Is A Bad Credit Rating A Good Thing?

Could a bad credit rating save you from bigger problems? It has done just that for many young people. How can this be? I'll start with a true story.

A Good Credit Rating Story

A friend, whose name I will withhold, started his adulthood with good credit. He soon was able to get credit cards at will, and finance cars, snowmobiles and more. He managed to make the payments on his debt, and went deeper and deeper into debt while he was at it. By the time he was 30 years old, he had over $20,000 in credit card debt, plus loans on cars and business tools.

It was too much to handle. He considered bankruptcy, but was convinced that the credit card companies would reduce his balance due if he just threatened to do so. First, though, he had to stop paying on the cards, or the credit card companies wouldn't believe he was in financial trouble. He did this, then drafted a nice letter to the companies, explaining his situation. Most of them cut at least 30% off what he owed, provided he paid the remaining balance immediately. This he did with a home equity loan.

In the end, his bad credit rating wasn't as bad as if he had actually declared bankruptcy, so he was able to rebuild his credit score. He has also begun to rebuild his credit balances. His good credit rating has enabled him to begin again the stressful process of overburdening himself with debt.

A Bad Credit Rating Story

Another friend of mine had her first credit rating based on the phone bill in her first apartment. She didn't ever pay the phone bill on time, and it was eventually disconnected. This, and a few other minor credit infractions when young destroyed her credit scores. What has this meant?

She can't borrow, so she hasn't had the pleasure of being at the edge of bankruptcy. She can buy things for cash when she has it, or wait until she does. Has this inability to have a bunch of things around that are worth a fraction of what she owes on them made her a less happy person? The opposite is true, in my opinion. She just doesn't have the debt-stress that is so typical today.

Is Bad Credit Good?

I am not recommending that you purposely try to get a bad credit rating, but if you already have one, it isn't all bad. The habits that got you there would probably get you into even more trouble if you could borrow more. Look at it as an opportunity to stop going further into debt, and a chance to learn better habits.

Start paying cash for everything. Pay down those credit card balances (the higher interest ones first). The moment you get those cards paid off, start setting aside money to buy a good used car for cash. When you've done that, start putting what would have been a car payment into a savings account, for a future down payment on house or a business (the only things you should borrow for). A bad credit rating can be good thing, if you take it as a lesson and an opportunity.

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How To Get Free Stuff

How To Get Free Stuff

Yes you can get free stuff, and yes, sometimes there are strings attached. For example, when we were at universal studios I got a free backpack. The catch? I spent six minutes filling out a credit card application. On the other hand, we ate pretty well for free on free sample days at local food stores when we lived in Tucson, and there really weren't any strings attached. Here are some other easy freebies

How to get Free hollydays

Somebody in Hawaii, Costa Rica or Colorado is just waiting for you to come and stay in their house while they are away. You may have to water the plants, and even get the mail for them, but you get to stay in a beautiful home in a sunny place. Sometimes you even get paid for these vacations. The only catch is that to find these opportunities, you may have to subscribe to one of the newsletters that list them.

We camped in our van for ten days at Williams Landing, east of Tallahassee, Florida, on Lake Talquin. It's a beautiful place, with hot showers. Our cost? Zero, and you can stay up to two weeks. There are free campgrounds scattered around the country. Ask an RVer about this, or buy a Woodall's directory from any large RV dealer. Camping can be an essentially free vacation if you do it right, because you may spend less than if you stayed home.
Free Entertainment

Some libraries now carry movies on DVD, and most at least have documentaries. We have even seen music videos on DVD in one library. The only cost is the time to get a library card.

Want to go to free concerts? Most festivals have some free musical entertainment. The National Cherry Festival in Traverse City, MI, for example, has free entertainment every night during the week-long festival, including many recognizable bands and (often) a Beatles tribute band. Go to any search engine and type in "festival" and the name of towns around you to find these freebies.
More Ways To Get Free Stuff

Most states give away free road maps. Some give away free legal forms too, like statutory wills. Check the state's online sites.

Free dental x-rays are available at some dental colleges. You have to be patient, as the students are just learning, but an experienced technician is always with them. You get the x-rays to take to your own dentist, which can save you $30 to $80. Some schools charge a small fee.

Some utility companies offer free energy audits. They come to your home and find the places where you are wasting energy. Some even give you a free kit for caulking windows and weather-stripping doors.


You can get free, confidential business advice from a business expert via email. Go to the website of "SCORE" (Service Corps of Retired Executives). These are successful business executives who volunteer their time to help others in business.
Some restaurants offer free dinners on your birthday. Others offer a free birthday cake. Many bars will buy your first drink for you if it's your birthday. How do you find the ones that do this? The same way you always discover how to get free stuff - as

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Debt Consolidation
Is It A Good Idea?

Why is debt consolidation necessary? Maybe it isn't. It seems like the easy way out of the problem of too many payments every month. When your credit card and loan payments add up to $900 every month, why not just get a loan that will pay all of these debts off and have a nice easy payment of say, $300? There are two reasons why this may be a bad idea.

