Online Financial Tips

Archive for December, 2010

Introducing the Citi Diamond Preferred Rewards Card, the credit card with the flexibility to earn the rewards you really want. You can earn anything from airline travel to gift certificates to statement credits and more.

You earn 5 ThankYou points for every $1 spent on purchases at gas stations, drug stores and super markets. For almost all other purchases you earn 1 ThankYou point. After the first 12 months that you are a card holder, all purchases earn one ThankYou point, including at gas stations, drug stores and super markets. Purchases at warehouse clubs, discount stores and convenience stores are not eligible for points.

The Citi ThankYou Network offers:

Rewards from many of your favorite merchants More than 1,000 rewards items to choose from Many rewards starting at just 1,000 ThankYou Points

You can redeem your points for things like:

Gift certificates for some of the finest stores and restaurants Retail merchandise, from the latest DVDs to sporting equipment Travel on any airline you choose, with no blackout dates (Round-trip tickets start at just 25,000 Points) Hotel stays, car rentals and vacation packages Statement credits toward your billing statement If there’s a reward you want that’s not in our collection, we’ll work to find it for you – we call it “Your Wish Fulfilled”

So you can earn points towards the rewards you want the most. It makes using your credit card exciting when you know it is getting you closer to your ideal reward. You may not be able to justify that new barbeque or a vacation, but what if your credit card could give you that?

Now when you apply you also get 5000 bonus ThankYou points after your first purchase. Unlike many rewards credit cards, there is no annual fee and the rewards program is free. Also there is a 0% introductory rate on purchases and balance transfers for 12 months.

The Citi Diamond Preferred Rewards Card is perfect for someone looking for a flexible rewards program. Choose the reward you want and easily earn it with your credit card.

Hard money loans are a specific type of asset-based loans. In this type of loan, a borrower receives funds that are secured by the value of a parcel of real estate. These loans are paid back with a higher interest rate than conventional commercial or residential property loans. This type of loan is rarely, if ever, issued by a commercial bank or other deposit institution.

Hard money loans are very similar to bridge loans. Bridge loans typically have similar criteria for lending. They also have similar costs to the borrower. The primary difference between a hard money commercial loan and a bridge loan is that a bridge loan frequently refers to a commercial property or investment property that is in transition. The property may not fully qualify for traditional financing yet. Hard money commercial loans refer not only to asset-based loans with a high interest rate but also loans for a financial situation that is possible distressed. Examples of this include cases where someone is arrears on an existing mortgage or where bankruptcy and foreclosure proceedings are already in process.

Hard money mortgages, both commercial and residential, are made by private investors. They typically make loans only in their local areas. The credit score of the borrower is not important because the loan is secured by the value of the collateral property. The maximum loan to value ratio is 65-70%. This means that if a piece of property is worth $100,000, the lender would give the borrower $65,000 to $70,000. This low LTV (loan-to-value) ratio gives the lender added security in the event that the borrower cannot pay and the lender has to foreclose on the property.

Commercial hard money lender programs are similar to traditional hard money loans in terms of the LTV requirements and interest rates. A commercial hard money lender is typically a strong financial institution with the deposits and abilities to make discretionary decisions on loans that are non-conforming. These borrowers do not conform to the standards of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, or other residential conforming credit guidelines. Since it’s a commercial property in question, the loan does not generally conform to a standard commercial loan guideline either.

Traditional commercial hard money loans are very high risk and have a higher than average default rate. Just like in a normal commercial loan, when a property owner defaults on a commercial hard money loan, he or she can potentially lose the property to foreclosure.

For more information on hard money lending, please visit http://www.pitbullmortgageschool.com.

Under a debt settlement arrangement your creditor agrees to accept a lump sum payment of less than your account’s balance to resolve fully your debt. If you have a bundle of cash, debt settlement is a legitimate option for taking care of high-interest, unsecured debts.

But don’t hire anyone or any company to settle your debts. You can effectively settle debts yourself. Debt settlement company fees are high and generally non-refundable. If a settlement company can persuade one of your creditors to take less than the full balance to resolve a debt, then so can you.

