iinvest2earn

Unclaimed Money

2009-11-10T21:08:00.002+11:00

So many times I have heard on the news or today tonight about 'millions in unclaimed money'. Well tonight we have a great experience. My sister in law just recieved a letter from a company called 'Money Discovery' saying that she may have unclaimed money of $1240.47. They advised that they would charge an 8% recovery fee. Now on the whole there is no problem with this idea - infact I think it is a great business and one that I may look into doing myself, BUT instead of using the company we just looked it up ourselves on http://www.osr.nsw.gov.au/benefits/ucm/find/ (for NSW) another great place to look is https://www.edge.asic.gov.au/unclaimed/simplequery.html Check it out - could save you 8%.

Options 2

2009-11-10T20:44:00.003+11:00

Well, it has been a while since I have added anything. Basically we used up all of our internet download and I could not be bothered with the super slow connection. So we have signed up with TPG 100Gb - should keep us going for a bit. Also as a result of the slow connect have not managed to suss out the option trading yet. Will have to get into it this week. Interest rates only went up .25% so it looks like a while longer till we buy our new house.

Hard Slog -> Options

2009-11-02T20:58:00.001+11:00

Well, this journey that I am on is not any easy one (of course). For the last week or so I have not really been able to progress a lot of the ideas that I have wanted to explore. But finally a change. I have spent about 4 weeks trying to open an options trading account - and finally today - my account has been activated. I have no idea why it took so long, but now it is done. A silver lining though, the stock market has been pretty crazy for the last 5 or so trading days and tomorrow of course there will be an interest rate announcement (I am hoping it will go up .5 of a percent - but it is more likely going to be .25%). All of which points to a higher likelihood that I would have lost money. I will start paper trading this week and see how I go.

eTrade $550 worth of free trades!

2009-10-29T20:39:00.002+11:00

Well anyone who lives in Australia and is looking for an online broker, I recommend eTrade. I wish I could make some disclosure here that I was somehow making money out of this reccomendation, but alas I am not. If you know how I can - please email or post and let me know!! So someone I know has been using eTrade for over 12 months (but has not use any of the others) and found that the interface is good and that the research information made available to users is also good. So we have been investing on her account. The accountant advised that we should open a joint account. So we started opening another account with eTrade and we found the promo for $550 worth of trades! one word of caution though - you have to spend it by the end of December 2009. C'mon free trades!

All Ords

2009-10-29T20:35:00.002+11:00

Wow, the all ords is tanking. I have a reasonable amount of money in the share market (well a resonable amount for me anyway) and it has been taking a beating! It is one of those times that if I could go back in time I would go back and sell amost everything - except TLS (Telstra) which is gaining despite everyone else dropping. But then again, this is really the time to be buying. So we are currently thinking of buying some banks.

Online Surveys 2

2009-10-26T19:56:00.001+11:00

Seems I was mistaken, she has not earned $5 so far, she has earned absolutely zip! Anyway - good luck in the competitions.

Online Surveys

2009-10-26T19:20:00.002+11:00

Well, someone I know has seen a lot of feedback about making money through surveys. It seemed like a good idea - however so far it has been a lot of work and not a lot of reward. She estimates she has spent about 10 hours and earned about $5. Of course there is lots of potential to 'win' things but at the moment - unless you love surfing and filling surveys - it does not seem like good reward for effort.

The Richest Man in Babylon

2009-10-22T20:43:00.002+11:00

I like what you are doing here. One thought I had about 'the richest man in Babylon' was that the key message was to pay yourself 10%. But more recently (I read it more than 10 years ago) I think that they should have been explaining what to do with that 10% - ideally invest it into something that provides a low risk return - what ever that is depends on the person...I hope they did not actually say that - cause if they did I feel a bit silly for not getting it - as I would be much wealthier now! Basically I have been going for the minimum 10% of income investment for two years and I am liking it. But with the GFC income returns have been low, capital growth has been ok though.

The Book Keeper 2!

