I have a few friends that look "good" from the outside, but if you knew their financial story, you would see a gloomier picture.  You see Jake and Mary are up to their eyeballs in debt, with no apparent way out.  They don’t want to go bankrupt for fear of losing some of their toys and their lifestyle.  At the same time though, if they don’t do something, that will be the only alternative.

I talked to Jake yesterday and he said they had gone to get some credit and bill consolidation help.  The company that they were talking to was going to help them through their debt negotiation program.

This process would be essentially a two step process.  First their credit card negotiation services department would try and reduce their credit card debt in half and get them a better interest rate.  Then another department would try and negotiate similar deals for their bills.

These reduced payments would be lumped together into one single payment that they would make each month - reducing their stress immensely.  The goal of the work that would be done on their behalf would be to get them completely out of debt in about thirty months.

Though they had been crying for debt relief for many months now, they seem a little calmer now.  They have a plan and just have to follow it - and their troubles and stress will go away.

I was talking to my cousin today on the phone.  She has been a successful executive at a local insurance company for the last few years and just recently married (in the last two years).  Right after their marriage, they purchased a large house for themselves and their new puppy.  Last time we talked, her husband had been laid off from work and they were struggling to keep up with all their payments.  I called to see how they were doing.

According to her, things were okay now, but they were pretty gloomy just a couple of months ago.  They were unable to keep up on their bills and even missed some mortgage payments.  It was to the point where if they missed one more mortgage payment, the bank would add their home to the repossessed properties they owned.  It ended up that these financial problems had put a huge strain on their marriage - they were at the point of considering divorce.

But a solution came from the least likely source - a coffee shop paper.  Erin had gone out for coffee one day and was reading a coffee shop paper, and saw an ad from a company that helped people avoid foreclosure.  She called and learned that they offered a sell and rent back program - they would solve her money problem by buying the house from them, and they would not have to move out of their home.

She shared this information with her husband and they quickly applied for their program.  Thankfully they were able to avoid having their home repossessed, they fixed their mortgage, and her husband has a new job.

I was so happy to hear that they made it through their financial crisis okay - it is hard to see others struggle.  For those of you in their situation, don’t worry, there are solutions - they just might turn up in the most unlikely of places.

You see, I happened to be reading one of my favorite business blogs today.  Specifically I was looking at the procedure on how to obtain an unsecured business loan as well as some tips and tricks about them.  Now I visit this blog quite regularly and I am happy with what I read - and they definitely know their stuff.  I learned some useful information there about business loans for bad credit - and how to approach your lender about that type of financing.  I was just about to leave, but I saw something I have never heard of before.

Business Cash Advance.

Huh?  Reading the article, I found out that it was the quickest way to obtaining financing - in fact you could get approved in less than 24 hours.  Little paperwork, no piles of financial statements or tax returns required.  It was easy.  Almost too easy.

I moved along to other sites seeing what was said about these cash advances - but I read nothing but praises.  In fact, I think I may have uncovered one of the most powerful ways to finance a business and seize whatever opportunities come your way.

In the "olden" days before the Internet, any kind of financial product was usually obtained by making an appointment with a lender and going to their place of business and talk face to face.  This was usually okay for most people, but for those people who worked graveyard shifts during the week, it was usually a nightmare.  Also, depending on the season, it could be easy to get to the lender’s office, or extremely difficult (think winter).

Now things are a little different.  You no longer have to go to an appointment, let alone talk to a real person (if you don’t want to) with the advent of the Internet.  For example, you can do a refinance online, just by filling out forms, and never have to talk to anyone.  For that matter, it can be three in the morning, and you could be working on your application.  For those people who work nights, this has definitely been a blessing - they no longer have to take time off work to deal with their finances.

Now this is not the only area where you can now apply online:  I would encourage you to check out other financial products now online such as bank accounts, credit cards, and investments - chances are if you need it, you can find it online.

With the Christmas season fast approaching, I have partnered up with a friend of mine to operate a little store in the mall selling doughnuts.

Now you might think that we own a doughnut machine - but you are wrong.  In fact, we don’t own anything we need to do the business - no cash register, doughnut machine, or supplies to do it.

So we have been looking for ways to get the equipment that we need.  Since this is our first try at this, getting some equipment financing and actually purchasing the equipment is out of the question - we don’t know how well the business is going to do at the moment.

Instead of buying the equipment, we have been talking to some companies about equipment leasing - so we are not tied down to the equipment should the business not pan out.  From the companies we have talked to, we will be doing commercial leasing which allows us to take a short term lease on the equipment - just for the Christmas season.

So, we are going downtown on Monday to sign the papers for our lease.  If the Christmas season goes well, perhaps we will stay open - who knows.

Well, I just got home from the bank.  You see, I went there to talk to a banker about my mortgage. 

It has been nearly four years now since I bought my house and there are some things I want to do to it.  The bathroom needs some improvement as well as we were thinking of adding a garage to our home.  The housing market here has been increasing as well, so we wanted to take out some of the money out of our home.

