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A few of you may have been alive during The Great Depression or possibly heard stories about the era and people?s daily struggle to live from parents or grandparents who lived through that period. You may have also heard of the phrase, ?Roaring Twenties?, which refers to the time just preceding the Depression, where everybody was making money on the Stock Market, the economy was growing rapidly, the motor car was taking hold allowing cities to expand and new industries to be created. The US, fast becoming the industrial superpower, has often had the decade described as the era of ?bath tub gin (alcohol was prohibited in the US during the 20s), the model T, the $5 work day, the first transatlantic flight, and the movie.?

Why am I mentioning all this? Well according one of the world best known and successful economists, we are going through a similar period right now. According to him it will more than likely dwarf the Roaring Twenties in terms of prosperity but also precede a time which could dwarf the Depression years in terms of daily struggle.

Now I know we are bombarded with experts in all forms of media predicting interest rates will do this, property prices will do that, etc. You are rightly sceptical as the information is either so vague or obvious to be of any real use at all or low and behold the same person comes along a couple of weeks later saying the exact opposite of their earlier advice. The question you have to ask yourself if these people are so expert in their fields, then why are they still working for a living?

The person who I am referring to as predicting all these happenings is Harry S Dent Jnr., a Harvard graduate and also a well known author, whose latest book ?The Next Great Bubble Boom? documents his view on what will happen over the next two decades and beyond. Now if you want credentials, this man predicted the prosperity and then ultimate crash and depression of the Japanese stock market and economy in the 1980s. He also in 1992, while a lot of the world was still in recession, published a book describing the boom of the 90s and also the crash (which he calls a correction) in the early 2000s and then relatively quick recovery leading into the period we are in now. Of course everyone has their critics but this guy has made some bold specific predictions, so it would be very hard to say he meant something else or go back on things if they didn?t eventuate.

How does this relate back to the 1920s? Well according to Dent and many others, we experience major technological breakthroughs approximately every 80 years, or every 2nd generation. Now you usually there is a 20-30 year gap between the technology being mass accepted in the marketplace. For example the modern motor car and its related components were invented and available in the 1890s and 1900s but it was only in the 1920s where it became an ?everybody item?. Similarly the microchip was invented in the 1970s but it is only in the 90s and now that computers, the Internet, mobile/wireless technologies are taking hold everywhere. Companies like Read more…

If the so-called ?gold bugs?, investors who believe passionately in the long-term value of buying gold, are right, then this could be a good time to add a little glitter to your portfolio. Over the last five years the price of gold has more than doubled from US$250 to US$574 a troy ounce and it is still nowhere near its all time 1980 high of US$850 a troy ounce. In fact, there are many who believe it could double in price AGAIN!

Just because gold is cheap now when compared to 25 years ago doesn?t automatically mean that it is a good investment. However, there are three sound reasons to believe that prices will continue to soar.

Firstly, the growing economies of Asia and the Middle East have resulted in a huge surge in demand ? especially for gold jewellery. For proof one need look no further than global gold jewellery sales, which increased by 19% last year.

Secondly, a rising number of private investors all over the world have been putting some or all of their savings into gold as a hedge against economic or political instability and, in some cases, war. When investors feel the future is uncertain (as many appear to at the moment) demand for gold always surges. This is doubtless in no small part due to the fact that the price of gold tends to move in the opposite direction to virtually all other conventional asset classes ? making it ideal when investors wish to diversify.

Thirdly, the mining industry can?t keep up with demand. Last year?s figures show that in excess of 4,000 tonnes of gold were purchased, but only 2,500 tonnes were mined. What?s more, production is falling by an average of 4% a year and it will take the industry anything up to ten years to increase supply by the required volume. In the past, when demand outstripped supply, the shortfall was met by many of the world?s central banks. No longer. Countries, which had been disposing of their gold reserves, have slowed down sales or even stopped selling altogether. Some central banks, notably those of Russia, Iran and China, are actually believed to be buying bullion.

