Investing in a second home

MANILA, Philippines—The Clubhouse appears to be the fruit of a million dreams, what with serene and beautiful mountain scenery overlooking the sea. In fact, singers Regine Velasquez and Ogie Alcasid chose that venue for their wedding.

Developed by Landco, “The Peak at Terrazas de Punta Fuego” is an intimate 12-hectare development and is one of the highest elevations in the area; at the same time, it nestles the morning sun on its lap.

The village is located in Nasugbu, Batangas, and it is easy to imagine the place as a vacation home for those who have more than enough, rather than a primary home for the average Pinoy. It is also a possible choice for an investor looking to buy a second home in the Philippines.

The decision to buy another house is a personal one and may include all sorts of reasons, not necessarily logical. However, for those who are looking at real property as potential investment, there also arises a need to quantify the decision.

Reversal in the US

In certain parts of the United States, there has been a reversal of property values that has completely altered lifestyles and investing habits. A few decades back, Americans could count on rising property values as a tool for getting richer or at least, a nest egg for their retirement. There was also the previous trend of purchasing subsequent homes because many Americans could easily sell property at attractive prices and move on to the next new house.

Nowadays, the apparent trend is toward building smaller homes, sometimes just the size of one room. Since the mortgage mess, many have had a hard time keeping up with mortgage payments, so they downsize instead.

A lot of luxury vacation homes are also available for sale in the market. For a certain income bracket, however, it is also an opportune time to purchase a second home given the low market values. The same is true in the Philippines.

Good time to buy?

MoneySense Editor Heinz Bulos explains, “A good time to buy a second home is when interest rates are low, like this year. This will allow you to lock in a low, fixed rate for a 25-year mortgage. This kind of rate environment exists during relatively stable economic periods, which also affect the robustness of the real estate market. So if the economy is doing well, like these days, it’s a good time to buy a second home, especially a new one. You don’t want to buy when there’s an economic crisis with spiraling interest rates and real estate projects getting stalled.”

When asked how to ascertain if buying a second home is a real investment or not, Bulos replies, “Consider a second home an investment only when you plan to make money off it, either by renting it out or selling it after several years when its market value appreciates. Otherwise, even though it’s an asset that increases your net worth, unless it’s converted into cash one way or another, it’s just a non-earning asset.”

Investing in a second home is not only calculated by numbers but is also based on a person’s need and lifestyle. Nevertheless, it is sometimes hard to say when the real needs end or if the investments pay off in the future. The growing trend toward simpler living further necessitates a re-evaluation of real estate choices, one that has long-term consequences.

Differing semantics can be confusing but the bottom line translates to weighing your decisions with utmost care.

Marie Cancio, who comes from a family of architects, suggests that you buy the second home you really want to live in so that in case you need to sell, it will be marketable. She adds, “Don’t just buy and make your money sleep. A house is a liability, not an asset.”

Source http://www.inquirer.net/

Selling technique, that's a phone call away: Young Turks

Young Turks brings you India�s young entrepreneurial talent from the length and breadth of the country. Young Turks tutorial gives a young start-up a chance to be mentored live on television. The YT Buzz will tell you everything that is hot and happening in the world of entrepreneurship.

Girish Batra makes money by getting you to make money. He started Net Ambit in 2000. Essentially, it is a company that retails financial service products. Today, he sales everything from insurance schemes to pension plans to mutual funds. He has got about 4000 employees and is spread across 150 locations. He has got Rs 100 crore in funding and is looking at going public until 2014.

Girish Batra is the one who created Net Ambit, a financial services company that has turned in revenues for over Rs 100 crore since its launch in 2000. His company has 1.5 lakh customers every year on its platform. Now, Girish has plans to take Net Ambit towards Rs 350 crore venture and also explore a potential listing by 2014.

From being a salesman going door to door to building over Rs 100 crore financial services venture, Girish Batra has come a long way. Breaking away from the traditional sales approach, Girish believed that an efficient selling technique was just a phone call away.

Cold calling potential customer to sell financial services products, Girish along with his co-founders launched Net Ambit in 2000. Retailing insurances, home loans, pension plans or credit cards, Net Ambit plans to dial in turnover of Rs 160 crore by this fiscal.

CNBC-TV18�s Shruti Mishra hits the road to find out more about Girish Batra and Net Ambit.

Below is the verbatim transcript of the interview. Also watch the accompanying videos.