Debt Consolidation Ignores The Cause

Too much debt? Why? Rarely is the cause due entirely unforeseeable circumstances. Most often, if you have debt problems, it is because you buy too many things on credit. In other words, it is due to bad financial habits.

Now what happens when you combine all that debt? Do you have less debt? Maybe you get a lower interest rate on average, but you still owe all the money, right? Your consolidated debt is just easier to pay, because it is in one lower payment stretched out over a longer period. What else becomes easier now? Adding more debt.

This is exactly what many people do. They get their $900 of various payments rolled into a loan with a $300 payment, and now they have all that excess income. Time to go buy some things on credit. Obviously, debt consolidation can be a way to postpone reckoning with the real problem - bad financial habits. Postponing dealing with debt makes it much worse, of course.

Debt Consolidation Costs More

It may seem like you are saving money on interest with some consolidation loans, but this isn't always true. The problem is that you are converting short-term debt into long term debt. The longer you take to pay off the money owed, the more you pay in interest.

Let's look at an example. If you owed $6,000 on a credit card, with 18% annual interest, it would take a payment of $176.26 per month to pay it off in four years. You would pay a total of $2460 in interest. Suppose, in order to get the best interest rate and easiest terms, you rolled the debt into your 30-year mortgage on your home (many people do this). If it was a 7% loan, it would add only $39.92 to the payment. That's easier than $176, and a much lower interest rate, but how much total interest will you pay over the years? $8371 - more than the original debt.

Of course there are debt consolidation loans that are not for 30 years, but you get the point. Even with a 15-year, 7% loan, which would costs $53.93 per month, you would pay at least 50% more in interest than with the 18% 4-year payoff. Converting short-term debt into long term debt can cost you a lot more in interest.

Try hard to make those payments and get rid of that debt sooner. You'll be glad you did. Of course, it may be impossible to make those payments. That happens, but for a reason. At least work as hard on changing your habits as you do on getting that consolidation loan.

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Living Cheap

Living cheap doesn't mean being miserable, or giving up what you want. In fact, in my own case, it meant getting to do the things I really wanted to do. The less you spend on each thing or activity, the more of them you can have, right? So the key is to spend less and still get what you need and want. Here is how I managed it.

Living Cheap In A Mobile Home

My first house was a mobile home on a small lot. I bought it for less than $20,000, and had payments of $257 per month. Even with taxes, insurance and repairs, it cost less than rent. It had three bedrooms, an expanded living room, and a nice fenced-in yard. I eventually sold it for $45,000.

What really made it cheap, though, was two things that I did. First, I paid as much as I could on it when I was working. I owned it free and clear within five years, and from that point on it cost an average of $300 per month to pay for the utilities, phone, garbage collection, taxes, insurance, and repairs. That's living cheap.

The next thing I did made it even cheaper. I found that I could easily rent the other two bedrooms, and get $65 per week for one, and $75 or more per week for the other. I included all utilities, and found decent young guys to rent to. The rents added up to $600 per month, making this more than cheap living, and even better than free housing. I made $300 per month AND lived for free.

Living Cheap By Planning

I found that I could work less, so I could get by without a car. That saved a lot of money. The occasional bus fare, and the used bicycle I bought didn't add up to a fourth of what it cost to have a car. I had to plan my trips around town a little better, but it was worth it.

During these years I never paid more than $40 for a piece of furniture. You have to know what is important to you. I paid $220 for a high-tech sleeping bag, because I liked ultralight backpacking. On the other hand, I couldn't tell the difference between a nice, clean used couch for $30 and one that cost $900.

One thing I found was that when I worked less, I had time to look around at my options. Time can save youa lot of money. I paid half of what others paid for groceries. When I did get a car, I found a repossessed one that was worth much more than I paid. I went to Ecuador for a month for $1,040 total, including all airfare, hotels, meals, a guided climb up a 21,000-foot mountain, and more. It was possible because I had the time to search for the deals.

I worked part-time jobs for years. I read books, played chess, wrote poetry. I traveled several times a year,

and met the love of my life in South America (happily married for over eight years now). All this was possible not because I made a lot of money, but because I spent less than I made, and used the difference for the things that mattered to me.

This isn't a how-to guide. I explain how I traveled and bought things so cheaply in other articles. This example is simply to get you thinking about the possibilities, and point out some principles. The principles? Don't buy things you don't need. Find ways to pay less without getting less. Spend a little less time working and a little more time thinking. Stay out of debt. Know what is truly important to you, because this is what you can have more of by living cheap.

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Excessive Credit Card Debt

There are many things you can do to resolve your excessive credit card debt. The first thing though, is to stop creating more. I have seen more than one person get out of debt briefly, only to fall back into it again. So start changing those habits. Of course, you have the debt, so what can you do to knock it down? here are some ideas.

Discount Your Excessive Credit Card Debt

Settle debts for a discount. When I collected debts for a living, we regularly took 50% as payment in full, if we thought it was the best we could do. If you really can't handle your payments, you may be better off to borrow the money from family to settle your debts for 20% to 60% of face value. Credit card companies regularly take 50% or less as payment in full if they are convinced you are headed towards bankruptcy.