Although I believe that gold prices are likely to carry on moving upward, I would only suggest buying if you already have a range of other investments including shares, bonds and property. Furthermore, I wouldn?t necessarily advise buying gold coins or gold bars. The idea of owning a little ?hoard? may seem attractive, but gold in all its forms is expensive to ship, store and insure. Instead you may like to consider investing in one of the various gold mutual funds. These offer a cost-effective, convenient and potentially more lucrative way to benefit from any increase in gold?s value.

A good example of what a mutual gold fund has to offer is the top-performing Merrill Lynch Gold

A great deal of new forex traders fail in their first trades and oftentimes quit the market altogether shortly thereafter. While this is a sobering statistic which causes many men to avoid the market altogether, the fortunate truth in this is that most of these traders fail simply because they jump into the market blindly and have no concept of how to effectively trade, as simple as it can be. Keep these three tips in mind unlike those who fail and begin acquiring wealth in the forex market immediately.

First, start with a demo trading account. Using a demo trading account, you’ll be trading with virtual currency which you track your losses and gains with. This also encourages you to make the learning mistakes which you wouldn’t otherwise had it been your own money. This way you can trade within the safe confines of this fake account for as long as you need to to feel comfortable and you can also get a number of successful trades under your belt before moving into the real thing.

Next, stick to trends. Many traders who have amassed their fortunes in the forex market didn’t do it by trading ahead of the curve and having insider information but instead simply investing in an upward trend and getting out quickly when that trend went out of their favor. There is good money to be made simply by reacting to changes in the market so if you have a little bit of time this is a smart approach to take.

Finally, you should think about using an automated forex trade program if you don’t have the time to devote to trading yourself. These are programs which keep constant analysis on real time market behavior around the clock, trade when they find high probability trading opportunities and react to changes as they occur to keep you on the winning end of your trades at all times. These programs are now used by over one third of all traders and are especially popular for those without the time or experience to devote towards trading as I mentioned.

Prosperity, in Capitalism, is the epitome of financial stability, reliability, and security. It can be more easily thought of as an abundance of items of economic value, or the state of controlling or possessing such items, and encompasses money, real estate and personal property. Particularly as it relates to the field of Real Estate, it can be safely stated that when house prices rise, so does prosperity. This is so because there exists a well-established link between housing wealth and spending, which makes an increase in prosperity – both as a nation as well as at individual levels – in direct function of an increase in spending which, in turn, increases the acquisition of all the aforesaid items upon which prosperity is founded.

When house values increase – especially as dramatically as in recent years – people feel freer to spend from the wealth they have, or the wealth they perceive they have. They may decide to buy a bigger car, to eat out more often, to indulge in electronics or fashionable items, all of which is in most cases financed by their equity. And, strangely enough, people spend their hypothetical riches faster when their houses go up in value than when their stocks do, because they believe that housing gains are more stable.

In response to this greater affluence, the general trend of people is to increase their spending. Conversely, when housing values diminish people cut back spending in a similar way. The general consensus is that a $100 drop in wealth, over time, reduces spending by about $5.00 per year. This suggests, therefore, that weakening housing prices have a mild effect on consumer spending, to the tune of an approximate annualized rate of spending reduction of five percent.

This makes sense, in that economic theory tends to support the fact that rational consumers ought to adjust their long-term spending in response to changes in their wealth, not the ease in which they can tap it. But there is another element equally important to be factored into the determination of the level of prosperity: how well debtors manage their debt. For instance, the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) reports that seasonally adjusted index of mortgage application activity, which includes both refinance and purchase loans, increased 3.6 percent to 575.6 for the week ended December 29, 2006. The index stood at 555.8 the previous week, which was its lowest level since early August. Demand for home refinancing loans also strengthened as the MBA’s seasonally adjusted index of refinancing applications increased 2.2 percent to 1,640.4. In 2005 the index stood at 1,363.2.

This evidence would suggest that consumers are using more of their home equity to pay off other borrowings such as credit card debts, in light also of the fact that mortgage debt in both the United States and Canada carries considerable tax advantages. This is another indication that, contrary to the forecast of some analysts, consumers manage their debts prudently, not recklessly.

