Debt Consolidation Credit Counseling In Phoenix

Many Indians living in the U.S. send money back to family in India. What are the easiest and safest ways to do that?

There are several ways to send money to India. The amount of time it takes, along with cost and level of security vary for each service.

On-line services such as ATM cash allow money to be transferred almost instantly.

On-line services allow you to transfer money to family in India 24/7 from your own computer and ensure that the money gets to the recipient as soon as possible.

Another way to guarantee a quick transfer of money to India is ensuring the recipient has an ATM or debit card. If the recipient is someone trusted, it's often useful for them to have a bank card linked to your checking or savings account.

As long as you are comfortable with the recipient having access to your account at all times, they could have a card and PIN number so that they could have access to cash through an ATM machine.

For situations where you do not want the recipient to have unlimited access to the money, a pre-paid debit card is another way to go. It works just like an ATM card except that it is loaded with a specific amount of money. The cardholder will have no access to funds until you have refilled the pre-paid debit card. At this time you could notify the recipient via phone that money has been added to the card.

Another way that many people find useful in sending money to India is through opening an account with a bank that has branches in both India and the U.S. This way you can ensure easier withdrawals or transfers.

The above steps are some of the ways that will help ensure that money arrives quickly when you need it and in the safest way possible.

Whether you are in your first 4 years of college or are attending graduate school you are paying several times more for your college education than your parents and grandparents paid. This increase makes it difficult for students. But there are programs out there that give much needed assistance.

Initially a college student may avail himself of many different programs to pay for college. There are student loans, grants and scholarships and some students must take advantage of all three.

The most common programs for students remain the unsubsidized and subsidized Stafford Loans. Subsidized loans are the most desirable, since the government pays the interest while the student is in school. But they are need-based. Unsubsidized loans are not need-based, making them available to a much wider group of students.

Here are some websites you can visit to see what you might qualify for: http://www.salliemae.com/get_student_loan/find_student_loan/undergrad_student_loan/federal_student_loans/stafford_loans/ and http://studentaid.ed.gov/PORTALSWebApp/students/english/studentloans.jsp

Graduate students have to work a bit harder for financial aid. Graduate school is more expensive and less scholarship opportunities are available. Typically a graduate student has to work as a research assistant or other employment related to their major to pay their tuition.

In recent times the PLUS loan program has been extended to graduate students. In the past this program was restricted to parents of undergraduate students. Now it has been expanded to include graduate students and rather than making the loan to parents the money is loaned directly to the student.

The Pluses of a PLUS loan

First, they're available. Since they're based on credit quality, not need-based, most borrowers can qualify. Relatively few grad students have had time to get into the credit binds that working adults often fall into. As a result, though their history may be sparse, they usually have few bad marks on their credit report. That makes the decision easier for college financial aid officials, who determine eligibility.

Are you starting a business but cannot raise the necessary capital to invest? Why not try to consider opening a self-directed IRA? This tool will let you finance a business with your retirement funds.

Have you heard about Guidant Financial and their offerings? Guidant Financial offers you the ability to set up and manage a self-directed IRA. In addition to that, it enables you to use your retirement funds to finance a business later. Financing a small business using retirement funds is now possible with Guidant Financial.

The popularity of self-directed IRA to finance small businesses catapulted the Guidant Financial Group from a mere start-up business founded last 2003 to a market leader in the industry of financing small business. This steady growth of the company enabled them to provide better control and services to their more demanding clients.

When looking for an instrument to invest with, Guidant Financial provides you with much greater control of your IRA using this self-directed model. A self-directed IRA model gives its policyholders complete control over where the money is invested in. Unlike most IRA where the money invested is trusted to an investment department or managers, you are given the opportunity to direct where your funds will be invested. You can venture in real estates or invest in private businesses you have already entrusted. And most certainly, you can have personal loans as well.

Guidant Financial also has an amazing product which allows you to invest your retirement funds for a new business venture. By investing them in a new startup or a franchise, they provide you more flexibility by eliminating the incurring distribution penalties. That's like working to grow your own business and have a direct positive effect on the value of your IRA.

This type of money management is not for everyone though. Many individuals especially with business background find this form of retirement vehicle more worthwhile to invest in. A lot of skeptics doubt the management of their IRA funds and they can't be blamed for that. With the proper skills and the knowledge, they believe that they are able to achieve much better interest gains in the long run. As an additional bonus, the freedom of controlling your IRA is definitely considered a great feature of this model according to most account holders. So get your IRA account in a self-directed model now.

