personal finance

A Carteret County leader who has been on the forefront of economic development efforts in the county for nearly a decade has announced his plans to retire.  

Thousands of workers protested in four Dutch cities on Saturday against a government decision to increase the state retirement age from 65 to 67 by 2025. "We think it is wrong for the government to seek to achieve savings by making people work longer," Paulus Plas, a spokesman for the country's largest labour organisation, the FNV, told AFP. Plas said 20,000 to 30,000 workers took part in each of the protests, the largest of which took place in the western port city of Rotterdam, where he said up to 2

Currently, we have four working people for every pensioner; soon this will be two to one. What does this mean for the younger generations?   -Jan Peter Balkenende

 

Credit card companies that want to solicit customers on New Jersey's college campuses are now facing tighter restrictions. Legislation that Gov. Jon Corzine signed Friday bars the companies from buying lists of students' names and addresses from colleges. They also can't offer gifts to entice students to apply for a card.  

One of the most attractive features of a housing loan is that it helps in reducing your income tax liability, and thus makes it easier and cheaper to build a fixed asset. A housing loan makes you eligible for tax rebates under Section 80C and Section 24 of the income tax regulations. A joint housing loan comes with the twin benefit of increasing the overall loan eligibility and the income tax rebate that can be claimed by both co-applicants individually under Section 80C and Section 24.  

The process of acquiring a home loan is a long one. Here is a step-by-step guide that can help a prospective homebuyer. The process of acquiring a home loan starts off with an application supported with necessary documents.  

Also called prepayment penalty, a lender levies this penalty on the borrower if he decides to repay his loan much ahead of the tenure. Some lenders charge no penalty in case the borrower repays the loan with his own funds after a fixed time frame - say six months. If the borrower intends to switch the lender, a percentage of the loan amount outstanding, say two percent - is charged as penalty.  

Retirement plans for most people [should be viewed] as a long-term savings and retirement income vehicle. So that's an important mindset to have over the course of markets that go up and down, both from the standpoint of investing and also from the standpoint of just getting into a regular rhythm of contributing to achieve a goal and not treating a 401(k) plan like a checking account. It really is there to provide income in the future when somebody retires.  

While annual cards are costlier than normal lifetime free cards, they have many additional benefits. The credit card market has a lot of offers for different customers, so it often becomes difficult to choose between the options offered by a large number of players. Such a situation results in a lot of cost saving, as intense competition inevitably results in a situation where a similar feature is available at a lower cost.  

The first part of home-buying is always deciding whether you are prepared for homeownership. Even experienced homebuyers must also keep in mind several early-stage factors, especially financing. Even before going out in the city looking for the right Miami condo, an effective financial strategy is a must.