President Barack Obama recently signed legislation that extends a first time home buyer tax credit and extends a smaller tax credit to move-up and other buyers. The extension and expansion of the popular home buyers tax credit gives both new and move-up buyers a tax incentive to buy a home until at least April 30, 2010, longer for military personnel.

The new law extends the existing credit for first-time homebuyers, worth up to $8,000, through April 30, 2010. A new credit of up to $6,500 is available to qualifying existing homeowners who buy a new primary residence (or have one built) by April 30, 2010, if they owned their existing home for five consecutive years over the last eight years. Second homes don’t qualify. (more…)

In the good old days, the world was a simple place. You went into a store to buy goods, or to an agent or broker to buy services. The price was quoted and you paid it out of the cash in your bank account. If your account was poorly stocked with dollar notes, you had to wait until you had saved enough. In this primitive way, people lived within their means, only buying goods and services when they could afford them. Those who had regular income and some collateral, were graciously allowed to borrow money from their banks. But pity those who defaulted. Their collateral would rapidly disappear into the hands of their bankers.

It was a tough world for borrowers. Then there was a revolution. Suddenly, there was cheap credit available and we could all have what we wanted right now. Just one down-payment and the rest in easy instalments. Then the revolution became a financial tsunami as the newly launched credit cards suddenly put real buying-power in our hands with generous credit limits. Add in the housing equity release plans and all the other wonderful financial gizmos dreamt up by the folk who live on Wall Street, and you have the modern age just before the worst recession in decades and the credit crunch that took everyone by surprise.

Buying insurance policies has always been potentially expensive. When you see the premium rate expressed as an annual sum, it can look a little daunting. Yet, when you are old enough to put wheels on the road, there’s mandatory liability cover in all but three US states. This is where dreams would fade were it not for the willingness of insurance companies to be flexible on the payments. First they dropped to 6 monthly payments. Some went for quarterly. And then the final act of liberation - the monthly instalment plan. Now you could buy your policy on the same basis as your home, the furniture and white goods in it, and the car you wanted to drive. Everything had come down to the total amount you could afford to pay every month and still have something left over to buy food. This has some major benefits. You can buy insurance with no down payment. Just use the internet search engines to find cheap auto insurance quotes offering the lowest premium rates, pay the first instalment in advance and you are legal on the road.

But there is more to it than that. Ignoring the supposed advantage of easier money management, it also frees you to change your auto insurance policy whenever you find a better deal. If you have paid six or twelve months in advance, this locks you into the policy. Yes, companies do allow you to change, but usually subject to cancellation charges - sometimes eye-poppingly high. The freedom to change insurers can be important if you change the make and model you drive. The existing insurer may be less competitive on the rates for the new vehicle, but the charges may take up the saving available by switching to a competitor. However, because insurers prefer stability, they offer discounts on 6 or 12 monthly payments to give them your cash in their hands. Paying on a monthly basis is always more expensive. As always, it’s your choice.

Looking around the US economy right now. Homes have been foreclosed, bankruptcy looms on private debts and the retirement 401ks have taken a serious hit. Life as we knew it has been turned upside down without anything in place to catch us as we fell. So how did we get into this mess? The economists tell us we have been living beyond our means. Credit was cheap and, with banks and credit card companies raising their borrowing limits, there seemed to be nothing we could not afford. There was no need for savings. Everything could be charged. If the limit was reached, the housing equity could be released as cash. Over a period of about twenty years, we switched from a country that saves to a country that spends on credit. In the period just after World War II, we had “prudence”. People mostly paid cash for what they wanted and, if they did not have enough, they saved. It was a revolution when, suddenly, everything could be paid for in affordable monthly instalments. In one sense, this is the easiest way to get into serious debt without noticing. When you only pay a few hundred dollars every month, it hardly registers the total debt is tens of thousands.

Insurance companies were the last of the hold-outs. For years, they insisted everyone should pay them a lump sum once a year. Then, slowly, there was a cave. First it slipped to every six months, then quarterly. Now almost every company across the nation accepts monthly. What’s the problem for the insurance companies? Well, they estimate the likely total cost of the claims they will have to pay over the next twelve months and divide that amount between all the policy holders as the premium. If the company has done its sums properly and everyone pays once a year, the company always has the cash in the bank to pay out on all the claims. If people pay monthly, they can easily change to another insurer. They can miss one month’s payment when the family budget is under pressure. That means the insurer may not have enough money to pay the claims. So, to encourage all you people with some savings (or some slack on your credit cards), they offer discounts if you agree to pay every six or twelve months. It gives them more security and saves you some money. Paying monthly costs you the most.