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Offshore LLC's offer professionals the highest amount of asset protection available. Domestic LLC's do not offer the same all-inclusive coverage when compared to offshore providers. If you are thinking about an LLC, explore offshore providers and the international access to jurisdictions that they can provide. You will have much greater asset protection from an offshore provider.

LLC's (limited liability companies) were created in order to offer business owners a layer of protection by limiting their liability for the actions and debts of a company. Offshore LLC's offer an even greater amount of protection.

Both big businesses and small ones have struggled to find ways to protect their savings accounts, investments and other accumulated assets. International channels offer greater asset protection and are more competitively priced LLC's.

Overseas company incorporation can have numerous advantages. Jurisdictions across the nation compete in offering LLC packages. When selecting an offshore LLC provider, research the company in order to ensure that your assets will be secure.

When you decide that you need to protect your personal possessions from outrageous lawsuits and excessive claims it is time for offshore asset protection. Some professions carry much more liability than others. The following professions listed below are representative of the types of jobs that simply require an offshore LLC in order to save your assets from lawsuits. Furthermore, this list is not comprehensive and there are many different types of people who could benefit from the protection offered by an offshore LLC.

Members of the following professions can benefit the most from an offshore LLC: doctors, lawyers, pilots, accountants, veterinarians, consultants, and ship captains.

People with following circumstances should also consider the benefits of an offshore LLC: People with a large amount of assets, high profile individuals, high risk professionals, or those that are facing or planning on getting a divorce, both small and large business owners, and anyone else who is looking to protect their investments and the possessions that they have acquired.

Offshore service providers can direct you towards many overseas countries and areas that offer competitively priced offshore LLC formation. An all-inclusive offshore financial service provider selects specific jurisdictions because of their stability, privacy laws, low maintenance fees, ease of incorporation as well as tax reduction benefits.

Credit card fraud has hit new heights, with London being named as the credit card fraud capital of Britain for the second year running. Figures released by insurance company CPP showed that 38% of people had been victims of credit card fraud in 2008. In 12 months, almost three million people in the capital were affected " a third of all cases in Britain and a 10% jump on previous figures. The average amount stolen was 650, although some had lost considerably more. Often, victims were only made aware of the crime when they had been contacted by their bank and hadnt been aware up until that point that their details had been stolen.

These worrying statistics show just how easy it is for determined criminals to get access to sensitive personal details, pin numbers and credit card information. Online fraud is of particular concern for many people as millions of very convincing but utterly fraudulent emails are sent to accounts every day, pretending to be from legitimate banks and asking for customers to confirm their details. These emails " known as phishing emails " look like the genuine article and once a customer has responded to the request their details are in the hands of the criminals and the bank account starts to empty very quickly.

However, there is a very easy way to protect yourself against this kind of attack and that is never respond to any email asking you to confirm sensitive information. No bank will ever ask you to do this legitimately either by phone or by email, so you can be sure those that do are scams. If you have any doubts, contact your bank directly. The growth of online auction sites and Internet shopping has given criminals a new route into peoples personal details, but again it is fairly easy to carry out a few basic checks to ensure that the site you are using is secure. A secure site should have a URL address that includes the prefix https and a padlock icon in the bottom right hand corner of the screen. If these are missing then the site is unsecured and so are your credit card details.

Skimming credit cards has become an increasing problem in Britains busy high streets and 21% of credit card fraud is a result of this practice. The insertion of readers that skim the details of your credit card as you use an automatic cash dispenser or a small camera that photographs pin numbers as they are punched in are examples of increasingly high tech methods employed by fraudsters. If an ATM machine shows any indication of being tampered with, avoid using the machine and report your suspicions to the bank. Covering the keypad with your hand is a very low-tech way of beating any spy cameras that may be trying to photograph your pin number as you enter it.

One of the commonest mistakes people make is to have the same password for all their Internet activity. This is fine until that password becomes common knowledge to a fraudster. Avoid using obvious passwords such as pets names or birth dates as passwords " these are the first things that fraudsters will check and once they have access to your details it is easy for them to start using your credit card with impunity. The first you will know about it is a nasty shock when the next monthly bill arrives. However, by ensuring that your passwords are secure and unique you can foil the fraudsters before they take advantage of your credit card limit. These are all easily employed methods that anyone can use to beat the scammers, but what about the banks? What are they doing to ensure your details are safe?