Write a nice letter explaining your situation, and how you will get the money for the pay-off. Explain that you will most likely be filing for bankruptcy, but would like to settle up with any willing creditors before that happens. This let's them know they may be left with nothing if they say no, and you split your remaining assets between other creditors.

How To Pay Debt

If you are trying to dig out of your debt, always pay high-interest cards first. For example, if you have $200 budgeted to apply to your cards each month, pay the minimums only on all others, then put the rest of the money towards the card with the highest interest rate. Once that one is paid off, work on the next highest.

This is a powerful technique that saves a lot on interest charges. If you have three cards, for example, you would pay the minimum of (let's assume) $40 on two of them, and apply the other $120 to the highest interest card. Once that card is paid off, you continue to put $40 towards one card, and now apply $160 to whichever of the two remaining is the higher interest credit card. This is the fastest way to pay down credit card debt.

Excessive Credit Card Debt - Other Tricks

Don't buy the credit card insurance. This typically stops your payments when you are injured or unemployed. It is one of the most over-priced insurances out there, and doesn't eliminate the debt, but just delays it.

Avoid credit card security insurance. It pays for unauthorized charges when your card is stolen, but you are only liable for the first $50 if you report the theft in any case, and many cards already have 0 liability.

Avoid consolidation loans. Don't consolidate debt into a home refinance unless you have a definite plan for paying the loan off early. 6% isn't cheaper than 18% when it is for 30 years instead of 5.

If you have tried some of these techniques without success, contact a nonprofit credit-counseling service. They may be able to help you negotiate lower rates with your banks, and otherwise counsel you on how to reduce your excessive credit card debt.

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Bargain Finder Secrets

Would you like to be a bargain finder? Wouldn't it be fun to be one of those people that always finds a good deal? You can start by learning the secrets of opportunism.

For example, did you know that you can eat a wider variety of fruit than your neighbor, and spend only half as much to do so? How? By buying fruit in season, when it is at the lowest price. As a bonus, it is also of the highest quality at these times. This is opportunism.

You'll notice that this means not always getting exactly what you want when you want it, but you get more variety this way, and you spend much less. You go with the flow. If oranges are cheap, you'll be eating oranges. If apples are in season, you'll be eating apples. Whatever the case, you'll always be finding bargains.

You don't have to eat things you don't like or deny yourself pleasure. You just shop for those things that you like among those that are cheaper now. There will be other, different, great deals next week or next month. Unless you are extremely picky about what you eat, you'll almost always find delicious foods that you like on sale.

This is the premise of opportunism - that you get more by going with the flow. A true bargain finder gets more variety in the long run, and more for the money. This can be applied to many areas of life.

Some Bargain Finder Examples

Before I went to Ecuador a few years ago, there were many interesting places I wanted to go. I chose Ecuador because it was a thousand dollars less to go there than to any other country. I had a fantastic time for a month for $1040 (including airfare). I also met the most wonderful woman I know there, and eventually married her, so you never know what riches you'll find when you go with the flow.

My wife and I go to the movies here in Tucson on Tuesdays, when we can get in for $2.00 each. Others are paying $8.75 a couple miles away. What are they getting by paying four times as much? They get to see the movie six weeks earlier. The movies don't change in those six weeks, by the way, and enough friends have seen them by then to let us know if they're good or not.

Opportunism means not paying more unless you are getting more. It also means making honest choices. Will you actually enjoy that movie more by seeing it now? More than you'll enjoy the FOUR movies you can see in it's place? Do you have to take that fishing trip now? If you're planning to take both a fishing trip and a gambling trip, why not do each when it's cheapest?

When William Danko and Thomas Stanley wrote "The Millionaire Next Door," they found that MOST millionaires bought used cars. They bought BMWs and Mercedes, not old Ford Pintos, but the lesson was

clear: They understand opportunity. Cars often lose half of their value in the first three years, but they're not half used-up, are they? Is it worth an extra $6,000 to say you have a new car (And you will have to tell people, since it's hard to tell a three-year-old car from a new one)?

To be an opportunist doesn't mean just settling for whatever is easy and cheap to get in life. We all have our areas that are more important to us. If you really love those $15 cigars, why not buy them? On the other hand, if you really can't tell the difference between the $5 and 50 wine, why not buy the former? Opportunism is one of the keys to being a true bargain finder.

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How To Be A Frugal Shopper

How To Be A Frugal Shopper

A frugal shopper has skills and ways of looking at things that help him or her take advantage of the money-saving opportunities in life. There are eleven of these techniques below. You can learn them in a matter of a day or two, practice them for a few weeks, and then save money for the rest of your life.

1. A frugal shopper studies other people. Do you know someone who always gets the best deal on cars, boats, or whatever? Ask him how he does it! Some people will tell you that the cheapest coffee in town is $3 per cup, while others will say 50 cents. There are probably people near you living a good life on half of what you make. Learn how others do things, so you'll know your options.