2009-10-22T17:54:00.002+11:00

Well, we met the book keeper. All seems a bit more daunting then first thought. We are going to spend about 4 hours on Sat just setting up for Tax. After talking for about 3 hrs we decided priority 1 is doing the books for tax. Priority 2 is setting up the books properly (more carefully) for the next tax year and priority 3 is setting up the 'budget'. Hopefully it all comes together pretty easily. So, slowly we are getting on the path.

Network Marketing 2

2009-10-19T20:47:00.002+11:00

Well, I have been thinking about network marketing and the AGEL opportunity I mentioned the other night and I am now thinking that I should say yes now! I want to do a bit of a review of the different 'markets' that I have looked into such as AMWAY and Nutrimetics. But for the moment if anyone is interested in joining AGEL (energy and vitamin gels - kinda Kool), then please email me I can join you up to a 'diamond level' upstream. For those of you groaning mmmm another 'network marketing blog' nooo, I won't be talking about it heaps. I will try and put it into a separate section for those that are interested.

House Valuation

2009-10-19T20:18:00.000+11:00

Robert Kiyosaki advises that you make your money when you buy something not when you sell it. I definitely agree with this – I put just as much energy into negotiating the price of things I buy down as I negotiate the price of things I sell UP! So I learned something very interesting today that should help us all – the people who do house valuations CAN be influenced. I live in a decent unit that has a decent view of the city BUT it is in a pretty depressed area. My bank said I had to have my unit valued for reasons I will explain some other time, the valuation came in at an amount about $30k below what I believe is a fair value. So I complained to the bank. The ‘said’ they spoke to the valuer and apparently they had done their due diligence very carefully and the valuation was correct. Well I was still dissatisfied and I asked them for their process for disputing their valuations, they wanted similar sales, with the process and the name and details of the selling agents. So I did this (which is exactly their job) and surprise surprise, they raised their valuation by $20k! YAY! So 1. don’t trust your bank / ‘the experts’. 2. YOU need to know your numbers and what things are worth.

The Book Keeper!

2009-10-19T19:10:00.000+11:00

Today I followed through on a peice of Robert Kiyosaki's advice. I organised a book keeper. "everyone needs one". Basically when I started asking around - a lot of my friends were saying things like - you should do it yourself - it is easy, etc. Well we meet / interview the book keeper tomorrow. I hope it does not take too long to get things happening - if nothing else I need get my tax done!

Network Marketing

2009-10-18T19:40:00.000+11:00

Well a friend of mine is quite successful in the network marketing area - he is doing 'Agel' which seems like a really good product. Sadly I don't feel that I would enjoy the network marketing environment. He has sent me copies of his cheques and the numbers are very big - like 20k-30k a month, wich is definitely fantastic money. So as they say in Agel, I am not saying 'no' I am just saying 'not yet'. Somehow I feel that there are more enjoyable ways to make money. I will need to add that as a dimension in my assement of various money making endevours. eg. with shares - basically I have either felt OK or Happy - but then again I think we were lucky because we bought in at the low end of the market and we seem to have had a pretty strong bull run for the last few months.

Passive Income

2009-10-16T21:59:00.001+11:00

So today I want to talk about passive income. Wow so many people have a lot to say about passive income. But I am not sure I agree with a lot of them. So what I will be doing is defining what I mean by passive income, I also have a feeling that I will start to use a different term as ‘passive’ not quite gel for me.
From the looking around that I have done, I think the term ‘passive income’ is used a lot because the American IRS use it as a defined term meaning: [Passive activities are trade or business activities in which you do not materially participate. In general, all rental activities are passive activities, even if you do materially participate. You materially participate in an activity if you are involved in the operation of the activity on a regular, continuous, and substantial basis] from: http://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc425.html accessed 16/10/09. Being an aussie I better check the ato site – they say: [passive income from investments such as rental property and share holdings or similar publicly traded investments that do not constitute a business.] http://www.ato.gov.au/businesses/content.asp?doc=/content/18059.htm accessed 16/10/09. Well they seem pretty similar. Hmm now that I have thought about it – my phraseology or nomenclature is basically irrelevant – or more likely incorrect and lead to paying more tax, because at the end of the day I want to end up with more income and paying less income – so the key thing would be for me to ensure I ‘learn the words’ as Robert Kiyosaki advises and use them to benefit me. Robert is interested in ‘passive income’ because it is taxed differently. So what I need to look at is the basic Australian tax structures and start form there.