That said, paying monthly gives you flexibility. You can use the online search engines to find auto insurance quotes at the lowest price. Then for just one month’s premium, you can be driving. In effect, this becomes a monthly policy. You can keep shopping around for new premium offers from different insurers. If you find a better monthly rate, you can transfer at the end of the month. But if you pay once or twice a year, the insurer will hit you with high cancellation charges to lock you in. Whatever you might save disappears. Worse, if you change the make and model of your vehicle during the longer policy term, it can be too expensive to move the policy to a cheaper company. You end up paying the higher premium until the six or twelve months end. So make a wise decision. Auto insurance is never cheap. Avoid making it too expensive.

Before you tie your shoe-strings and take your bank check ready to get insurance, get yourself together and ask yourself - do I really need it? If the answer is “no” - just forget about it and switch onto a new subject. If you still insist you need insurance then please focus on the following articles and give us 100% of your attention.

My name is Ryan and I have been a lawyer for as long as I can remember myself. I gave millions of advices to people that needed my professional help. I don’t do it for money only; I do it because I want to help. I have always been frank with my clients. I offered them to get insurance when I knew they would need it. They were grateful to me because I was right. I want to tell you that there are lots of myths here and there. People spread rumors around and others believe them. I am here to put the record straight and tell you about the false ideas people got so far.

#1: My business is not to be sued. I don’t have enough of profit from the company so they will just leave me alone.

Anybody’s business can be sued and so can be yours. Even when you think you don’t have enough for others to take from you, you are wrong. There is always something to take. Let us give an example. Even if you have a tiny office your equipment and furniture can be seized and sold. Your bank accounts can be seized also and that money will be enough to pay the attorney.

#2: I am protected from liabilities because I am of a corporate format.

Wrong. The corporate format protects individual investors only from personal liability and debts of the corporation for the reasons that were related to the corporate events. All states have the same rules and these rules involved a so-called “corporate veil” that can be removed or adopted according to some circumstances. When a situation like this occurs you may be giving away even your personal assets - such as a house, car or all of your savings.

#3: If I become disabled pr die my family and business partners will carry on without me.

Wrong. Yes they will but not in terms of business. The business won’t survive if it is small and is left without a major member at least this is the biggest theory around it. Kids don’t like to follow their parent’s footsteps when it comes to business. Usually they are interested in other things. But not to disappoint you totally I have to say that I have known cases when the family business survived.

Small business insurance should be a part of your present. If you care about your business enough to maintain it - please get your small business insurance now. This is my biggest advice to you.

The Malone Bay community features 18 lots at W. Kerr Scott Dam & Reservoir. Fourteen (14) are Lakefront and meet private dock requirements. All lots have access to public water, saving owners from $5,000 to $10,000 on drilling a well. These lots have public water and will save you the cost of drilling a well. The entire development also features underground utilities.

This is a gated community with lots ranging from 2.3+- acres to 6.8+- acres on the Hwy 421 side of the lake just off South Minton Road, Wilkesboro, NC 28697

W. Kerr Scott Lake is 1500 acres with 50 miles of shoreline and is controlled by the US Army Corps of Engineers. It is clean water with good fishing and is excellent for boating, kayaking, skiing, and swimming. The property is surrounded by National Parks. Wilkesboro is a beautiful community and town with friendly people. It is located just 40 miles east of Boone and Blowing Rock, NC and one and a half hours northwest of Charlotte.

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It seems marketers live in a world designed by Rod Serling where everything bad is ignored, most things are satisfactory and an alarming number of service providers are outstanding. J.D. Power and Associates is one of the largest marketing information companies in the world. It produces regular ratings and reports on how we view an industry in general and how we rank individual companies within that industry. So, for example, a recent report finds us satisfied with our banks and it lists the banks we think are the best. OK. So there is always a slight time lag between the collection of data and the publication of the results of analyzing that data, but this seems a strange result. In the midst of a recession with a record-breaking number of banks failing, predatory terms for credit cards and other credit hard to find, you might wonder where J.D. Power found the people to answer their survey questions. Well, the results of their 2009 survey of our attitudes toward vehicle insurance providers is also out. You will be stunned and awed by the revelation that customer satisfaction is up significantly this year! Some 23,000 human beings claiming to hold policies were polled in March and April, 2009.