2. Frugal shoppers tell people what they need. Just mention it in conversation. Do you know how many people get free or cheap things, just because they talk? My neighbor wanted to upgrade her living room debt, and was thrilled that I would take her 3-month-old couch off her hands for $30. Glad I mentioned I was looking for one.

3. Frugal shoppers pay cash. Things are cheaper when paid for in cash instead of credit. Want that new patio set? The price divided by the number of weeks you can wait to get it equals how much you need to set aside each week. You'll not only save on interest when you pay cash, but you'll often get a better price.

4. A good shopper looks for alternatives. Maybe you'd have just as much fun taking that discounted trip to the Bahamas as you would going to Jamaica. If you happen to enjoy pizza just as much - or more, skip the expensive restaurant and call Dominoes.

5. Frugality requires knowledge of values. It's tough to get a great deal on a car if you don't know what a great deal is. Start educating yourself on prices, especially before you're ready to buy anything that costs a lot.

6. Use the internet. I bought a ring for my wife on a wholesale site for $47, including shipping. When I received it, I took it to a jewelry store and found the same ring for $150. The internet is also an easy way to learn prices before you go shopping anywhere.

7. Advertise. Many years ago I put an ad in the classifieds that read, "Looking for a mobile home on land - can put $3,000 down." An older couple that was thinking of selling called me, and that's how I bought my first home at a good price.

8. Visit rummage sales. Only you can say if it is worth your time, but you can save a lot of money on a wide variety of things. Late or early is best. Early gets you the super-cheap stuff before others get it. Late in the day you can negotiate almost anything, and even get things free.

9. Visit flea markets. Again, the time you'll spend may not be worth the savings if you make $50 an hour at your job, but these are great places to practice negotiating skills. Haggling over the price is expected. Bring a list of what you need, so you don't buy too much unnecessary junk.

10. Shop at thrift stores. Note which ones have better prices or more of what you need. Many have a color-tag system to keep the stuff moving. Each week all the items with tags of a certain color are half-price. Just watch for those green tags and ignore the rest - their week will come.

11. A frugal shopper does the math. You didn't really save $400 on that car if it costs you $500 more in gas each year. Also, be aware that some stores are cashing in on shoppers assumptions that larger is cheaper. Yes, the gallon of pickles might actually cost more than four quart jars. Be ready to do the math.

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How To Save Money On A Pool Purchase

How do you save money on a pool purchase? Shopping for a great sale or negotiating a lower price are two ways that come to mind. But there are more fundamental ways to save money on any large purchase that have to be addressed first.

Pool Purchase - Questions To Ask

Think carefully about how you will use the pool, and what your true purposes are. Do you just want a way to cool off in the summer? Or do you want something to use year-round? Do you want the pool primarily for your own use or for parties with friends? Do you want a pool to impress people (a far more common purpose than you might think)? If the latter is the case, it will be especially difficult to save money.

Before I go any further, I have to tell a short story. I was at the house of a friend the other day and as we stood there in the 95-degree heat I noticed that his swimming pool was empty. It was just one of those free-standing pools that costs a few hundred dollars, but it seemed a waste to not be using it.

His daughter had been gone for a couple weeks, and since she was the only one that really used it, he decided to drain it. It had been collecting dust and leaves and growing slime. That was earlier in the summer. Although his daughter had been back for a month, he just hadn't gotten around to cleaning it and filling it up again.

Now, there are important two lessons here. First, that a pool is a lot of work, and unless you can afford to hire a pool maintenance company, you get to do that work. There is cleaning, emptying, filling, adding chemicals on schedule, replacing parts and making repairs.

The second point is that we all tend to overestimate how often we will actually use the things we buy. This is especially true with large purchases like pools. You might imagine yourself coming home every summer day to take a swim, but the reality is usually something else. Although I have not seen a survey done on this, I see a lot of pools around that are mostly decorative. I suspect that many people use their pools about once or twice per week or less during summer.

That brings us to the most fundamental way to save money on a pool purchase: Don't make it. I can't speak for you, and it is possible that you'll get every bit of value from that pool that you hope to get. But you might want to at east do some realistic calculation before you make the decision.

For example, suppose you have an in-ground pool built for $30,000 in your backyard, with a nice deck and all. You roll the cost into a home refinance. Of course that means that your true cost with interest will be closer to $65,000 (30 year 6% loan). Then there are the other costs. Water, cleaning, repairs, chemicals, added property tax due to the home value going up. These probably will add another $1,200 per year even though you only get to use the pool for a few months each year unless you live in a warm climate.

Now suppose that you use the pool more than most - we'll say several times weekly for four full months each

year. Your net cost per use will be lower than most people's then - maybe only $20 to $30 per hour. That's still pretty expensive, isn't it? It might make more sense to go to a water park several times each summer. Certainly the kids will like that, and it almost certainly will cost less in the long run.