What Debt Settlement Companies Do
A debt settlement company claims it will, for a fee, persuade your creditors to take as little as half of what you owe to resolve your debt. Sounds good! Since you probably don’t have a bunch of cash laying around, you’ll pay the debt settlement company a series of monthly payments. First, know that typically your payments go 100% toward the settlement company’s fee until the fee is paid. Only after the fee is paid do you start building a settlement fund. When you’ve built up enough in your debt settlement account, the company will try to settle one of your debts.

Here’s the Catch
Your creditors have agreed to nothing. During the many months you are making payments to the debt settlement company, the creditors you’ve been told will settle are starting or continuing aggressive collection activity. You get phone calls and letters and worse, and you could be sued and face garnishment while the debt settlement company is holding your money. Telling creditors that you’ve signed up for a plan with Settlements-’R-Us, Inc. and are making monthly payments will carry no sway whatsoever with your creditors. They won’t care. To avoid garnishment, you could be forced into bankruptcy. You can get back from the debt settlement company the money in your account, but the fee you’ve paid is probably gone forever, even if the company didn’t settle a single debt for you.

The moral of this story? Never consider signing up with a debt settlement company unless you get from each creditor involved a document, on the creditor’s letterhead, that states the creditor will accept a specific dollar amount on a specific date in the future to totally resolve your debt, AND, in the meantime, the creditor won’t pursue collection of the debt.

If you do have a lump of spare cash, you should consider doing your own settlement, along with other options, to pay off unsecured debts. Keep the following in mind:

You need an Emergency Savings fund. Don’t use every spare penny you can scrape together to settle a debt and leave yourself vulnerable. It’s a poor idea to withdraw money early from a retirement account to pay toward debt. If you settle a debt, the creditor will probably report the amount “forgiven” to the IRS. The IRS considers forgiven debt to be part of your income, and you likely will owe income tax on it on April 15th of the next year. Your debt settlement strategy must include a plan for having the cash to pay the tax on the forgiven debt. You don’t want to come out of a debt settlement with new IRS debt. Because you would be repaying less than the full amount due, debt settlement has a much worse impact on your credit score than any method that would result in full repayment of the debt, like a Debt Management Plan. After a debt settlement is done, your credit report should show the settled debt balance as $0, but may also show a notation-the exact wording is negotiable-to the effect of “less than full balance paid.” This notation may stay on your credit report for up to seven years after settlement.
With Those Cautions in Mind, Here’s How to Settle a Debt

Understand the source of your power in the settlement negotiation: You may not pay the debt at all. Before any creditor will agree to settle a debt, it must be convinced it will be better off accepting 40% or 50% of the total balance today instead of trying to collect 100% of the debt over many future months or years. This means few creditors will negotiate a debt settlement until the account is seriously past due and successful collection is clearly, from the creditor’s point of view, in doubt. If you reach a settlement agreement, the creditor will want the payment in a lump sum right away. Don’t start settlement negotiations until you have in hand the cash you’ve decided you can spare for debt settlement. Write a letter to the creditor proposing a specific settlement. You can find many example debt settlement letters on the Internet by searching “debt settlement example letter.” Photocopy for your records this and all correspondence with the creditor. Send all creditor correspondence by certified postal mail, delivery receipt requested. E-mail is not acceptable. What dollar amount should you propose as a settlement? There is no pat answer to this question because it depends on the situation. The more severely delinquent the debt, the less the creditor is apt to settle for. The lower the creditor judges the odds of collecting the debt in full, the less the creditor is apt to settle for. If you’ve missed two payments on a credit card debt, the credit card company is unlikely even to engage in settlement negotiations, period. But if you stopped paying on a credit card debt two years ago and the credit card company has charged off the debt and sold it to a collection agency, and you’ve paid the collection agency nothing and ignored their collection letters and calls, and your credit score is in the dumps, you may find the collection agency willing to agree to a settlement very favorable to you. Most settlements end up at 40%-60% of the original balance. As with any negotiation, you’ll want to leave room to improve your offer, so in most cases it’s probably smart to offer less than 40% of the balance. Say you’ve decided you have $3,000 of spare cash you can devote to settling a $6,000 debt. Start negotiations by offering less than $3,000, perhaps $1,500 or $2,000. If the creditor counters your offer with $4,000, you can, if you choose, improve your offer to $2,500 or $3,000, but don’t offer or agree to a settlement over the $3,000 you’ve decided you can spare. If the creditor won’t budge, politely end the negotiation by inviting the creditor to re-contact you by letter if it reconsiders. If a creditor answers your offer letter by telephone, make detailed notes of any proposals made in the phone call and include in your notes the date, time, and caller’s name and employee ID number. Agree to nothing on the telephone. Even if a verbal counter offer is acceptable to you, tell the caller you need the offer in writing before you will agree to it. If the creditor refuses to make the offer in writing, tell the caller you will not agree to any settlement that’s not documented in writing, and politely end the call with an invitation to the creditor to re-open negotiations with a letter specifying all terms of its settlement offer. Do not agree to any settlement offer unless it’s in writing and 1) names the dollar amount agreed to; 2) names the date by which the settlement amount must be received by the creditor; 3) states that the creditor agrees that this dollar amount will fully resolve the debt and it will not pursue further collection; 4) states the creditor agrees to report the account balance as $0 to all credit bureaus that include the debt on your credit report; 5) includes the exact wording of the notation, if any, that the creditor intends to send to the credit bureaus indicating less than full repayment. Once you have in hand a written settlement agreement acceptable to you, make the settlement payment promptly, by cashier’s check or money order and keep the receipt that accompanies the check or money order. Send the payment by certified mail, and be sure to get a receipt from the postal service indicating the date of delivery to the creditor. Don’t cut it close-mail your payment at least 15 days prior to the due date in your settlement agreement. Follow-up: Get every four months your free annual credit report from one of the three reporting bureaus. Examine closely each of the three free credit reports you’ll get over the next year. If the settled debt still appears, the balance should be $0. If the creditor agreed to specific wording for any notation that appears with the debt record, you should see only that wording. If the creditor fails to live up to the written settlement agreement, don’t waste your time contacting the creditor. Instead immediately pursue resolution by following the Federal Trade Commission’s procedures for disputing information on your credit report. Your evidence is the written settlement agreement from the creditor, your cashier’s check or money order receipt, and the postal service receipt showing the date the payment was delivered to the creditor.

