Zero Debt Expert

You thought you were going to eat how you wanted and spend your money and there would be no relationship between the two…..Well there is a huge relationship between the two!

It has long been proven since the days of the caveman that “He who is hungry and hunts for food is careful over all things for worry of being hungry again.” In short people who know the value of working for what they have quite simply..have. This is a very powerful spin on the hoard and stingy personallity of other people who think that is the way to health and wealth.

Being your mind is the most powerful resource you have it is the cure all for all things take for instance… There was a man who died of a drug overdose and was technically dead but his mother would not accept it and told his dead body to come back to life…it did! Health both physical and fiancial comes from how we hink about what we see, then what we do.

Did you know it has been proven that people who have poor health/fiances live their lives telling people the same thing. One of the first things a broke person can do to get more cash into their lives is simple say it. As obtaining a healthy lifestyle all one must do is look into a mirror and say “You are not sick” and your mind will begin to heal your body.

Now before you pass judgment on this well established technique first put it into practice. You do it with everything else, when you visit McDonald’s you first try the new burger before you look at it and choose not to eat it. An increase of most things only require and open mind to the things we are not familiar with.

Along with an open mind in these areas one must also have self discipline over themselves to reach their full potiential. Did you know according to a California Research Group 8 out of 10 people in America make choices based on how they feel at the time. This is not a healthy way to handle you health or your money especially in 2009!

The meltdown on Wall Street has taught us all many lessons.

“You Better Learn To Make Your Own Investment Decisions - And Not Let Brokers Make Choices For You!”

This is a basic fact we have been preaching for years now. Many times investors either blindly throw money at the market or let a broker do it for them. With a little effort you could learn to direct your investment accounts and retirement funds on your own.

In this article we want to point you in the right direction, and give you a few crisis tips too.

ETFs (Exchange Traded Funds) are an excellent alternative to mutual funds as an investment vehicle.

There are ETFs that cover every sector of the market. ETFs offer many advantages over mutual funds. Here are a few:

* Tax Advantages - ETFs seldom sell any equity positions or create taxable profit midstream. Mutual funds do this often. With mutuals, you could owe tax on part of the funds holdings (the winning stocks they sell at a profit) even though you lost money over all. A double whammy!

* Less Management Costs - Even No-Load Mutual funds have become top heavy with many “Professionals” employed and eating up GIANT parts of the profit. You might think of ETFs as Electronically Traded Funds. MUCH less management costs (in some cases no management costs) and the ease of trading them.

* Diversification - Let’s face it, this is what was attractive about mutual funds to begin with. Instead of picking out stocks on your own, you had “Professionals” (with the meltdown we can see that most of them are not too professional) putting together a diversified portfolio for you. With ETFs, you can get the same if not better diversification without the hassle of dealing with a mutual fund giant eating up all the profits.

* Easy To Trade - With true mutual funds you can only get out of a position After the market closes. You can trade ETFs just like a stock in your discount brokerage account. If you were locked into a fund when the market was in crash mode, it was not a good feeling. Had that been an ETF you could have bailed at any time (before the DOW closed down 777 points!)

We could go on with the benefits of ETFs, but you should be starting to see the picture. An even better way to call your own shots with your investments is to trade the index (or indices for plural). We are referring to the mini Dow, the S&P eMini, the mini Russell and others. (there are also ETFs the mirror the indices such as “SPY” for the S&P 500 index)

While we focus on mini-Dow trading, any index will do. With Index trading, you just follow the overall market up, or ride it down with a short position.

While we are on the subject of shorts it would be good to mention that while most US mutual funds are not allowed to short a stock, you can actually buy ETFs that do good with the market is dropping. One such fund is ticker “DUG” which does well when the Oil price is dropping (a tip we gave our readers after the big run up in oil to over $140 per barrel - at the time of this writing it has been dropping since).

You can find other ETFs that do well in falling markets. So, you don’t have to short the market (statistics show that 80% or more of investors never do short the market - but are always looking for a upward bull run), you just buy the right ETF and let it do the shorting for you. These are at times referred to as Inverse ETFs.

By now, many investors see the importance of having a strategy for making money when the market is dropping. Most investors have yet to develop this strategy. We prefer to do it with simple index trades. Whatever you do, find a way to make your own moves and don’t depend on someone else to invest your money for you. No one will take care of your money like you will!

*********************************************************** NOTE: To learn more about ETF’s visit Yahoo Finance and look under the Investing Tab at the top of the page - then select ETFs www.finance.yahoo.com ***********************************************************

A time comes when you begin to consider refinancing your mortgage. Maybe you want to take advantage of a downturn in the market rates, and save on the interest you are paying. Or you are faced with a number of small debts and the repayments are becoming unmanageable. It will be worth your while to consider some important points when you debate this issue.

If you are facing a difficult debt repayment situation with a number of repayments to manage every month, then it is definitely a good idea to put all your loans under a single ‘roof’ and deal with a single repayment issue. Just make sure you choose the repayment plan that suits your monthly cash flow. The question of saving per se does not arise here, since you are refinancing for a different purpose.

Most people think that the interest they pay on mortgages is unjustifiably high, and seek ways and means to reduce the interest burden. This is intelligent thinking. The point to consider is whether the market rate is showing every intention of reaching for the sky. If it is, and if your present mortgage is based on the variable market rate, then this is a good time to opt out of the present mortgage and refinance the mortgage with a fixed interest plan, where the interest rate is lower than the average market interest rate computed over the duration of the mortgage.

Whatever the reason for refinancing, you should study all aspects of this important decision very carefully. The one thing you should understand is that while refinancing your mortgage could save you a packet, it could just as easily cost you a packet. Refinancing can hurt you in certain situations.

The problem is that when you go to a refinancing agency they fail to mention the actual expenses you will have to incur to refinance your mortgage. Their excuse is that these are ‘external’ expenses and not their concern. Therefore you may be lulled into believing that the refinance scheme is going to save you a hefty sum over the mortgage period. Too late you find that you have to pay a number of incidental fees, charges and penalties, which can set you back quite a lot, and may nullify the savings you’ve counted on. There is no point in changing your financier if it is not going to save you any money.

When you consider refinancing, the first thing to do is to survey the market. Find out all the plans and schemes being offered by different companies. Make a comparison chart showing all the salient features and savings of each plan. Don’t restrict your survey to just your local companies. Go online and get information on various plans offered in your area.

Find out all the penalties and fees that refinancing companies may extract from you upfront. For example, there is an origination fee or points, which is taken before the refinance plan becomes operational. There might be a plan where the interest rate is slightly higher but you don’t have to pay origination fee. This may turn out to be better for you.

Refinancing is advisable if your net savings is significant. If not, you may as well keep the current mortgage going. Don’t go in for refinancing if you think you may have to move before the fresh mortgage period has time to play itself out. Such a move will require you to foreclose the fresh mortgage which entails a huge penalty!

Mortgage refinancing is a good way to save money by taking advantage of reduced interest rates. It is also a good way of dealing with a troublesome debt repayment position. But you must be aware of all the costs that are involved. Not knowing the true costs leaves you open to nasty surprises later on. Many people who went in for mortgage refinancing without proper analysis found that they had actually lost money instead of making the savings they had counted on!