There is one more issue here. If you spent a thousand dollars each summer going to public pools and water arks and beaches, you always have the option of discontinuing this expense if times get tough. It is much harder to stop paying on that loan and stop maintaining that pool. That's worth thinking about unless you have a lot of money and your income is very secure. To save money on a pool purchase then, seriously consider just saying no.

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Create Wealth From Home

Create Wealth From Home

How do you create wealth from home? There are many ways - more than there have ever been before. In fact, I am sitting here in my underwear as I write this, and yes, I do make a good living with these web sites. An internet business may be one of the best ways to make money at home. Here is a short list of some other possibilities.

Other Ways To Create Wealth From Home

Invest In Real Estate - All you really need to start is some space on the kitchen table and a willingness to learn. There are free resources online to teach you how to invest - even with no money of your own. In fact, you can use the link here to get a Free Real Estate Investing Course. Or if you like the idea of fixing and flipping houses, go get a course on Flipping Real Estate.

Make A Hobby Into A Business - Think of ways to make your hobbies pay. A friend of mine made a painted plywood cow and put it in his yard. A passerby offered to buy it, so he sold it and made another. Soon he was selling them regularly. Think you can't create much wealth this way? How about paying someone to make them for you, and putting them in all the right stores?

Become An Expert Investor - More than a few people have created wealth from home by simply investing wisely in stocks. Now it is easier than ever, with all the information you need online. You will have to study well to beat the averages, but it can certainly be done from home.

Be A Copy Writer - Many companies pay big money for advertising copy. Some even pay residual income each time they use your advertising copy. There are several great courses out there that teach you how to write to sell things, and how to find clients.

Create Wealth With Your Home - The tax law now allows you to keep all your profits from the sale of your home tax-free - as long as you lived there for two years. Some enterprising people are moving from one "project" home to another every two years, pocketing as much as $100,000 in tax-free capital gains each time.

Rent Rooms In Your Home - This works especially well if you live in a college town. Even in many small towns you can get $100 per week for a room (all utilities included). If you have a spare bedroom, why not rent it out, and put that $5,000 per year straight into good investments. This is a relatively easy way to create wealth from home. Use the link here to learn all the ins and outs of Renting Rooms. (I wrote this ebook based on my experience)

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Credit Card Wealth Secrets

"Credit card wealth secrets," the advertisement read. Being a skeptic by nature, I assumed it was another unworkable get-rich-quick scheme. Then I remembered the times in my life when I have used credit cards to make money.

As Robert Kyosaki of "Rich Dad" fame says, there's "good debt" and "bad debt. Using credit for consumer items is bad-debt. Doing so limits your future options, and you get less in life. It may seem like more, because you get it now, but with interest, and the tendency to pay more when buying on credit, you'll never be able to have as much as those who pay cash.

Credit card wealth secrets revolve around the idea of "good debt." This is any debt that is used to increase your income, or produce capital gains. How do you get your credit cards to start doing that for you?

Credit Card Wealth Creation Secrets

A friend once borrowed $6,000 from me at 9% interest. I didn't have the money, but I had a credit card offer for a cash advance for 8 months at 5% interest. I loaned him the money for six months (he is extremely trustworthy). A 4% spread meant only a $120 profit in the end, but it was easy.

A better example is the little house we bought in Montana. A cash offer would get us a great price, so with our savings and $2,000 worth of repairs on a credit card, we made it work. We paid $100 in interest before selling the house a few months later for a $6,500 profit.

My money was tied up in other projects when my brother found a truck we could make some money on. I raised the money with a credit card, and paid maybe $35 in fees and interest. My brother sold the car ten days later, and we split the $950 profit.

A friend once borrowed $300 at more than 100% annual interest ($50 for two months). Why would he do that? For tools he needed to re-start his dry-walling business. He probably made enough the first week in business to repay the loan.

The point is that debt - whether from credit cards or from other sources - is good debt if it creates more than it costs. I've known people that have started successful businesses or "flipped" houses for big profits with the help of credit cards. Can you get rich quick in this way? It's doubtful, but then my skepticism almost made me forget my own "credit card wealth secrets."

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How Barter Can Help Your Business

Barter trade is a powerful instrument that represents a solution for companies with available stock or services. By accepting payment in trade money instead of cash, a business maximizes their efficiency by increasing stock turnover or billable hours. Using the trade currency earned, that company can pay for goods or services they want, without paying cash.

1. Barter Generates New Clientele:

Allowing you to increase your market and preserve your cash paying customers. This is incremental business – clients who bypass rival businesses to do business with you.

2. Barter Moves Surplus Stock:

Retailers must keep their stock moving. Barter will bring you buyers to move surplus stock, eliminating the advertising costs and weighty discounting otherwise needed to achieve this.

3. Barter Conserves Cash and Increases Profits:

Bartering creates new clients because buyers are encouraged to pay with their products or services to save cash. e.g, if you had to buy a photocopier for £1500, what would you rather do? Write a cheque or pay with an equal amount of your product or service at its normal selling price to a new customer? Most businesses prefer to trade and preserve cash.