So what has apparently prompted this rise in the level of satisfaction with the insurance industry? Well, it seems the insurers - kind, caring and sensitive to a fault - have been reducing their premiums. In the earlier years of this century, we were all increasingly unhappy as those premium notices kept coming in with ever higher numbers written on them. But, come the recession and the insurers step on to the mound, they pitch premium reductions. According to J.D. Power, some 42% of all those insuring vehicles found their premiums fell during the twelve months period to April 2009; and that’s without having to change companies! Since we are all price sensitive, we now love insurers because they are saving us money. We all love their websites and find there are real improvements in the way the companies relate to us. That, of course, excludes claims handling which is the most important interaction. It seems no-one worries about the poor service on claims handling.

Which brings us to admit how we arrive at our prejudices. According to J.D. Power, we can all be bought by a few dollars of reduction in the premiums. Before the recession, the majority disapproved the quality of the service provided by auto insurance companies. Now we love them. Well, that’s the result you get when you ask questions about an industry’s image and design the questions to get mostly positive answers. Of course, we can like a company that reduces its prices. We can also admire the quality of its website and marketing materials. But if the questions do not focus on our experience when we try to claim following a traffic accident, the results of this hyped report are misleading. When you are shopping for the best auto insurance companies, do not believe the ads. Check out the companies on the website operated by your state’s department of insurance. Verify their financial stability with the ratings agencies. You do not want to pay your premium and then find the company is insolvent. Use reliable sources of information when looking for a policy.

Medical are constantly going up every year, and if you don’t want or have the money to spend on costly healthcare services, here are some useful tips to make your expenses much lower.

1. Prevent problems before they arise

The most effective way to keep your medical costs low is to prevent any health problems from developing. Exercise regularly, maintain a healthy weight, stop smoking, follow a diet, and run through regular medical checks at your doctor’s office. It all may sound simple, but the healthier you are the lower it will cost you to visit a doctor or get insurance.

2. Comparison shop when buying insurance

In case your employer doesn’t provide group insurance plans, you will benefit from individual insurance plans. But when shopping for insurance you will definitely notice how the rates differ from one company to another. Take it as an advantage and shop around, getting quotes from as many insurance providers as possible. This way you will find the most competitive offers that will help you save money. In case you are generally quite healthy and want to be insured only from serious illnesses or accidents, you will find more use from catastrophic insurance coverage.

3. Save money on prescription drugs

The most convenient way to cut costs on prescription drugs is getting them by mail in a several-month quantity either from pharmacies or online drugstores. This will cost you considerably less than buying from your local drugstore directly. In case your plan is a bit strict on the source of medications, you should ask your doctor about cheaper generic variations of the drug you’re prescribed whenever possible. Senior people and families with low-income can also contact pharmaceutical companies for direct assistance.

4. Sign with your spouse’s insurance plan

In many cases married people have two separate policies either provided by their employers or on an individual basis. And in most cases it’s not the best thing to have cost-wise. Analyze both of your policies to learn which one has better coverage and rates, and sign with the better one. Most insurance policies allow you to include your spouse so make sure to consult with your insurance company representative about that.

6. Ask about discounts

While not always medical institutions or insurance providers offer discounts, it never hurts to ask. First learn what other companies and facilities charge for the same services and in case the costs are lower, try negotiating a discount with your plan providers. Sometimes you can succeed in it, getting a good cut in costs.

7. Learn what your policy actually covers

Your health insurance policy can have more types of coverage and larger amounts than you actually need. But sometimes you can use certain services for free if your policy provides the coverage. For example most people believe that acupuncture procedures are not covered and will pay for them on their own. Some policies actually include these types of services too, so it’s much better to learn what is included in your policy before paying for something. On the other hand, your health insurance plan may have coverage you don’t need at all, which still costs you money, so you may consider dropping some types of coverage to reduce your rates.

The modern Western society is at war, which influences and affects virtually all domains of life and forces people to reconsider traditions, judgments and practices. This is the war of sexes. And if some domains women are left by men behind, when it comes to insuring one’s life, the strong sex is clearly losing it, with women going far ahead. But why is that so?

Back in February, the Society of Actuaries has conducted a study concluding that high amounts of testosterone (i.e. the male hormone) lead to more harmful effects on health and behavior, not to mention the overall risk-taking property of this substance, which makes men more prone to undertaking hazardous activities than women. Higher blood pressure and lower immune system activity is the cause of the substantial difference in mortality rates and serious health issues, which are most obvious at the age of 22, when men have the highest amounts of the hormone in their blood.