Finally, nothing above is legal advice. Consult an attorney to assure a legally binding, watertight settlement agreement with a creditor.

Property owners, who have let out their house on rent often face difficulty in getting rent on time. The tenant may not pay the amount on time or may miss out paying. It is indeed a difficult situation for landlords. In such circumstances, having an insurance cover such as landlord buildings insurance can help immensely.

This is a type of facility that is available for residential property owners and managing agents. The cover provides protection against damage to the building, loss or damage caused by storm, flood, theft, collision by vehicles or animals, fire, smoke, explosion, lightning, earthquake, and so on. This kind of requirement is often faced by people letting out buy to let mortgages. This can be combined with contents cover, legal expenses and rent guarantee policies if required.

The cover varies for every landlord. It is different for homeowner, and property owners. There are different provisions for both. It is important for homeowners contemplating to rent out property. The cover is valid for building and contents as well as liability and loss of rent.

Numerous insurers offer various kinds of quotes for insurance. You can get a favourable cover that suits your personal needs. If you already have one and are looking forward for a new one with better facilities, you can switch over to it. You can also find related details online. You could easily lay your hands on cheap policies that suit your budget. The cover is also available for loss of rent or alternative accommodation.

What is Content Insurance?

Contents insurance covers any kind of loss or damage to the contents of your home. It includes furniture, electrical goods and other items in the house. It can also include items that you may take outside home such as cameras, jewellery and briefcases. Generally, you will be covered against theft and fire, and also against accident. It provides you protection against these untoward incidents. You can get the right cover that suits your individual circumstances.

You must provide accurate estimate of your possessions. The cover usually covers:
o Your legal liability as occupier of the house, eg. if a visitor has an accident and injures themselves
o Cost of accommodation and storage if you can’t live in your home because of damage (e.g. fire, flooding etc.)
o Any kind of accidental damage to stereo equipment, TV’s, computers, DVD players and any glass in furniture
o Replacement keys and locks, and locksmith’s fees if you lose or damage your keys

The cover will protect the interest of the landlord.

Do you think your doctor woke up this morning and said “I wonder which patient I can commit malpractice on today?”

Do you think your doctor went to medical school for four years and postgraduate training, known as a residency for 3-6 years, and then into private practice just so he can turn around and commit malpractice? Do you think a physician enjoys paying $180,000 for an insurance policy to protect them in the event a patient sues them for medical malpractice in the state of New York? That is the cost for an obstetrician and gynecologist on the North Shore of Long Island to obtain medical malpractice insurance.