4. Networking Expands Your Customer Base:

Barter customers will bring you all of the cash referrals that your present clients bring. You will gain new cash paying customers too - as long as you give your barter customers the same great services and pricing as you offer everyone else.

5. Increase Productivity by Filling Downtime and Unused Capacity:

Service Business: Increase billable hours! If you are not at 100% capacity twelve months a year and can handle new customers, you fill your idle time with new business opportunities. Now you will have trade currency to purchase what you need.

I have started a online community forum that is specifically for people want to start Bartering or even for people who Barter already view our site

The Barter system is a fantastic opportunity for people to gain what they want by offering what is some surplus stock or some time.

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Making Money With Real Estate

Making Money With Real Estate

Optioning Hilltops

Making money with real estate isn't unusual, of course, but there are less common ways to do it. There was a man, for example, that went around optioning hilltops. If the owner wanted $30,000 for the land, this investor might offer $300 for an option to buy the property at full price ($30,000) within six months. He didn't have to buy, but the sellers liked the idea of getting full price, or just keeping the $300.

Next, he contacted every radio station, police department, and cell phone company in the area that might need a hill to put a radio tower on. It is common practice to lease the properties on ten-year or longer leases, for tax reasons. Once the investor got a lease signed, it was relatively simple to get a bank to lend the money for the purchase. So he might have payments of $200 per month, and the radio station puts up the tower, and rents the hilltop for $350 per month. Total risk? If he doesn't find an interested party, he walks away, losing the $300 option fee.
Making Money With Fixer-Upper Real Estate

It isn't unusual to buy a house, fix it up and sell it for a profit. It is less common to find these opportunities in the $10,000 price range though. We found that there are towns in this country where you can still buy houses as cheap as $6,000! We bought a house in a beautiful little town in Montana for $17,500, paid a plumber and a friend to fix a couple things ($2,000), and after living in the house for a few months, sold it for $28,000. For more of the story you can visit our website on Cheap Homes .

Making Money With Land

Several times I have bought property and then sold it on a "land contract." Also called a "contract for sale," and various other names around the country, this simply means taking payments from a buyer, and delivering the title when the property is paid for in full. This is a great way to make money with real estate if you already have some money to invest.

Here is how my first deal went: 3 acres for sale for $4,100. I offered $3,300 cash, and we agreed to $3,500. This was back when closing costs were lower, so I had maybe $3,660 into it after closing. I spent a few hours raking it, and removing dead branches, etc. Then I put a hand-painted sign on it, offering it for sale for $4750, with only $250 down payment and $100 per month payment, with 11% annual interest.

Within two weeks, I sold it for exactly that price and terms, and closed the deal in a restaurant, with virtually no closing costs. In the end, I sold the land for $1150 more than I paid, but I also collected hundreds per year in interest. The rate of return on a deal like this is somewhere over 20% - certainly better than a bank account, and of course it should be done on a larger scale than this (the next time I did it was on a mobile home on land).

The reason this works is that you are making it convenient for the buyers who don't have the cash to buy the land. At the time, that 3 acres was worth about $4,000, yet the buyer paid 18% more than that for the convenience, and paid 11% interest. With a couple hundred dollars in the bank, his options were limited. I made it possible for him to own that land, and it's worth about $20,000 now.
Other Ways Of Making Money With Real Estate

There are many unusual ways that people have used to make money with real estate. I know a guy who made almost as much money letting a construction company carve gravel out of his property as the property cost in the first place. It didn't even reduce the value of the land. A friend of mine bought a small piece of property and let a company cut half the trees out for $4,500. When they were done, you couldn't even tell they had thinned the trees out, and the land had the same value.

I'll add more unusual ways of making money in real estate in the future, so check back.

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Walking Sticks
A Money Making Hobby

I didn't plan on carving walking sticks as a money-making hobby. I sometimes made walking sticks when backpacking, and I had always enjoyed taking my pocket knife to a piece of wood to see what I could make. I hadn't thought of doing anything more with the hobby.

Then, when my wife and I briefly got into the flea market business, I noticed the occasional vendor who sold walking sticks. If the event was more of an arts and crafts show than a flea market, they even sold them for as much as $50 each. My wife Ana suggested that we could sell them too, so I went to work.

With a short saw I could cut 20 or young poplars in an hour, and get two sticks out of half of them. My favorite wood, though, was white cedar. In the Cedar swamps near our home, it grew straight and died young from overcrowding. Cedar wood remains solid for many years after dying, so I could quickly cut many perfectly dried sticks.

Soon there was a pile of wood shavings behind the house, as I cut the bark off and carved each stick into various forms. Many were just rounded off on top. Others I cut into a spiral, or pyramidal shape. I put padding and leather covers on some, and drilled out the tops to inset nice stones on others. This is a hobby that lets you really exercise your imagination.

All the walking sticks were wrapped with leather near the bottom, to prevent splitting, and most had leather handgrips. The leather was from old leather coats I bought at thrift stores. It was attached with both glue and small nails. Each stick had about fifty cents in materials in it at most.