The equilibrium in the issue as to whether consumers ought to treat their housing wealth as a nest egg or as a credit card – that is whether they should save rather than spend – is to be found in the ratio of spending to personal income. Surveys have shown that this ratio has peaked at more than fifty percent in 2005, meaning that people spent more than fifty percent of their disposable income using mortgage-equity withdrawal. This in turn would indicate that a slowing of mortgage-equity withdrawal could drag down spending faster than anticipated. The stakes here are high, because the behaviour of consumers will largely determine whether North-American economies will tumble into a recession or will merely slow down. This is so because in North America housing wealth has a bigger influence on consumption than other financial assets such as stocks and bonds.

Which in turn means, once again, that the level of prosperity is affected by the degree of spending proximately derived from the real capital wealth of consumers.

Luigi Frascati

Last night, as our dog Bram was drooling over Dave eating crackers and cheese, my Mom said:

If we all could focus on making money like dogs focus on food we would all be millionaires by the time we turned five.

Ok, five years old is a stretch but my Mom is definitely onto something. When you make something your focus, even just for an hour, how much do you accomplish? In this day and age of blackberries and iPhones, very few people focus on any one thing for long. So, think of the power of actually giving your biggest goal one hour of 100% attention every day. What if you focused an hour a day on building real estate wealth?

This means that you would spend one complete hour every single day with the sole goal of building your real estate wealth. What would you do with that hour if you are just starting out? Here are some ideas:

Before you do anything – figure out what your goals are! How can you focus your way to real estate wealth if you haven’t defined what that wealth is, or how you want to achieve it? Read a book about real estate investing. There are some great books out there that will help you learn the basics. If you are Canadian, I highly recommend you read Making Money in Real Estate by Douglas Grey. Research property values in your target area (and if you don’t have a target area, then you should be researching potential areas looking for places where there is going to be some positive changes to the economy or the housing market). Research real estate agents and property managers for your target area, and start making calls to find people that you would be comfortable working with. Speak to a mortgage broker to get a handle on your financial situation, and what you can qualify for in an investment. Visit open houses in your target area. Start researching rental rates in your target area by reading newspapers, checking craigslist and other rental websites. I am sure you can think of so many more things to do to move yourself towards your goal! With an hour a day, you will be surprised and impressed with how far you’ve come after just one month. But how to find that hour a day?

Here are some of my favourite blog posts along the lines of this subject. Search for them in google and read them for inspiration and motivation!

Tim Ferriss – one of my favourite blogs – specifically read 4 Hour Work Week Blog: 9 Habits to Stop Now: Once you read this I am pretty sure you will find several ways to get an hour out of your day. For me, it’s checking my email MUCH less! Rock Your Day – Lots of posts on getting up really early to rock your day. Always great content in this blog. Read: Rock Your Day: Catch Yourself Making Excuses and then do Something About it. Early to Rise – Daily newsletter which I have been reading for over four years now. Early to Rise is FULL of great ideas for making money, being healthy and maximizing your potential in whatever you want to do. Read: Early to Rise: 3 Steps to Success.

Anyway – it’s now time for me to focus my way to Real Estate Wealth. Or, is it time to take Bram for a walk? I think Bram is telling me it is walk time… well I will focus after I walk the dog…

Gold bullion is just another form of gold, meaning that it is melted down from the coin stage or the jewelry stage or directly mined and turned into scraps or gold bars, which is then invested in by many different types of people. Investing in gold bullion can provide a great means of income and safety for the financial security of your family, even in tough economic times.

Since gold no longer has a face value in the sense of being used as legal tender, the price fluctuates greatly each day, giving people a chance to earn a substantial return from a small investment, or lose money if the markets decline which has happened very few times. However, those who invest in the world gold markets understand that their investment is for the long haul, and not just an overnight way to make a quick buck.

Putting your money in gold bullion can be much safer than investing in other stocks because the price of gold has remained steady in comparison to other stocks and commodities, even though it has had its fair share of highs and lows throughout the late part of the 20th century and early into the 21st. Gold averages about the same investment value in all five of the world markets, making it an internationally safe choice to place your money. Many people and some investors don’t believe that gold is still a precious commodity, and think that it is outdated and reduced to being used for jewelry and other fancy adornments. There are those that are dead set against gold as a stable investment.

