Archive for December 2008

Steps to Financial Freedom, Step 6

31. December 2008 by admin.

HAPPY NEW YEAR’S EVE!

Here’s Step 6 from Dave Ramsey’s The Total Money Makeover

Get financially ultra fit and 100% debt free. Pay off your mortgage early.

Imagine the day when you can say to yourself. You have no debt, nada, zip, zilch. Nothing. No credit cards, No student loans. No nothing.

What joy! It can happen. For many people, the mortgage is the single largest payment they will ever have. Imagine the feeling when you make that LAST MORTGAGE PAYMENT. To get to this point you will have to round up all your extra money: after saving 15% for retirement, after having three to six months expenses, and after stashing away college money for your children.

You can do it.

Yes you can.

Many scoff at this step by saying: “Why pay off your mortgage when you can have the benefits of deducting the mortgage interest on your taxes every year?”

Let’s reason together, shall we?

Why pay $5,000 in interest to a bank each year just so you won’t have to pay $1,500 in taxes to the government. Sit down and do the math with your own mortgage interest payments and tax savings. Does it make sense for you?

So start paying down that mortgage principal and before you know it. You’ll be coasting on to the final step to financial freedom.

Update: Don’t forget to sign up for my bi-monthly newsletter. You’ll get important updates and the chance to enter free contests designed exclusively for my newsletter subscribers. To sign up send an email to info@preslaysa.com and write “Newsletter Sign Up” in the subject line.

Posted in Finances | Print | No Comments »

Steps to Financial Freedom, Step 5

29. December 2008 by admin.

Here we go again!

Check out Dave Ramsey’s book “The Total Money Makeover” for an in depth explanation of this and the other steps to financial freedom.

Step 5: Fully fund Education Savings Accounts and/or utilize 529 plans.

Definition of a 529 plan: an education savings plan operated by a state or educational institution designed to help families set aside funds for future college costs. It is named after Section 529 of the Internal Revenue Code which created these types of savings plans in 1998.

Definition of an Education Savings Account: a tax advantaged investment account designed to encourage savings to cover future education expenses. It is found at Section 530 of the Internal Revenue Code.

In other words, start stashing away money for your children’s college, even if they are infants. In fact, infanthood (Is that a word?) is the best time to start saving for your children’s education. The earlier you start the more attention you’ll be able to give to funding your children’s education. Using 529 plans or Education Savings Accounts will assist with this. These plans have certain income limits and/or fees so check the fine print before you sock your money into these types of accounts.

Visit http://www.irs.gov/ for the latest tax information regarding these types of accounts. And if you are worried about investing your children’s education money in stocks, I suggest putting them in safer, cash type investments while still using the 529 or Education Savings Account vehicle.

Update: Don’t forget to sign up for my bi-monthly newsletter. You’ll get important updates and the chance to enter free contests designed exclusively for my newsletter subscribers. To sign up send an email to info@preslaysa.com and write “Newsletter Sign Up” in the subject line.

Posted in Finances | Print | No Comments »

BOOK REVIEW: “Havah, The Story of Eve” by Tosca Lee

26. December 2008 by admin.

Nav Press Publishing, October 10, 2008
This masterpiece by talented Christian author Tosca Lee tells the story of Adam and Eve (known as ‘Havah’ in the book) through Eve’s eyes. Lee takes the reader through Eve’s eyes. Lee takes us from Eve’s ecstasy as she walks with God in the garden and enjoys a ‘one flesh’ relationship with Adam to the damning choice that causes her to deteriorate in a decaying world.
I rarely read fiction that causes me to weep. This is one of those jewels. I was sobbing throughout, especially at the end. After years of living as a Christian, I can count on my fingers the times I’ve felt tangibly close to God. This was one of them. I even came to understand why God gave us to have the choice to eat the ‘forbidden fruit.’ Real love begins when a human, in their fallen state and living in a fallen world, can still look beyond their five senses and choose God. Real love begins when that same God humbles himself, choosing to experience life and redemptive death through a human’s five senses, thus restoring our relationship with Him.
Philippians 2:5-9 (NASB) says:
“Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name,”
Havah is the best book I’ve read in 2008. Italso earned a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly, so if you get a chance. Add this one to your reading list. It’s well worth it.
Visit the Tosca Lee’s website at http://www.toscalee.com/ and her blog at http://www.toscamoon.blogspot.com/

Posted in Book Reviews | Print | 1 Comment »

| Next Entries »