A Money Making Hobby

I sold them for as little as $6 each to as much as $24. This was less than others sold walking sticks for, but then we were mostly selling them at flea markets, rather than arts and crafts shows, where they would get a higher price. I also wholesaled them to a vendor who sold them at gun-and-knife shows, and to a friend who sold them at Native American pow-wows.

How much can you make selling walking sticks? I don't know. I sold about $1200 in walking sticks that summer, before we moved on to try an internet business. They were a nice addition to our other crafts and the stuffed animals we sold at various flea markets. My advantage was that I was very efficient in making them, spending less than an hour even on the most elaborate ones.

I never sold more than $250 in walking sticks in a day, but I saw vendors who paid $300 to rent a space for the weekend (we typically paid $10/day for a flea market space), and sold only walking sticks. They were undoubtedly selling much more than I. In any case, doing something you enjoy AND making a profit is a nice advantage of any money-making hobby.

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Easy Ways To Make Money

Yes there are easy ways to make money, but this means different things to different people. Do you want easy ways to make money right now, or ways to make the most over time with the least effort. These are two very different things.

Easy Ways To Make Money Now

-Get a job. Or work more hours at your present job. Don't believe that starting a business or learning to invest successfully is easy. A job is much easier. Go to work, and get a paycheck every week or two guaranteed - that's easy!

-Sell your things. Another easy way to make money quickly is to sell whatever you don't need. Get rid of the second car, the snowmobile you never use, etc.

-Cut your expenses. Cancel cable TV, and learn how to spend less for all the things you buy. If you can spend $14 less each day on unimportant things, it adds up to over $5,000 annually. That's like making $7,000 more, since you have to earn that much to have $5,000 after taxes.

-Buy a lottery ticket. Hey, it's easy if it works, right?

Easy Ways To Make Money - Eventually

Okay, I said that the job is easier than a business, and that is true in the near-term. On the other hand, if you define easy as "the most money over time for the least effort," you need to invest or start a business. I'll tell you two stories in regards to that idea.

First, I bought my first home when I was in my twenties. It was just a mobile home on real estate, but I discovered that I could easily rent rooms. I lived for free as well as banking some of the money. This was no "get rich quick" scheme, but I made as much as $7,000 per year extra from my investment. I had to work to pay off the mortgage, but in the end I was working much less than my friends were.

The second story has to do with this internet business. I spend a lot of time writing little articles now, and distributing them. People read them, click through to my web sites from the link at the bottom, and maybe they buy a product that I get a commission on, or I get paid for the advertising there. It really is pretty easy now, but that's not how it started.

I worked at this full time from the start, and six months into it, I was making a net profit of about $2 per day. It was a bit discouraging, and I had a lot to learn. However, as it turns out, I was making something closer to $30 per hour for my time. It's just that I wouldn't be paid for the first year. I just kept building the business, and now it is pumping out the money I made from those earlier efforts. Not only that, but I can ignore it for weeks at a time and it keeps making money.

You see, that's the way it is with money. If you want more than a job will provide, you have to start a business or invest and get your money working for you. That might mean you work for free, or for a dollar per hour to start, so that you can easily collect $100 per hour down the road. If that sounds too discouraging, then so will this : Maybe there are no easy ways to make money.

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Ways For Kids To Make Money

There are the usual ways for kids to make money, ranging from lemonade stands to newspaper routes and mowing lawns. Then there are the more interesting ways. The ways listed below are partly from my own childhood, when I was always looking for another way to make a buck.

1. Cooking. When I was about eleven years old, I used to sell meals to my brothers (I had four of them). I think I got 25 cents for scrambled eggs or a sandwich, and more for more complicated meals. They preferred to stay in front of the TV and let me do the work. The food was already provided by my parents, of course, so the income was pure profit.

2. Service menu. If there are a lot of people in the family, a great way for kids to make money is to sell their services. They can make a menu of things they'll do and how much they charge for each. Washing windows for 50 cents each, for example, and maybe $1.50 to walk a dog. If the list can be copied, it could be handed out to all relatives and possibly neighbors too.

3. Computer helper. There are many young kids who know a lot about computers. My own nephew was getting paid for programming by the the time he was fourteen. Even younger kids might show old folks how to use a computer and the internet for a fee. If they know how, they can even set up computers for new owners who are using them for the first time. Telling grandparents to spread the word would be a good marketing ploy.

4. Returnable cans and bottles. We used to collect and return bottles for a deposit as kids. Now that there are more states with return laws, this is an even better way to make a little cash. In fact, during the Cherry Festival, when I lived in Traverse City, Michigan, adults came to town just to collect the cans that people threw all over. Even with a 10 cent deposit, they were collecting more than $100 worth per day according to several of them. Wear gloves, leave the broken cans and bottles alone, and use some hand sanitizer, and this is a safe way to make money.

5. Mini-carnival. As a child, I charged my brothers five cents for a wadded up piece of paper selected from a bucket full of them. Most had a penny or two in them, and a few had a quarter. That was just one of my "carnival" events. Another involved them throwing pennies at a bowl across the room. If one stayed in the bowl they won a dime. I am almost embarrassed to admit how much of their hard-earned paper route money I took from them.