Q: What made you believe that the combination of retail and financial services would work?

A: We realised as an organization that there is a big gap in the market. The financial services sector was opening up and there were lot of products and brands available in the market. It was a new experience for Indian consumer who are largely being used to dealing with PSU Banks or PSU life insurance companies.

We thought it would be a good idea to try out financial services for market model, wherein we would reach out to the consumers and explain to them what those products are all about and offer them the options.

Q: Why is there a need for a third party like Net Ambit, because financial institutions themselves have a reach to their own consumers? Why the need to partner with you?

A: If I wouldn�t take a home loan and walk into a bank branch, I would get to see only the particular loan that the bank is offering. There are internet savvy consumers today who can go to internet and compare various brands, whereas for a typical tier-II, tier-III or tier-IV town consumers who is not internet savvy, our company comes into the picture.

Q: Have you created a one stop shop for financial services products? How do you push customers? How do you target your customers that this particular brand will work for them? How do you sell particular policy to your customers? Is there any arrangement for that?

A: We are brand agnostic. We give options to the consumers. We aware the consumers about the pros and cons of every brand available with us and then, we let the consumer help in deciding what brand suits them the best. We don�t push any specific brand, be it on the insurance, mortgage or the corporate FD side.

Q: Forbes has called you the kings of non-affinity. How do you go and get a client?

A: Forbes has referred to our direct marketing model, wherein they have referred to us as kings of non-affinity, which is a very unique model. We have call centres which work on a cold database, wherein we take anybody. We believe that every Indian household needs some kind of a financial product.

Any cold database, any name and number is good enough for us. We call out on those numbers and try to assess the need for the consumer or their family. There is a process involved in making a very high quality lead. There are multiple rounds of discussion with the consumer.

Once our supervisors believes that it is high quality lead, that lead is then sent to the market to our feet on streets. They meet the client as per appointment. We get as high as 50-60% conversion on those leads. We have more than 200 members strong co-sales service team which focuses on this.

We ensure that there is no inconvenience caused to the consumer. We do the complete coordination like fixing an appointment with the doctor or with the consumer. In most of the cases, our person will go with the consumer to the doctor�s place for getting the medical start.

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Source http://www.moneycontrol.com

Mobile home park residents challenge rent control changes

CAPITOLA -- The city has received a petition calling for the repeal of recent changes to its rent-control ordinance, and if the signatures are confirmed, the City Council will have to approve the repeal or allow Capitola voters to decide.

A decade-long battle between the city and mobile home park owners over rent control seemed to reach a crescendo March 18, when the council voted to amend its ordinance, allowing for incremental rent increases and total decontrol when a current resident leaves the park. The decision was driven by a desire to reach a settlement agreement with Ron Reed, the owner of Surf and Sand Mobile Home Park, who had filed two lawsuits.

But the park's residents had one last recourse, filing a petition challenging the amended ordinance. They went door-to-door gathering signatures, and five minutes before the 5 p.m. Mondaydeadline they delivered the petition to repeal the changes to the city clerk. The residents gathered 875 signatures, well over the 400 required.

"There wasn't much else we could do," said Surf and Sand resident Shirley Hill, 80. "Either we get the petition signed and let the people vote on whether they want this mobile home park to stay here or not, or we file a lawsuit. We are mostly low-income people. We can't afford a lawsuit."

Mayor Dennis Norton said there was "no chance" the council would repeal the changes, and if the petition is verified, the issue will be left up to Capitola's voters.

doesn't have any support except for some people in the mobile home parks," Norton said. "The community doesn't support it, and if the ordinance is repealed, we would be facing millions of dollars in litigation costs again. Then we will have to start by cutting major services that affect all our residents to find the money."

Councilman Sam Storey was not as quick to rule out a repeal, saying the council would have to review the issue again once the petition is verified.

Both the city clerk and city attorney will review the petition to ensure signatures were gathered appropriately. Also, the county elections department will check the signatures to make sure they come from registered Capitola voters.

Reed, like many mobile home park owners, has argued that rent control prevents him from getting a fair return on the property his family has owned for more than five decades. The changes to the ordinance were implemented to reach a settlement with Reed, whose two lawsuits challenge the city's decision to deny an application to close the park and the city's denial of an application to subdivide the mobile home park.

