Astro Ship

Strategies (coaching in business) for Planning Wealth

By Haywood Dickerson

 The last ten years has seen massive wealth growth in the United States. This brings up the issue of wealth planning, particularly from a tax perspective.

Got Wealth?

There is little doubt that the overall wealth of a significant percentage of Americans has grown like a weed in your garden over the last 10 years. There are a variety of reasons for this growth. Real estate appreciation has set historical records. Stock options are creating massive paper wealth, while also creating tax nightmares. Demographically, a bulge in our population, the baby boomers, are reaching retirement age. Regardless of the reason, wealth planning is becoming a big issue for many people.

Wealth planning strategies tend to be very detail oriented. They also tend to be an option only for certain situations. As a result, you need to speak with a professional regarding each particular strategy to determine if they are of assistance to your situation. These techniques are not universal solutions like stuffing money into a 401k, so don’t take them as such. Let’s take a look at one popular strategy.

Once wealth planning strategy that is very popular deals with real estate. The strategy focuses on making a fixed asset, the equity in your home, grow. Many homeowners do not realize that the equity in their home is not growing. Instead, it is the value of your home that grows, which creates ADDITIONAL equity. Let’s look at an example.

Assume I own a home worth $1,000,000 and have $500,000 in equity. The equity is just sitting there. It does not grow. If the value of the home drops to $900,000, I still have the same amount of equity. If the home appreciates by $100,000, I get an additional $100,000 in equity because the house increased in value, not because my original $500,000 grew in any way. If you can get your mind around this concept, you will realize the problem.

The strategy for this situation involves turning the equity in your home into a growing asset without taking on any additional risk. The process is very simple, but a masterful one. You refinance the home to remove as much of the equity as possible. The equity is then put into no risk custom life insurance product. It grows tax free in the product, which is based on the performance of the stock market. If the stock market has a negative annual return, the insurance policy is tailored to eliminate the risk by setting your annual gain or loss at zero. Put another way, if the market loses 10 percent this year, you lose nothing.

This simple strategy is a tremendous way to double the wealth you gain on your home. Instead of just being happy with the appreciation, you get both appreciation and the tax free gains in the insurance policy. In laymen’s terms, this lets you leverage your property for double gains.

Wealth planning strategies are very subject specific. The above one works with real estate, but no other subject. To identify the best solutions for your situation, you should consult with a top tax attorney, financial planner or accountant.

Information on wisteria care, pruning wisteria , wisteria pictures can be found at the Gardening Central site.

Business Coaching Information From A Professional Source

What to Do in the Event of Identity Theft

By Dillon Norris

 Identity theft can be hugely damaging to a victim’s credit rating, as their file will invariably be filled with the worst kind of adverse information - unpaid credit bills and bad debts. While prevention is obviously better than cure, and there is plenty of information around on how to help protect yourself against ID theft and fraud, unfortunately many people still fall victim to this most modern of crimes. What should you do if it happens to you?

The most immediate and urgent step to take is to close all your accounts that you either know or suspect have been compromised, to prevent the thieves making use of them. You should also be sure to tell the providers of the accounts why you’re closing them, as the quicker you report ID theft the less your liability will be for any financial damage that results. You could be held liable for any fraud that occurs between discovering your ID theft and notifying your banks, although many major organisations like Mastercard and Visa enforce a maximum liability of $50.

You should first request closure of your accounts by telephone, speaking to a representative of your bank’s security and fraud department, and this will place your accounts on hold blocking any further access until you follow up the request in writing.

Any replacement accounts you open should at the absolute minimum have different account numbers, and should also have different PINs, passwords, and any plastic cards or checkbooks etc should be replaced.

Next, you should place a fraud alert on your credit file by contacting the three major national credit reference agencies - Experian, Equifax and Transunion. This will make it harder for people in possession of your information to commit further fraud. The first kind of alert, an ‘Initial Alert’ stays on your record for 90 days, and is a way of informing financial companies that there may be a problem either now or in the near future, for example if you’ve had your wallet stolen.

Having an initial alert on your file will make any credit applications made in your name be subjected to extra scrutiny, minimising any future damage. You are also entitled to a free credit report from each of major credit reference agencies.

The next kind of alert is known as an ‘Extended Alert’. This kind of alert stays on your file for seven years, and is appropriate when you’ve been a confirmed victim of ID theft. As well as providing longer term protection against further damage to your credit file, an extended alert entitles you to two free reports from each of the three credit reference agencies listed above, which can be requested within twelve months.

Your details will also be removed from pre-screened credit offers marketing lists for a period of five years, meaning you won’t receive any unsolicited offers of credit - and neither will any fraudsters still using your details.

Hopefully these steps will prevent any further fraud being committed in your name, so now it’s time to start clearing up the damage. You’ll find that banks and other organisations will be very helpful in this, advising you on what forms you need to fill in and what steps you need to take. It’s a very good idea to report your case to the police and get a crime number, as this will be needed for most claim forms.

The final step is to report your case to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to help them build up better profiles of how ID theft happens and how criminals commit fraud, so making law enforcement agencies better equipped to prevent it happening in the future.

Everything on pain in the lungs can be found at the Lung Pain website. Visit the Meaning Of Roses website to find information on symbolism of roses. Drop by the Normal Lab Values website to read about good lab values.

executive business coaching

Thursday, December 31st, 2009 at 7:45 pm and is filed under business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.