6. Dog washing. If a busy street where people walk their dogs is in front of the house, a fun way for kids to make money is washing dogs. They can set up with shampoo and water and a hose for rinsing, and ask people as they go by if they want their dog washed, perhaps for $3 per dog, or on a sliding scale according to size.

7. Rummage sales. If their parents agree, kids can have rummage sales, and sell not just household things, but arts and crafts and refreshments too. A real cooperative parent might even take their kids to a flea market to set up. I sold (as an adult) over $1,000 worth of hand-made walking sticks one summer, and my wife sold hundreds of dollars worth of pewter figurines glued to pretty rocks and crystals. Kids can sell cookies and drinks too. It is a way to learn about business, and a great way for kids to make money.

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Ways To Make Money Fast

Are there legal and ethical ways to make money fast? Of course there are, but they're primarily short term solutions. Use them for to raise some money quickly, but don't think these are get-rich-quick plans. With that in mind, here are a few ways to make some money fast.

Sell More Of Your Time

I likethis way least, but it is one of the most reliable. Work longer hours at work, or get another job. This way to make money fast has the added benefit of taking away time you might otherwise use spending more money. Get shifts from other employees, stay late at work (if you are paid hourly), volunteer for holidays. If you don't like this plan, keep reading...

Sell Your Time For More

This is a slightly better way. To sell time for more money, do one of three things. Look for a higher-paying job, negotiate a raise (this works best after the first option), or get paid for what you produce, if you are a productive worker. This last one could mean getting paid by the piece in some jobs, or getting paid commissions in a sales job.

Arbitrage Based On Your Expertise

What is arbitrage? Buying low and selling high in markets that have pricing inefficiencies. Suppose a used car of a particular model and year normally sells for $4,500 - and you know this. Watch for an opportunity to buy this car for less, and you can resell it for a quick profit. I know people who regularly make $1,000 to $3,000 per vehicle buying and selling cars out of their front yard.

It's not about cars, though, but about the principle. Where is your expertise - what can you put a price on and find a buyer for? I knew someone who regularly bought used restaurant equipment for half of what others were paying. Even engagement rings and dogs are "turned" for a profit in this way.

If you have no cash saved for this plan, get a credit card advance or cash advance. Paying $100 in fees and interest is unimportant if you make $1000 buying and reselling a coin collection, right? No credit? Get a partner. If my friend who knows boat prices ever tells me he can get a $5,000 boat for $3,000, I'll put up the money for half of the profit. I love making hundreds of dollars in just weeks just by playing with money - and others do too.

Flip A House or a Contract

Essentially, you offer a low price for a home (often a fixer-upper), and put in the offer the right to assign the contract. You also put a clause in there letting you cancel the contract if you can't get financing - your risk-free way out.Then you find an investor who will buy the contract from you for, say $8,000 (he expects to make even more when he fixes and sells the home).

Your risk? Mostly time. I have known people who have done this repeatedly, making as much as $20,000 at a time. Education and experience helps a lot here, because without it you can waste a lot of time - your own and other's.

More Ways To Make Money Fast

Sell your things if you aren't using them, or if you just value more the other things you'll do with the money.

Have a business? Sell accounts receivable. The buyers call the process "factoring." I have a friend who often has $15,000 owed to him by various clients, and is always facing cash-flow problems. He could sell these accounts receivable tomorrow to raise cash, but I don't tell him. They do sell at a discount, after all, and this constant reducing of long-term income to raise short-term cash can be a bad habit to develop. It is a way to raise money fast, though.

Cut your expenses. Cancel the movie channels. Buy a cheap used car for cash and get rid of your car payment. list every single thing you spend money on, and find ways to spend less for half of them. If you are surviving now, and can spend $500 less per month, you can bank that money and effectively make money fast.

Use whatever you've got to make money fast. Have a home? You could rent rooms. If you are single, you could rent a room instead of an apartment, and bank the difference. Extra time? Start a business on the side. If I want to make more money fast, I can mail an offer to my lists. Of course, this is because I put in the time to build my internet business, which brings up an important point.

If you think you'll start a business today and be rich in a few months, you're probably doomed to struggling forever. It's not that it's impossible. Take away a rich man's last penny, and chances are he'll have more money than you three months later. But this is because he has spent years learning about money, and making contacts.

Some of these ways may seem too mundane. Perhaps they are, but then, how much do you want that money? If you were to move to a cheaper apartment, get a raise, work Saturdays, sell your unused things, and buy and sell something for a profit once each month, you could bank a lot of money relatively fast. Enough to start a real business for longer-term wealth building.

Ironically, those looking for ways to make money fast and easy are least likely to make it. Opportunity seekers chase easier ways instead of making strategic plans and commitments. You can use these ways to make money fast, but don't think you'll attain real wealth without some kind of commitment to learn do what is necessary.

For many more ideas, see the following collection of pages on our blog

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