins at a nice local tratoria and attending a little theatre afterwards. No long drive home just a 5 -10 min car ride and plop into your own comfy bed with no sand in it.

4/ Traffic, Traffic, Traffic

5/ Gas Price, Gas Price, Gas Price

6/ Cottage Politics. Cottage living is like living in a small town, it has it’s good points but some definite negatives.  If your neighbour decides to build an offensive addition and there is an argument the whole community talks…. Same if young Sally gets caught making out with the neighbours son and the two young ones have to be taken to task, somehow it gets around.

7/ Expectations. Once you own a cottage you feel pressure to invite up your relatives and friends. Then of course you have to entertain them.  This means extra food expense, changing beds, extra laundry and having someone drink your good bottle of Chablis while you were out shopping to feed this lot. Need I say more.

8/ There is nothing to do out there.  You may go into town at night to see a 3 year old movie or to a local corn roast.  But really what fun is that.

9/ Guilt.  Now you’ve bought the place you have to use it.  You can’t just go somewhere else, you can’t just forget it… and there is still maintenance, maintenance, maintenance. After a hard snow fall you may have to go out there and make sure the roof didn’t collapse.  All this and you could have been in  Florida enjoying the sun.

10/  Boring Games.Because there is nothing to do out there you end up playing boring games at night.  Your chance to know every bit of boring trivia about everyone that you never really wanted to know.

11/ Who’s got the supplies.  There is always someone who brings everything and then there are those who don’t bring enough and expect everyone else to supply them with stuff.  They constantly interrupting asking if they can have some of yours and you comply trying to be nice. Before you know it your stuff is gone to and there is no where to go to buy more. 

12/Reciprocity. You can get an invitation to a cottage if you already have a cottage.  The rest must suffer in silence hoping for invitations and they have nowhere to invite you.  This system doesn’t really work.  Try an online house swap  this would be much more reliable and can work really well if you have a home in a desirable downtown location.

Well that’s my list and I am staying home this season.

IT’S RRSP TIME…THE ON GOING DILEMA.

At this time of the year you might ask yourself…
RRSP or Mortgage?

It’s RRSP season and that means you can’t turn on the TV without some talking head trying to bully you into making a fat contribution. But if you’re younger and still paying off your first house, you shouldn’t be saving a cent for retirement this year. That’s right – it would be more prudent to forget contributing to your RRSP altogether and pay down your mortgage instead.

The debate as to whether you should focus on your RRSP or your mortgage has raged on too long. Part of the problem is that the banks win twice if your RRSP takes precedence: they get fees from selling you mutual funds in your RRSP, and they keep you in your mortgage for longer. That’s why their traditional advice is to put as much money in your RRSP as possible and then use your tax refund to pay down your mortgage. This approach certainly won’t land you in the poorhouse, but it’s not the optimum way to go.Both shelter you from tax

The biggest misunderstanding in this debate surrounds the tax implications of the two approaches, says Malcolm Hamilton, actuary extraordinaire at Mercer Human Resource Consulting in Toronto. Many people think that your RRSP payments are tax sheltered and your mortgage payments are not. No wonder: when you put money in your RRSP the tax man sends you a juicy tax refund, but when you make an extra mortgage payment, you get nada.

But Hamilton says that RRSP payments have no significant tax advantage over mortgage payments. That’s because every time you make an extra mortgage payment you reduce the principal amount that you’ve borrowed, which means that you will pay less interest in total over the life of your mortgage. All of those future interest payments that you no longer have to make would have been made with after-tax dollars, so in effect, you not only save the interest, but the tax on that interest too.

It’s hard to get your head around, but the net effect is that you get a tax-free return on the money you use to pay down your mortgage, just like the tax-free return you get inside an RRSP.

It comes down to risk

If neither approach has a tax advantage over the other, then the next logical thing to look at is the return. Do you get a better return on your money by paying down your mortgage, or by investing it in your RRSP?

Most comparisons will tell you that you get a better return from your RRSP, but those comparisons don’t play fair. Usually they’ll compare, say, a 6% mortgage rate to something like an 8% return on your RRSP. Paying down a 6% mortgage is like getting a 6% return on an investment, so they conclude that the 8% return you get on an RRSP is the better deal.

That seems reasonable, but it’s not a fair comparison at all. That’s because the 6% return you get on your mortgage is a sure thing, and the 8% return on your RRSP is not. The truth is, a guaranteed tax-free 6% return is almost unheard of right now. An investment product offering such a return would devastate the market for GICs, T-bills and bonds as investors stampeded to the higher guaranteed rate.

Not only that, but the comparisons usually forget that the average mutual fund in Canada charges over 2% in fees, so the actual return you could expect from an RRSP after fees is more like 6%. “And in order to get that 6%, you’re going to have to take on the full risk of being in the stock market,” says Hamilton. “I think that most investors will appreciate that if you’ve got a choice between a high-risk 6% return and a no-risk 6% return, you’re well-advised to take the latter.”

The dangers of success

Since paying down your mortgage offers you the best risk-adjusted return, anyone who’s buying their first house should concentrate on that task, even if it means neglecting your RRSP contributions for a while. However, there are some dangers.

The biggest pitfall is that you’ll be so successful at paying down your mortgage that you’ll think you can afford a bigger house than you really can. You also have to keep in mind that once your first house is paid off, you really do have to get going on those RRSP contributions. If instead you decide to turn around and buy a bigger house, you could run into trouble.

The most important thing to remember is that paying down your mortgage and building your RRSP are both worthy causes. In the end, if your biggest financial concern is which one you should put your money in, you’re probably going to be just fine either way.

Duncan Hood

Staging Your Home With $5000.00 To Spend

Setiing The Stage To Sell Your Home With A Budget Of $500.00

Staging Your Home To Sell …. The $100.00 Fix Up.

This Video shows you how with as little as $100.00 you can get your home ready for sale.

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