Capitola has spent more than $1.22 million to defend its rent-stabilization ordinance against various lawsuits, City Manager Jamie Goldstein said. About a third of the money for that defense has come from a mobile home administrative service fee paid by Capitola's mobile home park residents.

Reed was seeking $27 million in damages, a staggering figure for a city that has an operating budget of $12.3 million for 2010-2011.

The Surf and Sand residents' attorney, William Constantine, said the city is likely to win the two lawsuits based on previous court decisions, and that the cost of going to trial is not as steep as the $1 million the city projects.

The majority of Surf and Sand residents pay between $260 and $400 in monthly rent. Under the agreement, all rents would jump to at least $475 while low-income residents would be offered a minimum of a 34-year lease and rents will go up based on the consumer price index each year.

Moderate income tenants would have their rents raised to market level over an eight-year period.

If a resident terminates the lease and leaves the park, rent for that space could be raised to fair market value. Because the owner could raise rents to market level once a coach is sold, residents say all equity in their homes is lost because potential buyers would balk at both a high rent and a mortgage.

"There are a lot of people's lives involved here," said Surf and Sand resident Jack Alsman. "A lot of people don't have other places to go. I'm 65 and my plan when I bought this place in 1982 was to retire here. I'd probably be forced out of here if the ordinance stands."

Source http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/

The Last Place She Expected to Be

“I’m beginning to feel more and more like I’m in the wrong place,” my mother said.

As was so often the case, she was the first to note this out loud, although my brother Michael and I knew it and were alternately pretending otherwise and making random stabs at solving the problem. In consultation with an elder care lawyer, my brother tried to make sense of New York State Department of Health regulations involving assisted living, “enriched” housing and adult care homes. Which was my mother actually in? We didn’t have a clue.

And why were they prohibiting us from hiring private-duty help for her or from even providing her with a wheelchair so she could get to meals and to the bathroom without falling?

Unbeknownst to us, we had chosen for my mother an assisted living facility licensed to provide extra care in only one way: We could sign a new lease for “enriched” housing, at monthly prices ranging from $150 to $1,150 on top of her current rent. This would buy her up to 10 hours a week of personal care, although she could never receive more than four consecutive hours.

Otherwise she was on her own or one of us had to be with her. Anyone needing more attention than that was expected to move to the on-campus nursing home. That place made me shudder and eventually prompted an epiphany on elder care.

When shopping for an independent living, assisted living or continuing care retirement community, focus on the nursing home that is either affiliated with or part of the facility. If you can’t imagine your mother or father winding up there, look elsewhere. This requires that you imagine the worst-case scenario, which nobody wants to do. But only by doing that can you be sure your parent will be spared moving to a completely new setting every time her condition deteriorates.

“Aging in place” is the mantra of elder care, ideally at home or in one facility that will serve your needs forever. It rarely happens. Things change. In the trade, moves are known to cause “relocation trauma,” physically and emotionally, for the frail elderly person, already sick and scared, and for the adult children, who must orchestrate everything.

As my mother deteriorated in her assisted living facility, I got her three hours a week of personal care. It wasn’t nearly enough. Many nights she couldn’t make it to the dining room on her walker. But getting her the wheelchair she needed would put her on the fast track to the unthinkable nursing home there.

Was there a chair we could borrow on difficult days, I asked? The facility had two, I was told. One had to be kept in the office for emergencies, and the other could be borrowed by signing up for it during regular business hours, a day in advance. So I would have to know by 5 p.m. Tuesday, say, that my mother was going to need the chair to get to dinner on Wednesday. Or maybe Wednesday’s dizzy spell counted as an emergency? But no. The emergency chair had to stay in its place. It all had a “Catch-22” quality.

I didn’t sign up for more hours of help because I was worried about money. The idea of going broke haunted me. At night, when I couldn’t sleep, I calculated when she would run out of money, then calculated when my brother and I would run out of money if we had to pay all the bills.

Consumed by worry, I felt work was the one safe place — but only so long as I wasn’t at my desk, where the phone rang incessantly. My sturdy, independent mother was now in perpetual meltdown. She was petrified, losing control of everything all at once, humiliated, enraged. The mood swings from sweet-and-grateful mom to it’s-all-your-fault mom destabilized me as nothing ever had before. I had reached a point of desperation. I needed help.

