ShareBuilder has undergone a facelift! Not only has their parent company, ING DIRECT, redesigned the site to make it easier to use, they have also renamed it – ING DIRECT Investing.
It’s still the same awesome site it’s been when it was created over 10 years ago. Their goal has remained the same: Bring Wall Street to Main Street.
I think they have succeeded. They make it easy for the average investor to invest in the market.
Wyndham Rewards is the rewards program for a family of 12 hotel chains that are found throughout the world. When you join Wyndham Rewards, you have the flexibility of choosing to earn points for free hotel stays and gift cards or airline miles or Amtrak miles. If you stay at Windham resorts then it’s definitely worth checking out their rewards program.
An IRA can be a great tool to help you save for retirement and the traditional and Roth both have interesting tax advantages. But the amount you can contribute every year is limited. The Federal government imposes limits as to how much money can be contributed to both the Roth IRA and the traditional IRA accounts. An account holder’s age (and income) is also a factor in how much s/he can contribute per year.
The investors who are 49 years old or younger have had maximum limits that are $1,000 less that those investors who are 50 years old or older since the 2006-2007 investment year.
The nature of this investment fund demands that an investor contributes the maximum amount of contribution allowed every year in order to enjoy maximum yield. For example, the contribution amount for a person 49 years of age or younger in 2010 was $5,000. If he only invests $3,000 in 2010 he can’t add the $2,000 deficit to the $5,000 contribution allowed in 2011. The IRA is a “use it or lose it” investment fund which means any money not invested into an IRA is lost forever.Continue Reading
Many people who feel they are prepared to enter the real estate market by purchasing their first home have experienced a roadblock to good mortgage rates – their credit cards. Credit cards can play a positive, but also a negative role in the process of purchasing a home.
There is not a doubt that having a credit card can work highly in your favor when it comes time to shop around for your first home. If you have a consistent history of timely credit card payments this builds a strong credit rating. Having a high credit score not only will secure you a mortgage quickly, but one with very competitive rates.
Your credit card can be very influential when determining what mortgage you are seeking because the credit card payments are added to what the payments ‘would be’ on a possible mortgage to determine how much can be afforded.
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Having excellent credit (usually 750 or higher) is good for more than mortgage and car loan rates.
An excellent credit score can also yield you a credit card that offers better benefits such as longer balance transfer periods, low introductory APR interest rates, cash back bonuses, better rewards, and better general benefits.
Below I’m going to highlight some of the best credit cards for excellent credit. If you are looking for a new credit card, and you have excellent credit, see if any of the following cards fit your spending needs.
To keep things simple, I’ve left out specialized cards like airline miles cards, travel rewards cards, small business cards, or hotel rewards cards.Continue Reading
One of the biggest questions many have when it comes to financial planning has to do with how much life insurance they need.
There are some rules of thumb, such as getting seven times or 10 times your yearly salary in coverage, but, really, how much life insurance you need comes down to your personal financial situation, and what you hope your life insurance will accomplish.
Prince William and Kate got married over in the British Empire. They are now known as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. It was rumored so many people might tune in and tweet about the wedding that major websites and services like Twitter might crash. Thankfully the wedding started at 3am Eastern time, well enough early not to disrupt much of anything on my end of the world.
You may have no interest in the Royals — neither do I — except this one curious fact: it is estimated that up to 80 million pounds (about $134 million) was spent on the wedding. Even if a hefty chunk of that is security, and if you’re off by a factor of 50%… that’s a ton of money. And they say there’s a global recession!Continue Reading
In my Betterment review I talked about how they make investing easy for someone who wants to start investing but doesn’t know where to start. Now they are adding a cool incentive to their program:
In order to qualify for the bonus you need to make an initial deposit of $250 when you open your account.
If you are looking for a fairly simple hotel rewards program that offers convenient locations and the ability to book flights (and more) with your points, you need to look into the Starwood Preferred Guest hotel reward program.
Starwood Preferred Guest offers 2 points (Starpoints) for every dollar spent at over 1,000 approved locations in 93 countries and 9 hotels including Sheraton, Four Points by Sheraton, W Hotels, aloft, The Luxury Collection, Le Meridien, Element, Westin and St. Regis.
You are required to give basic information such as your name, address, and e-mail address in addition to your room preferences when signing up for a Starwood Preferred Guest account. You can optionally give more information such as your phone number.Continue Reading
For many of us who are mortgage holders from time-to-time we find ourselves asking, “When is a good time to refinance my mortgage?” Hardly a day goes by without noticing many lenders advertising tempting deals to entice you to refinance your mortgage. That temptation to refinance can be huge because depending on your situation, refinancing your mortgage can be beneficial in areas such as reducing the interest rate, shortening or extending the mortgage loan, and even by getting some extra cash flow happening by lowering the monthly mortgage payments. A word to the wise though, refinancing must be done with great caution because not every situation can have the desired benefits.
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