For a long time the common belief was that women live longer because they are not subjected to serious stress and hazards, traditionally working at home. But with the modern tendencies of women undertaking tasks that are traditionally done by men, researchers have observed that women who are making part of the working force actually have a longer duration of life even compared to those who stay at home.

Another study has analyzed the overall demographic mortality rates in men and women of the same age. As a result, not only men typically live less then women, but they are more likely to suffer from potentially fatal health conditions such as cancer, diabetes, heart diseases, strokes, infections, and other serious health issues. That’s why men usually pay more for life insurance then women. Another common threat for both sexes is smoking, which is more prevalent in men (however, today now women tend to smoke a lot too). And comparing the life expectancy of a smoker and non-smoker, the difference is as much as nine years, in favor of the non-smoker of course. That’s another factor contributing to higher life insurance rates.

Still, these overall tendencies can be reversed if you take in consideration all of the risks you are prone to and make everything possible to minimize them. If you feel that you are prone to some disease, lower the risk by kicking bad habits, exercising regularly and switching to a healthy lifestyle in general. This will not only improve your overall quality of life but will also lower your life insurance rates substantially. Even if you are a woman, reading this, then you should think about improving your healthy lifestyle too as there’s no point in overpaying for insurance just because you have a bad habit like smoking that is hurting you in general.

Remember that lowering your insurance rates is possible, it only takes a few steps towards a healthier way of living your life that will pay off in the long run far beyond simple life insurance costs.

Some of you have probably heard of universal policies used for insuring life. What are they all about and what benefits do universal policies bring to their holders? Well, simply put, universal insurance polices are insurance products that provide coverage for a person’s entire life.

Universal insurance policies are a form of whole life products that most of you are quite common with. Term insurance policies provide coverage only for a specified period of time, whether permanent policies require you to pay premiums for the entire life and respectively provides coverage for as long as you live. It is important to understand this difference, because universal policies can be regarded as a combination of term insurance with some of the investment options provided only with whole life policies.

Universal insurance policies are a specific insurance product that targets certain groups of people, while other groups may think it’s useless for them. To make it clear to you, here’s a short explanation of a universal life insurance policy. Like any other insurance policy used for covering life, universal policies have death benefits that are paid out when the policy holder passes away. This is what both term and continuous policies provide. However, universal policies also incorporate an element, which is more common in continuous policies: an additional tax-free savings account. This account is used to accumulate money over a long period of time, which then can be employed for paying your insurance premiums instead of you. To put it in other words, your policy will start paying for itself over a certain period of time so you won’t have to pay premiums for the entire policy term. Besides, this money can be used for other purposes as well, without affecting your death benefit like in case of whole life insurance policies.

But not everyone will find such policies useful. Universal insurance policies are most useful for those who are looking for long term insurance services and plan to have coverage upon retirement. In order to accumulate any significant amount of money at your savings account within universal insurance you’ll have to pay insurance premiums for at least 15 years before getting any results. So anyone looking for less prolonged coverage plans or mortgage securing options should look into other insurance products or special investment tools, rather than universal policies. Otherwise, having such a policy for a long time will sure give you certain possibilities that other insurance products.

First of all universal insurance is a relatively cheap life insurance if compared to whole life policies. First of all, you don’t have to pay premiums over your entire lifetime as at a certain point when there’s enough money accumulated, the policy will start paying for itself. And it won’t affect your death benefits, like most whole life insurance policies do.

In order to get the most attractive and useful universal policy you should take your time and compare life insurance quotes for this specific product type. It really pays to shop around, because different companies have different rates and options for their universal insurance polices and you of course want to get the best product for the lowest price. Don’t hesitate to see what different companies have to offer and get the policy that attracts you the most.

Waterfront on New River

Heritage Estates Lot 46. 1.3 acres. 100 feet on the river. Anchored gazebo stays. Septic permit. Shared well. Graded and ready to build on. Paved road.

MLS Number: 54345
List Price: $110,000

Very nice lot on New River. Good neighborhood, paved road to lot. Over 100′ on river, has a new gazebo anchored on lot that stays. Septic permit has been pulled as per seller. Grading has been done and shared well on lot. Ready to build on.

Ashe County
Lot Size, Apx Acreage: 1.37
Type: Waterfront
Suitable Use: Residential
Topography: Level, Stream/Creek
Utilities: Total Electric
Water/Sewer: Community Water, Septic Tank
Road Frontage: Private Road, Paved Road
Miscellaneous: 1-5 Acres

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