I had no right to expect someone to fix in short order a situation that had been deteriorating for months. But one day, in a conference room at a geriatric care management agency, that is essentially what I asked. At the table were one of the owners and a social work supervisor. I told them our story, of choosing an assisted living facility that could neither fill my mother’s needs nor let me hire someone to fill them. I told them I was coming unglued.

The two professionals agreed that the most important task was to find an appropriate facility. First, however, they’d broker a deal for her to get the help she needed in her current situation: they’d instruct her assisted living facility that safety laws, and my mother’s changed status, required 24-hour care and a wheelchair until we could find a suitable new home. Michael and I would go look at a highly regarded nursing home and an assisted living facility that accepted residents with live-in aides and wheelchairs.

They explained the pros and cons, financial and otherwise, of a nursing home versus an assisted living apartment with 24/7 help. They seemed to be leaning toward a nursing home because there, should my mother run out of money, as she likely would, her care would be paid for by Medicaid. In an assisted living facility, someone who can’t pay her own way must leave.

Things moved quickly now, but without that heady, anything-is-possible rush I remembered from the weeks surrounding my mother’s return to New York from Florida. Nine months had chastened all three of us.

I wouldn’t say we were smarter, only that we knew how much we didn’t know. Also, we were well on the way to changing our definition of success. My mother was never again going to have the life she had in Florida. She was never again going to be self-sufficient, independent of her children’s interference, and we were never again, until her death, going to be free of the responsibility for her well-being. Three people who were family more in name than in fact, not estranged but certainly distant from each other’s day-to-day lives, were now working in harness, our goal a safe harbor in which my mother might live out her dwindling days.

Michael and I went to see the Hebrew Home for the Aged, on the banks of the Hudson River in Riverdale, N.Y. We intended to look at a small assisted living building on the main campus, even now clinging to the reluctance of adult children to “put away” their parents. But it was already inadequate to her needs.

Instead we toured the skilled nursing floors, each with 48 residents, two R.N.’s and six certified nurse aides. The admissions director, unbidden, said the ratio of aides to residents was “never enough.” Her honesty was appealing.

Our next stop was another assisted living facility, also in Riverdale, run by a corporate up-and-comer in the field. This was one of their newer properties, less than half full. A pushy sales person offered a discount on a one-bedroom apartment, with room for a live-in aide, $3,295 a month, rather than the list price of $3,650. Warning bells went off. The speil continued, but we weren’t listening.

Our minds were made up. Hebrew Home it would be. This was the most important decision we had made so far, and my brother and I found ourselves utterly in harmony, led to it as we were by my mother’s clear head. Rather than balk at our clumsy efforts to be good children, she had given us permission to do the unthinkable. She would go to a nursing home after all.

Source http://newoldage.blogs.nytimes.com/

Make Money From The Stock Market With These 7 Free How To Videos.

OnlingTradingCash.com announces the release of 7 free videos that assist investors with making money from the stock market.
(Celina, TX - April 29, 2011) - OnlineTradingCash.com has released 7 free videos for investors that want to learn how to ma

Online PR News – 30-April-2011 –OnlingTradingCash.com announces the release of 7 free videos that assist investors with making money from the stock market.

(Celina, TX - April 29, 2011) - OnlineTradingCash.com has released 7 free videos for investors that want to learn how to make money from the stock market and cash in no matter if the market is Bullish or Bear. "Stock and options trading are a great vehicle to make a full time income from home if you know what you are doing", comments Mike Meares, owner of OnlineTradingCash.com.

"That is why my company put together 7 outstanding videos that walk through how many home grown investors are making money from the stock market." These videos are offered from his site located at http://www.onlinetradingcash.com.

Mike went on to say, "there are many people that want to learn how to use the Stock Market as a vehicle to make a monthly income, but they are nervous because of all of the so-called risks. Building a trading business and managing by the numbers helps reduce these risks greatly and can provide a simple method to making money monthly and even daily."

As a matter of fact, one of the videos covers the four risk that one needs to be concerned with and how to avoid them. Each video provides insider information that provides insight money making stock and option trading strategies for the non-professional.

Making Money From The Stock Market Videos That Are Included For Free.

- Stock Trading as a Business.
- Profitable Positions.
- What is the Goal of the Stock Option Trading Business?
- The 4 Risks of this Business and How To Avoid Them.
- Expiration Week and Options Positions.
- How To Make Money in the Stock Market
- How to Make a Guarantee Profit By Locking in Profits.
- Market are in Turmoil and How To Profit From It.

