It happens to everyone at least once — just when you think you are on top of your finances and your budget is flowing smoothly, disaster strikes. The size of the disaster may not be huge; it could just be a blown tire during your tightly budgeted vacation. Or it could be as big as the loss of a job, a house fire or a disabling health condition. Whatever your financial emergency, you can get through it if you have planned ahead and prioritize. (more…)

There are steps you can take to protect your assets so that upon your death your family will have clear access to as much of your estate as possible.

How you protect your children’s inheritance depends upon the kind of estate you have, and the resources you are able to utilise before your death to establish the appropriate instruments for the disbursement of your estate. (more…)

There have been many articles and books written about ways to lead a stress-free life, and a good many of those publications suggest lowering your cost of living as a good start.

For average or even high earners, lowering your cost of living is an immediate way to get more money. Also, by lowering our expenses we begin to think more about the things we are doing and spending our hard-earned money on. (more…)

The credit card statement may not be a welcome piece of mail in most homes, but if it is not checked correctly or thoroughly credit card holders could be incurring more costs than they realize.

At first glance the credit card statement can be confusing, but once you know what to look for you can save yourself money and even protect yourself against fraud.

First you’ll want to ensure that you look over the “purchases or new charges” section to review what you purchased over the previous period. Ideally you should keep your charge receipts for all purchases so that when you receive your statement you can check those charge slips against the charges listed on your statement. (more…)

Home loan approvals rose a little in March, after a slight drop in February, almost 20% up on the year. Mortgage lending has eased off as homeowners paid off debt.

Approved loans for house purchases rose to 34,905 in March from 33,360 in February and up from 29,212 in March 2009 according to The British Bankers’ Association.

The BBA said the figures indicated the effect of the reversal of a temporary increase in the property tax threshold at the start of the year. This had impacted the demand for home loans in February. (more…)