With the prices for everything skyrocketing these days, every penny counts. This includes your homeowner's insurance costs. If you're thinking of buying a home and need homeowner's insurance, here are a few tips on getting quality insurance for a fair price: Tip #1: Shop Around Ask family and friends about their homeowner's insurance. Check the Yellow Pages, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) and the state insurance department. Other places to shop for insurance include consumer guides, insurance agents and online insurance quote services. Don't just look for … [Read more...]
Here’s How You Can Leverage Your Home To Reduce Your Tax Burden For Next Year
Each year around April, we can find ourselves becoming a little more tense at the thought of what is about to occur: tax time. Instead of falling into the trap of procrastinating your taxes, however, it's much more beneficial to face tax time head-on and do your research on your applicable deductions well in advance. Your home is good for many things, but using your home to reduce your tax burden may be one benefit you haven't thought of. Here are some tax benefits that can be leveraged with your home, and some ways to lower your tax bill in 2014. Deduct Interest On Home Loans Though interest … [Read more...]
3 Common Myths About Real Estate Short Sales
There is a lot of misleading and incorrect information about Phoenix real estate short sales. Many people don't have a clear understanding of the purpose of short sales or how they actually work. Essentially, a short sale is when one sells their home for less than the balance remaining on the mortgage attached to the property. The proceeds from the sale are used to repay a pre-negotiated portion of the balance to settle the debt. A short sale can be a solution for homeowners who really need to sell their home but owe more on the mortgage than the home is worth. Understanding the short sale … [Read more...]
The Importance of Paying Yourself First
If you are like most other average Americans you will have a list of bills that you have to pay every month, such as rent, cable, internet, cell phone, water, electricity and much more. If you were to list each of these monthly expenses in order of importance, which would be number one? The answer is none, because there is one payment you need to make which is even more important than all of these and that is to yourself. The bill of “You” should be the first payment you make before you make any of your other payments. You can pay this bill by contributing a certain amount of your … [Read more...]
Smart Tips for Beginning Investors
So you have reached the point where you have some money in savings that you want to keep for the long term future. However, you realize that putting it in your run of the mill savings account will likely result in its compound interest rates barely keeping up with inflation. You are willing to accept a little bit more risk in return for a higher reward and you are interested in investing in the stock market. Investing can be intimidating for the beginner and there is a lot to learn about the world of stocks and bonds. Here are a few things to remember when you are first starting out: Educate … [Read more...]