After a flurry of reports about personal banking details being left in rubbish bags for refuse collection, the banks and financial institutions are now much more conscientious over the security of their customers details. They are also working much more closely with the Police serious fraud and high-tech units in an attempt to combat the rising tide of fraud and identity theft. It is a continuous battle as many of the fraudsters operate outside the UK. But by pulling together in a concerted effort perhaps the UK can shake off its reputation of being an easy target for the cyber-criminals and fraudsters and secure the general publics details from prying eyes.

The Applied Bank credit card is a secured card. This is how it works; you open an account with Applied Bank, you make a deposit, and you are then issued a credit card.

The deposit is designed to secure your account should it default. The limit on the card will be equal to the amount of the deposit, which can be between $200 and $5,000.

You will still have monthly payments and a fixed APR of 9.99%. Additionally your card will report to the credit bureaus.

Because your account is secured by the deposit, no one will be turned down and there is no credit check required. The annual fee for the card is $50.

This card is issued as a visa and is accepted everywhere the visa logo is displayed. By making on time monthly payments you will be able to create a trail of positive payments.

This can help repair a damaged credit score, but we also recommend that you eliminate negative information from your credit report.

Dont think that you just have to live with a poor credit rating; you may contact the credit bureaus to dispute the negative items and have them erased.

Contacting the credit bureaus to dispute derogatory entries is the most effective way to improve a low credit score. Many people believe that negative items must stay on your credit for seven long years.

However, this is completely untrue! According to The Fair Credit Reporting Act, seven years is the maximum amount of time that an item can remain on your credit report"no mention is made of a minimum amount of time.

Many debt collectors have been sued and forced to pay fines for violating this law by manipulating the system and leaving a negative mark on an individuals credit report for more than seven years.

In addition, it is common for credit reports to contain errors"in fact, estimates say that 25% of the population has inaccurate information on their credit report.

Despite the fact that having a credit card can help you build credit and have a positive reporting account, it is important to get rid of the harmful marks as well.

A lot of people underestimate the importance of your credit score, but a poor score can impact your employment, financial wellbeing and self-respect. There are few words more humbling than Im sorry, but youre declined being spoken by a loan officer.

However, it is still possible to live the lifestyle that you deserve. By building positive reporting accounts and eliminating the damaging items, you can achieve a higher credit score.

It is staggering to see the number of choices that you have for your next mortgage. Once you see how many different mortgages are out there, you may want to know which one is right for your particular financial situation. Selecting a great mortgage is complicated and you are going to have to plan to do a lot of research and calculations and then plan on spending a lot of time to get the best mortgage possible.

When going mortgage shopping, you are going to want to make sure that you have a budget made out. When making a new budget, plan for the expenses that come for a new house, including property taxes, insurance and repairs; also don't forget about your nest egg. You never know when something is going to come up and you will have to make repairs on your house, so be prepared. Once you have your budget on paper, you should be able to see how much money you can spend every month on a mortgage payment.

Now, take a look at how much your dream house costs and compare that to how much you can afford. If your dream house is a lot more expensive than your budgeted mortgage payments, you need to find a new house. Taking out a mortgage for more than you can afford, even if you take out a less than traditional mortgage is very risky and should be avoided. Remember, you are going to have to pay off this mortgage, so you need to be able to afford it. You may think that your income is going to grow in time to help you pay off your mortgage, but you shouldn't count on it and risk your house. By being more pessimistic about the future rather than optimistic, you are going to be sure that you always have enough money for your mortgage.

Now that you know how much you are going to borrow, you are going to want to answer the question of how long you plan on staying in your house. If you plan on only staying in your house a couple of years and then move to a bigger and better house, you are going to want to make sure that you get a mortgage that is going to be advantageous to you in the short run and less advantageous to you in the long run. An adjustable rate mortgage is going to do that - it is going to give you a lower rate of interest for the beginning period and then a higher rate later on. This is good for first time buyers who are buying a starter house, but plan on upgrading in a couple of years when they start their own family.

Finally, you have gotten to the point where you should talk to some banks. After you have figured out what type of house you want and what you can realistically afford each month, you will be able to get good recommendations from the banks on the best mortgage for your situation. Every bank should be open and honest about the fees, interest rate and monthly payment on their recommended mortgages. The thing that may surprise you is that you are paying a huge amount of interest with each monthly payment. If you can, make double payments whenever possible so that you can pay off your mortgage sooner. Making extra payments in the beginning of the mortgage really helps to pay off the principal of the loan.