We sat down and discussed my options.  In my case, to get the money out of my home for improvements as well as the increased value, we applied for a home equity loan.  It took a little while to fill out the papers but we got it done.

He also let me know that I had to come in next year to renew my mortgage - and I should consider doing a home refinance as the interest rates are lower now.

I thanked him for his time and he let me know he would call me when he found out about the loan.  My wife and I will be going out tonight to go look at bathroom stuff.  I can’t wait!

Well, I want to challenge you all with a task.  Sure, you read the blog but how many ever ask you for a call to action?  Well, here it is - a call to action.  Now you might ask me what this is about, why you would want to, and what benefit will you receive for accepting the challenge.

So….

Basically the challenge here will save you some money.  It may be a little, it might be a lot, but it will depend on you and your situation.  It also won’t take a lot of time and you can do it when you have a free minute.

Ready?

Alright.  I challenge you to three things.  The first is I challenge you to make your money work harder for you. 

How?

Well, that is easy.  It would be as simple as looking online for the best savings accounts - you are looking for one with high interest and little or no fees (yes there are ones out there that have no fees - I have one of them).  This way, when you do have money sitting around, it will earn you the most interest possible.  Sure, it won’t make you rich, but it will help your money hold its’ ground against inflation.

The second challenge would be that I challenge you to compare credit cards to the ones you have.  Now, the idea here is to save yourself some money on interest or fees, as well as get the best bang for your buck.  Some suggestions for those of you who carry a balance on your credit card month after month would be to get a 0% interest or low interest card.  For those of you who don’t carry a balance a cash back or rewards based card would be a good choice for you.  Just find something that fits your spending and repayment habits.

Lastly, I urge you to compare car insurance.  I know that you probably have heard enough about this one if you watch television, but it is important.  With the heavy competition in this industry, you can usually pay less than what you paid last year - every year.  Quite a few of the major companies also allow you to view their quotes and the quotes from their competition in one convenient place.

Are you up to this challenge?  Like I said, for the little time you spend doing it, you will see more money stay in your pocket - you just have to decide if it is worth your time.

I always figured a loan was a loan.  If you needed money, you could borrow it under some sort of terms and that would be called a loan.  At least, that was the definition that I had in my head.

My friends didn’t seem to know any better.  Some of my buddies who had loans in the past didn’t give them special names, rather they used loans as a blanket term to describe the financing.

Well, my whole world was turned upside down when I went to college.  I thought I was really smart in my finance class when I told everyone that whether you were borrowing to buy a house, a car, or renovating your home, the product you needed was called a loan.  After a quick chuckle, the professor proceeded to tell us:

"There are many types of loans."

We touched on many of them in class: mortgages, secured homeowner loans (that is usually used for renovations), and unsecured loans (like a car loan).  I walked out of that class with a bit of a headache - I never realized that it was so complicated.  I am going to have to review my notes to get a grasp on the subject.  At least now, when I go get a car loan at some point, I won’t sound so stupid

I have a friend that has made some good money over the past five years since he left college.  He was almost out of debt and things were going good.  He especially loved his career and him and his wife were thinking of starting a family.

That is until he got in an accident.

I can still remember the night of September 5, 2003.  My buddy was driving home after a long day of work an was hit on the drivers side by a drunk driver.  The drunk driver was killed instantly but my friend was not so lucky.  It ended up most of his bones were broken and he was in a coma.

They took him to the hospital and for the next year he underwent surgery after surgery to try and repair the damage.  In the meantime his employer let him go.  Financially they were in trouble with all their credit cards and lines of credit at the max.  They sold pretty much everything they had, but the bills still came.  It came to the point where they had to declare bankruptcy and lose everything except for their house.

Fast forward to last week.  Bruce had to go renew his mortgage on his home - but to his dismay he found it wasn’t as easy as it had been before he went bankrupt.  Mortgages issued to people post bankruptcy are different than what you and I would get - there are a few more hoops to jump through.  His banker explained to him that his case was a bad credit remortgage and that banks were a little more cautious dealing with these loans.

He left his appointment a little disheartened.  They had a baby on the way and they didn’t know what they would do if the bank didn’t approve them.  Luckily a few days later, they got a phone call and found out everything is ok.  I am so happy for them.

I have an appointment on Friday to go talk to a banker at my bank about credit cards.  You see, my mailbox has been full of credit card offers lately, and I have finally decided to give it a little more thought.  With so many options out there, sometimes it is hard to decide which one to get.

I realized that my banker would only be a specialist in their products - but I wanted to make an informed choice.  I thought I could go online and compare credit cards from my bank to those offered by the other banks in town.  This way I would have some idea as to what to expect as well as know what the competition was offering and maybe get a better deal.

I found many websites online that talked about credit cards.  What I was really looking for was a website that dealt with my locale and also was about the type of credit card I was looking for: a cashback credit card.

I found a few sites that would work specifically for me and printed off some information.  I am going to take it with me when I go talk to my banker on Friday - both to see if I am getting a good deal with my bank, and also to see if I can get a better rate on the card they offer me.  At least now, after doing this research, I will know what I am talking about.