However, gold bullion has a value that is worth far more today than it ever was as legal tender. In 1971, the value of the U.S. dollar was no longer determined by the gold standard, which allowed gold to take its own place in the free markets as people and the law of supply and demand determined its price. This caused a huge jump in the price and took it up to about $850 per ounce in 1980. After this, the markets declined rapidly for almost 20 years, leaving gold at an all-time low of just $252 per ounce in 1999. Since then, the price of gold has been steadily increasing and did see another all time high of over $1,000 per ounce in March of 2008, but has since fallen off this historic level.

If you have invested in gold during a time when the value was low, you are going to be more likely to make a profit. For example, if you invest in gold when the market is low like it was in the late 90s, you’ll be more profitable than someone who invested in gold when it was at its peak, because they have had to wait for nearly 20 years for the price and their investment to recover, that is, if they didn’t end up selling at some time in the past.

Investing in gold bullion is a very sound move in most cases today, because it is still a precious commodity around the world. Unlike company stocks which fluctuate with the changing economy, the price of gold sets its own standard in the market, often making it more desirable for trading and investing in.

At some point in the future, you will no longer be working where you are. Whether it?s because you retire, get laid off or change employers, it?s your responsibility to be prepared. It?s a necessity — your retirement depends on it.

That?s because when it comes to your pension funds, you have several options open to you when you leave your job. And if you don?t know what those options are, and choose the wrong one, you will have the IRS smack dab in the middle of your IRA. This means your chances of having the opportunity for long-term tax deferred wealth building become very slim.

Option 1: Taking a lump-sum distribution (cash out)

Off the top, you will lose 20% of your accumulated money because your employer is required to withhold this amount for federal taxes. Cashing out your retirement plan is counted as receiving ordinary income, and depending on your tax bracket (ordinary rates now reach 35%) you may end up owing even more than that 20%, and that doesn?t include the state taxes that may apply as well.

Furthermore, if you are younger than 59? (age 55 in some limited cases) you will be penalized for an additional 10% off the top. So, our old pal Uncle Sam just slashed your retirement savings you have accumulated for your Golden Years by a third or more!

Avoid this entirely. (In fact, it?s difficult to even think of it as an ?option.?)

For example, Dan, age 50, left his job. He had $100,000 in his employer’s 401(k) plan. Dan decided to take the money from the plan and open a self-directed IRA account. As a result Dan’s former employer sent him a distribution check for $80,000 — Dan’s $100,000 account balance, less 20% withholding. To avoid all income taxes and penalties, Dan must not only deposit the $80,000 check within 60 days of the distribution, he also must deposit $20,000 (the amount withheld by his employer) by that same date. The $20,000 must come from sources outside of the distribution. If Dan does not have $20,000 from other sources, that amount will be treated as a distribution and will be subject to income taxes and penalties.

Sure, Dan will get this $20,000 back in the form of taxes withheld when he files his tax return, but that could take a number of months. Why go through this hassle when using the correct transfer method will avoid the 20% withholding and will not make you scramble to find funds to cover the withholding amount?

Build Your Wealth and Retire Financially Secure With Your 3 Other Options

Your other options include (1) leaving your money with your former employer?s plan; (2) rolling it over to your Read more…

There are number of theories to any one of these questions, but let us deal with reality and facts. The distribution of wealth comes from the primary belief that wealth, money, is something that can be attained, sustained, and retained. This belief is passed from one generation to the next and continues, which would explain how the wealthy stay wealthy. In contrast, the lack of this belief system is demonstrated among the groups that are maxed out in credit card debt, living paycheck to paycheck, or living at poverty levels. The wealthy ensure their legacy of wealth will be continued for generations to come by educating their family on the importance of having money and respecting their wealth with prudence. They also believe in higher education and prepare for this expense early.