A quiet day

2009-10-15T19:12:00.000+11:00

Well today I went ofr a job interview for another 'day job' seems I am not quite ready to live on the $2000 or so per year I get from investments. The interview basically wiped my whole day with no progress. Hopefully I will ave something to report soon. By the way no extra money made on the blog today either - but some good news - my blog from yesterday appears in googles blog search results - I am hoping that is a good start!

Money!

2009-10-14T18:11:00.003+11:00

Wow, it only took a few days - but I finally have some blog money. $3 over the last few days!!! I am hoping this is only the begining as I have the goal of a $100 check by Jan 2010.

Commercial Property

2009-10-14T18:10:00.000+11:00

So today I called my friend and he was asking me if I was interested in investing into some commercial property. Basically a factory unit. I would go in at a partial share – yet to be decided, and then his family company that he works for would rent it. So the two key questions that I am asking are, 1. What would be the return on the investment – I am hoping for at least 10% for it to be worthwhile. 2. How much do I need to outlay. Well I will be spending the weekend at my friends house as it is the Australian MotoGP at Philip Island and we basically watch it every year! I am sure we will be talking about this a lot!

Too much 'day job'

2009-10-11T19:57:00.000+11:00

Well, I have not posted anything for a few days. Basically I think it is a result of not recovering from the 'day job'. It is one of those ironic situations, if I don't put the effort into investing in alternate sources of income, then I will need to keep doing my 'day job'. BUT my day job takes a lot out of me which slows me down from investing. Well it is Sunday night and I am going to chill out and read some more of Robert Kiyosaki's book, Retire Young Retire Rich for inspiration.

Day 2

2009-10-07T20:33:00.000+11:00

Well today is day 2. Sadly earned = $0. I tried to check out my blog today at the 'day job' but no luck - could not find it in any search - will have to investimigate this a bit further tomorrow and see what the story is.

So what did I invest in today, well I have decided to develop a domain name registration reseller site. Basically this means if anyone wants to register a domain name - they can do it through my site. I am basically taking GoDaddy.com as my 'best practice'. I have found someone to do the coding for me - it should only take a week or so to get it going. Once I have progressed on this a bit more I will report back.

I have also sussed out a friend of mine who can host a 'wordpress' instance - this is basically a competitor blogging tool to google blogger. The thing is you need to be a bit tech savvy and I might not cut it. This will be a bit more of an experiment and is likely to take me months rather than weeks to progress on.

Well, that's it for me today - damn I forgot about the spelling again : (

Today's investment activities

2009-10-06T23:02:00.000+11:00

So today I have taken some big steps to create two new income streams.

First earlier today I met with a colleague at my 'day job' to discuss a container storage business.
Second I signed up to googles blogger - to create this blog - not that the blog itself will make me any money at this stage - but it is an 'enabler' for my third activity.
Third I 'monetized' the blog with google Adsense.
So as at close of business (cob) today (day 1) I have invested about 4 hours and according to my adsense report I have earned $0. I am hoping to make at least something by the end of the month and will aim to have my first $100 cheque sent to me by the end of Jan 2010. This is the minimum amount that google pays.

As I learn more about investing I will be blogging it here. So you are guaranteed to see some silly mistakes! Please swing by and have a laugh at me.

Hmm bugger I cannot find the spell checker - will stick it into word and do a spell check there - hope I don't loose the lot eeek.

Blog more tomorrow!

And so it begins

2009-10-06T22:12:00.000+11:00

Today is the day I finally begin a blog.