All of these stock market and option trading videos are delivered online on high speed servers. The quality is outstanding and the information is enlightening. Visit http://www.onlinetradingcash.com to get instant access to these videos.

Source http://www.onlineprnews.com/

How to Make Money Online, for Free

A common trend amongst teenagers these days to earn money online. An easy way to do that is by writing online. Making big followings can attract advertisers and promoting products of others can help one earn commissions. One just has to sign up at a free website and can earn money for reading emails, taking surveys, writing newsletters, joining sites, promoting sites, posting on blogs and playing online games. This is an easy way to make money, even for those who do not have proper skills.

Online surveys are very easy. Selecting a right paid survey site and answering some questionnaires can help one earn. There is variety of topics from shopping to politics and doing this can easily give you a healthy pocket money.

People having interest in photography can earn online too by selling their photographed pictures to interested buyers. Photo collection agencies have made it very easy for pictures to reach people who are interested in them. Agencies usually tend to offer money in exchange for photos.

If one cannot write, design or even do coding, even he does not need to worry anymore because now they can earn online too, just by researching for those who do not have time to do the researches by themselves.

Providing support and service to webmasters is another way of earning online for all those who have know-how about web designing. A good knowledge of coding, and you’re highly demanded by the market.

Transcription, a process of converting data from one medium to another, is also a good source of earning online. E.g. writing oral statements made by medical experts or doctors. It includes history and physical reports, clinical notes, consultant notes, reports, letters, psychological tips etc. Medical transcription is a career that can easily be done from home.

The last but not the least way to earn online is by giving virtual assistance to companies who do not prefer hiring full time employees. They expect you to handle their work from home, just like an assistant or secretary would have done for them, and they pay you a good amount.

Source http://www.trcbnews.com/

D.R. Horton profit rises on tax benefit

(Reuters) - D.R. Horton Inc (DHI.N) reported higher-than-expected margins on Friday as the economies of scale associated with being the biggest U.S. homebuilder helped to offset weak home-buying demand.

Horton's gross margins of 16.2 percent are helping it make money despite stiff price competition from cut-rate foreclosures and short sales that are depressing housing prices as the downturn nears its fifth anniversary.

Margins were down from last year's 18 percent, but still higher than most analysts expected.

Horton, which has operations in 26 states, reported earnings of $27.8 million, or 9 cents per share, for the second quarter ended March 31, up from $11.4 million, or 4 cents per share, a year earlier.

Wall Street analysts had expected a loss of 5 cents per share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

The profit included a tax benefit of $59.2 million because of a favorable ruling from the Internal Revenue Service that allows them to stop paying a certain reserve, spokeswoman Jessica Hansen said.

Without one-time items like the tax ruling, the company would have reported earnings in-line with Wall Street's expectations, wrote Wells Fargo analyst Adam Rudiger.

Second-quarter revenue fell 18 percent to $733 million, and orders declined by 23 percent to 4,943 homes. In 2005, a peak year for homebuilding, the company sold more than 21,000 homes in the Southwest alone.

Orders are a leading indicator for builders, which do not recognize revenue until they close on a home.

LONG SLOG, EASIER COMPS

U.S. single-family home prices fell for the eighth straight month in February, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller composite index, which showed a year-over-year decline of 3.3 percent for 20 cities.

Horton says the road to recovery will be a long and tough slog.

"The homebuilding industry over the next two to three years will be very similar to what it has been for this year, with the potential for slight improvements but not significant improvements," said Chief Executive Officer Don Tomnitz on a conference call with analysts.

Investors give Horton's management a premium for being more realistic and accurate in its assessment of the duration and severity of the downturn, said FBN Securities analyst Joel Locker.

The company's business model focuses on lower-end homes for first-time homebuyers, which means it benefited more than many of its peers from the federal home buyer tax credits that expired a year ago.

As a result, Horton faced difficult comparisons that will ease in the second half of the year. In its second quarter last year, orders rose 55 percent.

The easing of those comparisons in the second half of the year sets the company up for an improved perception of its prospects that should translate to gains in share price, said ITG analyst Demir Gjokaj.

"This is going to be the last quarter for Horton for truly bad trends" in revenue and order declines, he said. "From now on, it'll be slow growth."

Shares of Horton were up 2.9 percent at $12.45 during morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

Source http://www.reuters.com/