There is an ever growing disparity among the ?haves? and the ?have-nots? in our society; albeit, some groups have shown significant growth in wealth the past twenty years. Not only is education about money and all its intricate components important, but also establishing a consciousness about being wealthy and creating a wealth legacy.

Creating a wealth consciousness can begin to cure the generational disease of being in a state of poverty. Poor is a disease of the mind and it demonstrates itself through behavioral acts such as over-spending, devaluing education, and settling for mediocrity.

The value of money is created by the perception you personally place on it. Money survives on the energy put into it? you either love it or hate it ? your behavior and attitude about money is the tell all. Your focus should be to attain lifelong, generational wealth. Building wealth Read more…

Assuming that wealth was a stranger who decided to knock on your front door, would you let the stranger in? Probably not, most would see a stranger and not the potential good the stranger could possibly bring.

Wealth is so foreign to some people, that if it were standing directly in front of them speaking very loudly, they would need an interpreter to translate its language. Then, it stands to reason that we should learn the culture of wealth and to speak the language of wealth. How many of you have ever taken the time to learn a foreign language? You know then, how concentrated your efforts must be to exact the dialect so that you can speak it fluently without being misunderstood. Speaking a common language creates rapport, trust, and comfort.

Wealth is not about money at all. The fact of the matter is wealth is the result of using money wisely. This statement may surprise many, but it is true. Wealth is about lasting security, freedom, and peace of mind. Learning the culture of wealth, its language, and building a relationship that will last a life-time, requires time. Let?s face it; we live in a time-deficit society, starving ourselves of the real values of living. So how can you find time to start a budding romance with wealth? The answer: you just do it. As with any relationship, there is a period of courtship. You must court the idea of possessing wealth subconsciously.

In practical terms, you begin with doing a simple task every pay day. You pay yourself first. Subtract at least ten percent of your earnings and put into a retirement account. For those under 30, this Read more…

It is all well and good to start a plan for a solid financial future. We have all heard the sound advice. Buy shares, buy properties, land, precious metals, businesses, so long as you buy something worthwhile, your future financial stability is assured. But is it?

There are three factors that can significantly threaten your net worth, and wealth. These are easily identified by the acronym PIT:

1. Procrastination

2. Inflation and

3. Taxes

The first phase of any financial plan is accumulation. But how many of us put this off until the last minute? Procrastination is an interesting psychological behaviour that we all employ to varying degrees. We often know what we should be doing even though we may not have done it yet. Being aware of procrastination can become the beginning of doing something about it.

Truth be told, until you save, you cannot accumulate. The earlier you start planning, the sooner you will save, and the faster your assets will grow. Remember, it is not about getting it right, it is more about getting going.

When most successful people were asked what they would have done differently, their unanimous answer was, ?I wish I?d started sooner.? Do not be afraid of making ?mistakes?. Think of them as part of learning.

Find yourself a good wealth coach and start taking small steps. Save to invest a minimum of a tenth of your income, regardless. You do not need hundreds, or even thousands to start investing. I know many investments that you can start with as little as ?50 per month. Learn as you go and build your understanding and confidence gradually.

The next biggest threat to your financial future is inflation. Inflation is the fall in the market value of your money and is closely linked to the cost of living. Ten years from now, you will still have to purchase goods and services that will cost much more than they do today. Invariably, your pension plan (if you are lucky enough to have one then) that seems like so much today will most likely be a pittance then. You only have to look at how much our parents bought their homes for to realise what impact inflation can have.

The last, but by no means least threat to your financial future is the taxman. Learn to manage your relationship with him for he plans on becoming your financial partner for many years. What inflation does not wipe out, the taxman patiently will. In trying to avoid the taxman, be careful not to evade him. There is a marked difference between tax avoidance and tax evasion.

There are legal strategies and vehicles to avoid paying excessive taxes on your investments. A good tax advisor or accountant can help you with your plan.

In the UK, the greatest tax avoidance vehicle is the Individual Savings Account (ISA). With an ISA, you can save and/or invest up to ?7,000 each tax year, and not pay any tax whatsoever on the income Read more…