A doctor who intentionally commits wrongdoing on a patient creates many legal problems. If a doctor commits an intentional harm, that is known as an assault and battery. Those are criminal matters that can land a doctor in jail. In addition, if a physician intentionally harms a patient, typically his medical malpractice insurance company will refuse to cover any lawsuit where the patient brings a claim against the doctor seeking compensation. Why? Because in every medical malpractice insurance policy in New York, it will only cover a doctor only for unintentional acts. That means that if the doctor was careless or negligent, the insurance policy will cover the claims up to the amount that they have insurance coverage for. There have been instances where a physician has committed an intentional harm and the insurance company disclaimed and refused to participate in a lawsuit against the doctor. In that event, the doctor is left with no insurance to pay compensation to the injured victim.

That ultimately means that the injured victim and their attorney must prosecute their case against the doctor personally, and attempt to go after the doctor’s personal assets if they are victorious.

What are some examples of intentional conduct that cause harm?

A few years ago in New York there was a mentally unbalanced surgeon who carved his initials on a patient’s internal organs. Thankfully, that physician’s license to practice medicine has been revoked. If memory serves me correctly, that physician may still be in jail today.

An injured victim often questions why they suffered injury at the hands of a doctor or hospital. A patient may feel that the doctor intentionally harmed them. Others recognize that physicians are human and can make mistakes and errors. The problem is that when a physician makes a mistake, the result can have deadly consequences.

In my experience as a medical malpractice trial attorney in New York, I’ve never seen a physician intentionally cause harm to a particular patient. That’s not to say that it has not happened, and that is not to say that it does not happen. However, the majority of physicians wake up each morning expecting and hoping to do good for the patient’s that walk in their door.

We place our trust and our lives in the hands of doctors. They have specialized knowledge that we as laypeople do not have. We often expect them to be super-human, and when they exhibit frailties and errors, we become frustrated and upset.

A physician’s lack of communication with their patient following a complication or error is the major cause of an injured victim picking up the phone and calling me. If more physicians were transparent in what they did and owned up to the fact that they are human, I believe more patients would understand and accept the doctor’s explanation.

However, even a physician who admits responsibility to a patient after causing harm may not escape a lengthy medical malpractice lawsuit. The patient may require a lifetime of ongoing medical care and corrective surgery. If that individual lacks health insurance, or an ability to pay for the ongoing medical care, the patient may have no alternative but to bring a lawsuit against the physician seeking compensation for all of the medical bills they have incurred in the past as well as all the future medical bills they can expect to incur in the future.

In addition, if the physician has caused a patient harm, the doctor creates a debt that can only be repaid with money. In our system of justice, compensation is really a form of repayment of a debt that is owed by the physician to the patient.

If you are a constant traveler and you love driving your car and being on the road, then you should really consider getting a gas station credit card. Gas is a necessity for frequent cross country travelers and in order to outweigh the drastic effect of continuous increase in gas prices, road travelers should avail of gas credit cards.

Gas credit cards allow its card holders to save some money for every fuel fill. Usually, these cards allow the card holder to have 3% or 5% cash back for their fuel expenses. Moreover, each time you purchase gas, you will also earn reward points which you can then present to gas stations in exchange for incentives, discounts, and more. If you reach a certain “quota” provided by the credit card company, you can even request for your rebate in the form of cash checks.

Getting yourself your very own gas credit card will not only allow you to save some money through rebates and discounts. It can also help you keep track of your gas expenses. Such can be highly important for someone who is in a tight budget, and for businesses that needs to manage their business expenses tightly. Gas station credit cards are also perfect in times of emergencies when you are traveling far from home and then you suddenly find yourself at the brink of temporary bankruptcy. Having a gas credit card in your pocket will provide with the security that you need if you are always on the road.

The Benefits of having the top Gas credit cards

Discover Open Road

This gas credit card pays its cardholders 5% rebate out of their total gas expenses. In addition to gas cash rebates, the user will also receive 5% cash backs from automotive expenditures and 1% on all the other purchases that is made using the card. If you are a frequent purchaser of automotive parts, then this card is right for you.

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