To pick the right mortgage you are going to have to do research. The research that you do now is going to save you money and trouble for the next 30 years.

It is important to use retirement planning expense worksheets so that you can estimate what your expenses will be after you retire. You will be able to budget your monthly expense more wisely if you take advantage of retirement planning expense worksheets.

Retirement does not mean that you will not have to maintain your finances. The key to using retirement planning expense worksheets is project how much money you have today and how far that money can take you in ten, twenty, or thirty years from today. Retirement planning expense worksheets can educate you to how much your money can grow if you invest it in different ways.

A retirement planning expense worksheet will help you with your finances even now. It can help you organize and manage your finances today while you plan for tomorrow. There is no need to guess at how to handle your finances or how to plan for the future. With a good expense worksheet you can have total control with no guesswork.

A good spreadsheet helps you stay clear about what your financial situation is. If your goal is to maintain the same standard of living in your golden years as you are enjoying right now your expense worksheet can show you how to do that. It will help you identify areas where you may need to adjust your spending so that you can stay on track with your retirement goals. It gives you a clear view of the money you have coming in and what you are spending.

It is Wise to Plan for the Future

You will be educated and prepared on the reality of what inflation can do to your finances. You will have time to think about how to spend your money to make the most of it. You will be able to plan ahead on what to do if you come up short.

By planning ahead you take control of your finances and eliminate many unwanted surprises. You will be educated on how to handle the changing market and you will know how to adjust your finances accordingly. You will be planning for a happy, stress free financial future.

It is important to start now so that you can build a strong retirement plan. You do not want to be like so many people who reach the age of retirement unprepared and have to return to work just to take care of their necessities. With some planning and forethought you can avoid that outcome.

You may be like me and are tired of hearing about how bad the economy is in; however the truth is that most people are just learning that it is important to begin becoming debt free and to begin thinking differently about the money you make at your job. We as a society are so prone to spending all our money on material items as long as we can make the payments we do not care how much it costs.

This should not be the case if you are trying to learn how to become debt free. You have to begin to look at debt differently. You most likely work hard for your money and the last thing that you want to do is continue to give someone your money while you continue to be broke.

It is not easy to become debt free and it is going to you to begin thinking differently about what you spend your money on. However if you take the time to do that right now; then you will not have to worry about constantly worrying about how you are going to pay your bills.

You should become financially smart; this means that you should begin learning more about money. While you may think that you know everything that there is to know about it. The truth is that the wealthy people think differently about their money than you and I do.

Learning how to make your money work for you so that you do not have to continue to work hard your entire life is a huge thing. People who spend all their money right now when they are young are going to realize at a later date that they wish they would have learned how to be smarter. No one is going to take care of you when you get old; so it is up to you to find out how.

Stop watching so much television and get your hands on some financial books that will show you how to handle your money and begin leveraging it to work for you. When your children notice that you are investing and saving your money; then they are going to learn how to do exactly what you do when they become older. Your children mirror exactly what you do so begin teaching them good values that will help them.

Becoming debt free is not a dream and with the right attitude and the ability to learn about why you are facing this situation; you can literally change your financial future. Visit our site below and get all the information that you need to help you stay out of debt forever.

It may not be the most absorbing of topics but if you have a burglary or all the food in your freezer spoils, you will be glad you had the foresight to arrange a house insurance policy. If you own your house, you may be offered a joint policy that covers both the building and the contents as well although this may not be worth it if you rent where you live.

While you are searching for the ideal house insurance, it would be a good idea spending some time going around your household making up a written inventory of all your most important personal things. An elementary way to do this is to carry out a walk-through of your home with a camcorder if you have one or a digital camera if not and take pictures of the rooms and the contents. In combination with the written stock, this makes a superb record of your house and possessions. Nevertheless, you should not overlook the need to keep your household insurance current so any new items must be added to the list and pictures taken as soon as possible.

Luckily these days, most insurance companies are able to supply quotes online so you can compare a number before determining which one suits your circumstances best. The advantage of getting an immediate online quote is that insurance quotes from major providers are brought to your computer screen in a matter of a few seconds. house insurance plans bought online are normally supplied at a discount rate owing the fact that the companies involved have lowered their expenses by supplying these products without the need of premises and a large number of staff. The insurance company you pick out should have a good name as well as be competitive so it is well to be comfortable about this from the beginning.

