Credit Cave

Debt can de debilitating, especially if you have accrued a substantial amount of debt over a period of time. But for some strange reason, there is a tendency to ignore debt and even add to it. This is especially true in the case of credit card debt because it is so easy to buy stuff online, over the phone and downtown. In other words, as a credit card transaction is nearly almost electronic you do not get the physical reminder that you have spent money.

Therefore, the first step that you absolutely must take to get out of debt is to admit it to yourself. And there is no better way to admit and acknowledge your debt problem than auditing your finances. Here are a few tips that I recommend.

1. Make some free time where you are not going to be disturbed by anyone. If you share your debt with another party, have a meeting with them present.
2. Gather all your bills together (including the unopened bills tossed into a dark corner) and group them into credit cards, loans, mortgage, utilities etc.
3. Fire up your computer and setup a spreadsheet on either Excel or Google Spreadsheets.
4. Start entering your data. I like entering totals of previous bills so that I can identify trends.
5. Add up your totals. Find out exactly what you owe on your credit cards, loans and living costs such as electricity and heating.
6. Now you can clearly see where you stand financially and the extent of your debts should be laid bare before your eyes.
7. If you have any payday loans, especially from online payday lenders, get them paid off now! Sometimes payday loans are a necessary evil but you should never use them as revolving credit, so if you have an outstanding payday loan or cash advance get it paid off immediately.

What you do from now on is crucial. I’m going to make further blog posts on the topic of getting out of debt so please visit again soon or subscribe to our RSS feed.

The Bank of America are running an innovative promotion that should catch the attention of personal finance bloggers and savers alike.  It’s called Keep The Change, and I have to say that it looks really good.

So how does it work?  Well, say you were out buying some groceries and a coffee.  The groceries came to $34.50 and the coffee was $3.20, Bank of America will round your purchases up to the nearest dollar.  The difference is then deposited into your savings account.

It sounds so simple, it’s basically a digital cash jar.  Well worth looking into in my opinion.

I am in debt.  There’s no other way to put it except to say that my spending on credit cards on the run up to and after my recent marriage has left me with a sizable balance on my credit card.  Like many people, I have buried my head in the sand and hoped for the best.  I kept thinking, who cares when you can get away with paying out the minimum every month?  Well,  eventually it hits home.  I have a problem.  I have too much credit card debt and I need to clear it ASAP.

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Have you ever wondered how we got to the point we are at now?  Does it ever cross your mind why cash has a monetary value?  It certainly has with me.

It’s a very complicated thing, but basically your money, your savings, what is in your bank account is not backed 1 : 1 in gold as it used to be.  We now have a system where for every dollar, only a small percentage of it is actually backed by gold.  In other words, you would get 20 cents worth of gold for your paper dollar.

Now I am not for one second going to pretend that I know anything about the finer intricacies of this.  So if you are interested in what makes a dollar worth a dollar and how the Federal reserve affects you, check out this video (hosted by Google Video) that takes you through from the very beginning.

As we are on the run up to Christmas, with Black Friday and the madness that is the holiday shopping season looming on the horizon, I thought it would be a good idea to create a list of ways to save money this Christmas.

It’s so easy to get sucked in by the rampant consumerism and the necessity to spend money. But it deosn’t have to be this way, you do not need to put yourself in debt in order to have a great Christmas. In fact, you’ll enjoy Christmas more without finance headaches.

So, without further ado, 101 ways to save money this Christmas.

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Every body and their dog knows just how heated the housing market has been in the UK and many other countries over the last few years.  We’ve seen record appreciation year after year, but it has now got to the point where the average earner cannot afford to buy into a property.  Worryingly, the crucial first-time buyers are starting to dry up as the property markets keeps rising to price them out.

So as a result of this crazy house price bubble we’ve all been experiencing, there are fewer buyers.  And because there are fewer buyers, the market is no longer sustainable according to a top market research group, Capital Economics.

In an interview with the BBC, Capital Economins’s Jonathan Loynes said that house price growth “will severely constrain consumer spending and weak consumer spending will mean that it will be a struggle to get growth up to the levels forecast by the Chancellor.”

This comes hot on the heels of a report from the Halifax, a leading UK mortgage lender, that gave a buoyant outlook for the property market and the recent interest rate rise intended to cool off inflation.

What will happen next is anybody’s guess, but as soon as the market starts to show signs off a drop I’m selling up and renting until it bottoms out.  Then I’ll buy.  But let’s hope it doesn’t get to that stage.

Well after months of expectation, the Bank of England committee decided to raise the base rate of interest in the UK to 5%, that’s the highest it has been in 5 years.  Now, while that may seem a negative figure, please take into consideration how high interest rates were during the late eighties and early nineties.

So why did they do it?  To keep down the growing rate of inflation, consider the rate increase as one way of being cruel now to be kind later.  If inflation continues to climb consumers will end up priced out of the property market and stop spending in the shops.  Well, at least that’s the reasoning behind it.

To be honest, I will feel the pinch once this comes into affect.  My interest only mortgage will see a nice rise month-on-month, but we will be able to cope with it just like most others.  It’s the people who are in deep debt with bad debt on credit cards and store cards who will feel it most, which will probably be reflected in the number of bankruptcies in the coming months.

The bad news, if a rise in interest rates isn’t bad news enough, is that most city analysts are calling for a further rates increase to 5.25% in February 2007.  And if the rate increases after that I think the UK economy will really be in trouble.

Mobile payment has been a buzz term in the financial industry for quite a while, and it actually seems to be happening over in the Far East where mobile phones are where convergence is happening.

McPay have continued the trend with the introduction of the MC-30, a portable credit and debit card payment system that connects via a mobile phone. This device allows payment at any location using only your own mobile phone and the MC-30. And there is one major benefit in the MC-30, printing of your receipts is included.

The MC-30 is available now for SKW250,000 / ~ $270, but McPay will be rolling out new portable payment solutions supporting smart cards, IrDA and Bluetooth in December.

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