Insurance firms call the amount they protection as the sum assured and this amount is the most they will pay out on your plan should you make a claim for total loss through damage, accident or burglary. The sum assured is often worked out by the insurance supplier for you based on figures for replacing the contents of an average house.

Although the contents of your household may all be important to you, remember your policy will not always cover all of your personal possessions. household workers for instance should be conscious that stock used to run that business from home is not always addressed as standard. Also, if the sum assured does not cover high value possessions, such as jewelry and electronic equipment, you may have to pay extra on your house insurance plan to insure them at the level you require.

Insurance providers normally call for particulars of specific items that may not be covered by their standard policy so be aware of this before committing yourself. Many people who work from home are caught out by this as business stock is not usually covered automatically. High value items such as jewelry and electronic stock are often not included in the house insurance and may have to be addressed at additional cost. The household owner should be conscious that whatever the stipulations of the insurance plan, it is the household owner who is responsible if a claim is denied for something that the policy does not provide for so it is important that these issues are verified in advance of any decision being made.

More investors as of now want a safe yet innovative option to invest for their retirement in the near future. With the baby boomers having the most influence in the economy today and they are retiring soon, this market of investment-seekers are going to grow dramatically even with the gloomy financial outlook.

Guidant Financial, as the leader in providing self-directed IRA services today, allows investors the control to make alternative investments in real estate, franchises, and businesses. The company, along with most financial services firms, anticipated the significant downturn in their business. But the trend in their business analysis shows that the traditional financial turmoil appears to encourage many investors to consider other platforms of investments for their security in their retirement. People have been traumatized by the meltdown in the real estate market and the volatility of the stock markets. With the instability in these markets, many people are avoiding the traditional securities markets altogether. People are more intelligent right now with their money and wanted a new and secure way of controlling their assets. This is probably the driving force behind the staggering growth of the Guidant Financial Group.

More investors are afraid of investing further and some are deciding to transfer their retirement savings out of the stock market. These investors are looking for other asset classes offering better control and monitoring for their money. They found that self-directed IRAs offer them the chance to control their investments without first committing to a specific investment. This concept, though had been there for a long time, was not very much promoted due to the absence of middleman profits for financial companies. Now, it has steadily gained some popularity since last year.

Guidant Financial Group's self-directed IRA is a form of retirement account where the investor has the ability to invest in both traditional and non-traditional assets. Most Guidant clients prefer to invest in rental properties or private loans. Similarly, they also considered private stock and tax liens with a little education in these fields. These alternative investments generated cash-flow opportunities making them a very attractive option for those retiring soon.

With more direct form of management, they have saved a few thousand of dollars from holding and administrative fees. They also monitored personally where their money is invested. This is peace of mind for most of them. This is the major reason behind the unexpected growth in Guidant's self-directed IRA business.

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Living with the stress of your big balances from your credit cards is simply annoying. Another thing you worry about now is that you are getting a little unhealthy and you don't have savings in case you get sick. You probably have been living the life with a deadly combination of overspending using your cards and eating unhealthily outside.

Eating in our favorite restaurants or fast foods most of the time is one of the most common causes of health problems in our modern times. When ordering your favorite meal at your fast foods, you are unaware of the contents of those foods like trans fats and added saturated oils. In the long run of eating these foods, you are getting yourself sicker and sicker everyday.

We have not yet discussed how these fast food stuffs actually make your wallet thinner every time. The answer to these problems is eating at home. Some people would say they don't know how to cook or they don't have the time to do all these things. If one will just skip the TV for a few hours, you will find more time preparing your food and making your life healthier. This does not even include yet the bonding time you can share while cooking or eating together.

By beginning to prepare more meals at home, you will require yourself of honing your cooking skills. This skill is very important for entertaining your guests during parties and is a necessity these times of crisis. Rather than eating out, you prepare your own food and actually monitor what you eat. So you can go back to losing some extra weight again.

The other advantage of preparing more meals at home is that it is cheaper. And you will finally use that cookware you have been keeping all this time because you just used it a few years back. By doing the grocery with a plan of the weekly meals to be prepared, you get yourself restrained with a budget you can stick with.

With only the electricity you will use in preparing for your food and the groceries, you will definitely save thousands of dollars in a year. Reserve the eating out sessions for some special occasions. And it will definitely make you healthier because you will make sure you are only serving the right food in your table. In hindsight, it will even save you from that hospital bills you expect. Get debt-free today with tips on how to get rid of debt here.

For information on how to get rid of debt, go to http://www.Howtogetridofdebt.net/ by Paul J. Easton.