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Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | Should I buy a house or am I making silly assumptions that I can afford it? | The rules of thumb are there for a reason. In this case, they reflect good banking and common sense by the buyer. When we bought our house 15 years ago it cost 2.5 times our salary and we put 20% down, putting the mortgage at exactly 2X our income. My wife thought we were stretching ourselves, getting too big a house c... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Should I buy a house or am I making silly assumptions that I can afford it? | Having convinced myself that there is no point of paying someone's else mortgage Somewhat rhetorical this many years later, but I expect some other kid forcefed the obsession with propping up the housing market might be repeating the nonsense about "paying someone else's mortgage" and read this. Will you be buying yo... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Should I buy a house or am I making silly assumptions that I can afford it? | A common rule of thumb is the 28/36 ratio. It's described here. In your case, with a gross (?) salary of £50,000, that means that you should spend no more than 28% of it, or £1,167 per month on housing. You may be able to swing a bit more because you have no debts and a modest amount in your savings. The 36% part comes... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Should I buy a house or am I making silly assumptions that I can afford it? | When I bought my own place, mortgage lenders worked on 3 x salary basis. Admittedly that was joint salary - eg you and spouse could sum your salaries. Relaxing this ratio is one of the reasons we are in the mess we are now. You are shrewd (my view) to realise that buying is better than renting. But you also should ... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | What is a subsidy? | Subsidy usually means gratuitous financial support. For example, if for whatever reason you live much below the living average paying utility services in full might be too expensive - you'll be out of money before you even think of buying food and basic clothes. Yet it's clear that once can't live in a city without uti... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | What is a subsidy? | subsidy - financial support. For example subsidized housing - when the government pays a part of your rent (usually for low income families). or subsidized student loan - when somebody else is paying interest on the money you borrowed while you are in school. |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | What is a subsidy? | It means a government giving out money to encourage a particular product (or service) to be bought or sold. Some people will use the word more loosely to refer to any financial incentive, even if it's not coming from the government. Wikipedia has a list of examples that may be helpful: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subs... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | What is a subsidy? | A subsidy is a payment made by a group (usually the state) to individuals or corporations in order to shift the balance if the rational economic decision for the individual would be detrimental to the group as a whole otherwise. For example, if there are different quality kinds of crops that can be planted, for example... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Investment Newbie - Options in India - For $10K - for 10 years | I would suggest you to put your money in an FD for a year, and as soon as you get paid the interest, start investing that interest in a SIP(Systematic investment plan). This is your safest option but it will not give you a lot of returns. But I can guarantee that you will not lose your capital(Unless the economy fails... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | Who sets the prices on government bonds? | Who sets the prices? Effectively the market does, like basically all openly traded things. The Greek government could well have said "5% is as high as we will go". As a result, investors may not have chosen to buy the securities. The global bond market is highly liquid, and investors who have a choice could well then... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | What does quantitative easing 2 mean for my bank account? | QE2 will mean that there are about $500 billion dollars in existence which weren't there before. These dollars will all be competing with the existing dollars for real goods and services, so each dollar will be worth a little less, and prices will rise a little. This is inflation. You can probably expect 1.5%-2% annual... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | What does quantitative easing 2 mean for my bank account? | IMO, QE2 will likely have no perceptible impact in the near term. Keeping all of your savings in a bank guarantees that you will lose money to inflation & taxes. I'd suggest consulting a financial advisor -- preferably someone who understands issues facing someone with assets in the US and Canada. In terms of what port... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | What does quantitative easing 2 mean for my bank account? | Probably means next to zero chance of having decent rates on savings accounts for the near future - who needs your money if banks can have government money for free? Probably no short-term effects on you besides that. |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | What is the best credit card for someone with no credit history | If you've never had a credit card before a likely reason can be due to lack of credit history. You can apply for a department store card. Nordstroms, Macy's, Target will often grant a small line of credit even with no history. Target would be my first attempt as they have a wide selection of every day items, improving ... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | What is the best credit card for someone with no credit history | You have what is called in the biz a "thin file". Check with a Credit Union. They will get you a secured card or maybe a straight credit card. They usually will graduate you from a secured card to a real credit card in 12-18 months. Then you are on your way. You should also sign up for Creditkarma to get your cred... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | What is the best credit card for someone with no credit history | You have a lack of credit history. Lending is still tight since the recession and companies aren't as willing to take a gamble on people with no history. The secured credit card is the most direct route to building credit right now. I don't think you're going to be applicable for a department store card (pointless any... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | What is the best credit card for someone with no credit history | Capital One's normal master card is known to approve people with limited or bad credit history. If not that look into a secured credit card. You put down a deposit of $200 or more and you get that much in credit, sometimes more. |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | What is the best credit card for someone with no credit history | Consider getting yourself a gas card. Use it for a year. Make your payments on time. Then reapply for a credit card. |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Why are “random” deposits bad? | Random deposits are a bit like playing the lotery - especially if one is frequently chasing "hot tips". You might make it big, but the odds are vastly against you. "Random" deposits into various investments won't be optimal, because such "random" decisions will not be properly diversified and balanced. Various invest... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | Should I always hold short term bonds till maturity? | Risk is reduced but isn't zero The default risk is still there, the issuer can go bankrupt, and you can still loose all or some of your money if restructuring happens. If the bond has a callable option, the issuer can retire them if conditions are favourable for the issuer, you can still loose some of your investment.... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | Is it worth trying to find a better minimum down payment for a first time home buyer? | It's worthwhile to try and find a better minimum down-payment. When I bought my home, I got an FHA loan, which drastically reduced the minimum down-payment required (I think the minimum is 3% under FHA). Be aware that any down-payment percentage under 20% means that you'll have to pay for private mortgage insurance (... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Is it worth trying to find a better minimum down payment for a first time home buyer? | If you are putting down less than 20% expect to need to pay PMI. When you first applied they should have described you a group of options ranging from minimal to 20% down. The monthly amounts would have varied based on PMI, down payment, and interest rate. The maximum monthly payment for principal, interest, taxes, an... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Is it worth trying to find a better minimum down payment for a first time home buyer? | When I first purchased my home six years ago, I was able to get into a Bank of America First Time Homebuyer program that required no down payment and no PMI. While I hope you find a lower initial payment, the banks have tightened their requirements so that buyers have "more skin in the game" so to speak. Exotic loan op... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | classify investments in to different asset types | REITs can be classified as equity, mortgage, or hybrid. A security that sells like a stock on the major exchanges and invests in real estate directly, either through properties or mortgages. Trades like equity but the underlying is a property ot mortgage. So you are investing in real estate but without directly dealing... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | classify investments in to different asset types | A foreign stock mutual fund definitely belongs in stocks. It's composed of stocks. Your self occupied house is definitely real estate. You don have to keep in mind,however that selling it would create costs such as rent. I wouldn't leave it out, if doing that would cause you to buy more real estate. This would cause y... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | Portfolio Diversity : invest $4000 into one account or $1000 into 4 accounts? | You spread money/investment across different accounts for different reasons: All this is in addition to diversification reasons. Investing all your money into one stock, bond, Mutual fund, ETF is risky if that one segment of the economy/market suffers. There is a drawback to diversification of accounts. Some have mini... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | What is the big deal about the chinese remnibi trading hub that opened in toronto | Chinese suppliers can quote their price in CNY rather than USD (as has been typical), and thus avoid the exchange risk from US dollar volatility- the CNY has been generally appreciating so committing to receive payments in US dollars when their costs are in CNY means they are typically on the losing end of the equation... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | How frequently should I request additional credit? | I don't know of a guideline to how often you can ask for an increase. You can ask as often as you like. As for consequences, refer to Is there a downside to asking for a credit increase?, where the consensus is that, aside from a possible (temporary) hard pull on your credit report, there's probably no risk to asking. ... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | How frequently should I request additional credit? | I do this all the time, my credit rating over time plotted on a graph looks like saw blades going upward on a slope I use a credit alert service to get my credit reports quarterly, and I know when the credit agencies update their files (every three months), so I never have a high balance at those particular times Basic... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | What is the best way to stay risk neutral when buying a house with a mortgage? | To avoid risk from rising interest rates, get a fixed rate mortgage. For the life of the mortgage your principal and interest payments will remain the same. Keep in mind that the taxes and insurance portion of your monthly payment may still go up. Because you own the property, the costs to maintain the property are you... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | What is the best way to stay risk neutral when buying a house with a mortgage? | How can one offset exposure created by real-estate purchase? provides a similar discussion. Even if such a product were available in the precise increments you need, the pricing would make it a loser for you. "There's no free lunch" in this case, and the cost to insure against the downside would be disproportional to t... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | What is the best way to stay risk neutral when buying a house with a mortgage? | Note: I am making a USA-assumption here; keep in mind this answer doesn't necessarily apply to all countries (or even states in the USA). You asked two questions: I'm looking to buy a property. I do not want to take a risk on this property. Its sole purpose is to provide me with a place to live. How would I go abo... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | What is the best way to stay risk neutral when buying a house with a mortgage? | It is pretty simple to avoid risk in home ownership: Do those things and your risk of home ownership is about nil. |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | What is the best way to stay risk neutral when buying a house with a mortgage? | You can hedge your house price from losing value if you believe that the housing market is correlated with major stock indices. Speak with a commodities broker because they will be able to help you buy puts on stock indices which if correlated with housing prices will offer somewhat of a hedge. Example. House prices dr... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | Relation between interest rates and currency for a nation | What you are asking about is called Interest Rate Parity. Or for a longer explanation the article Interest Rate Parity at Wikipedia. If the US has a rate of say zero, and the rate in Elbonia is 10%, one believes that in a year the exchange rate will be shifted by 10%, i.e. it will take 1.1 unit of their currency to ge... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | Relation between interest rates and currency for a nation | From Indian context, there are a number of factors that are influencing the economic condition and the exchange rate, interest rate etc. are reflection of the situation. I shall try and answer the question through the above Indian example. India is running a budget deficit of 4 odd % for last 6-7 years, which means tha... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Are Australian mutual fund fees large compared to US? | This is a Vanguard-specific difference in the sense that in the US, Vanguard is a leader in lowering management fees for the mutual funds that they offer. Of course, several US mutual fund companies have also been lowering the expense ratio of their mutual funds in recent years because more and more investors have be... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | How to donate to charity that will make a difference? | OP wants to do something very honourable, applause for that. Being a Greek I have insider knowledge about the impact of various organisations. Fact is, for people from abroad what is the most highly recommended action would be to support organisations of an international network (red cross, doctors w/out borders etc), ... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | How to donate to charity that will make a difference? | I can't say specifically about charities to help Greece. If someone on here has specific knowledge, please chime in. The only shortcut I know to tell if a charity is legitimate is to consult one of the ratings/watchdog type groups that monitor charities. For example, for explicitly Christian charities, there's a group ... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | How to donate to charity that will make a difference? | In the. US, i'd suggest hitting the Charity Navigator website for evaluation of how efficiently various charities will use your money. At this point I won't donate money to anything that gets less than three stars unless I know the organization very well indeed -- and I've been progressively swapping out 3-star groups ... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | Opportunity to buy Illinois bonds that can never default? | Can't declare bankruptcy isn't the same as "can't default". Bankruptcy is a specific legal process for discharging or restructuring debts. If Illinois can't declare bankruptcy, that means it will still owe you the money for the bonds no matter what, but it doesn't guarantee that it will actually pay you what it owes.... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Opportunity to buy Illinois bonds that can never default? | If Illinois cannot go bankruptcy This is missing a few, very important words, "...under current law." The United States changed the law so as to allow Puerto Rico to go into a form of bankruptcy. So you cannot rely on a lack of legal support for bankruptcy to protect any bond investments you might make in Illinois. ... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Opportunity to buy Illinois bonds that can never default? | If you give money to a person or entity, and they don't have the ability to pay you back, it doesn't matter if they are legally required to pay you. |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Opportunity to buy Illinois bonds that can never default? | Sovereign immunity is the state's ultimate "get out of bankruptcy free" card. After all, the state has a hand in defining what bankruptcy even is in their state. Federal law is a framework, states customize it from there. The state's simplest tactic is to simply not pay you. And leave you scrambling to the courtho... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | How foreign cash is beneficial for a country? | Let me ask you another question: if that person stayed at home and made a widget instead, would exporting that widget benefit his home country? There is no difference, economically, between the two situations. A foreign worker sending home remittances is no different from a local manufacturer exporting their products. ... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | How will Brexit affect house mortgages? | Only you can decide whether it's wise or not given your own personal circumstances. Brexit is certainly a big risk, and noone can really know what will happen yet. The specific worries you mention are certainly valid. Additionally you might find it hard to keep your job or get a new one if the economy turns bad, and in... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | How will Brexit affect house mortgages? | Nobody can predict the affects of Brexit but it is wise to consider them. We saw the pound weaken after the vote to leave and it is possible the pound will weaken further after Brexit and this devaluation could be quite dramatic. If that happens it is likely to increase inflation, UK inflation has gone from under 1% ar... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | How to quantify differences in return with low expense ratio vs high expense ratio mutual funds? | Yes you should take in the expenses being incurred by the mutual fund. This lists down the fees charged by the mutual fund and where expenses can be found in the annual statement of the fund. To calculate fees and expenses. As you might expect, fees and expenses vary from fund to fund. A fund with high costs must perf... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | How would bonds fare if interest rates rose? | 1. Interest rates What you should know is that the longer the "term" of a bond fund, the more it will be affected by interest rates. So a short-term bond fund will not be subject to large gains or losses due to rate changes, an intermediate-term bond fund will be subject to moderate gains or losses, and a long-term bon... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | How would bonds fare if interest rates rose? | When interest rates rise, the price of bonds fall because bonds have a fixed coupon rate, and since the interest rate has risen, the bond's rate is now lower than what you can get on the market, so it's price falls because it's now less valuable. Bonds diversify your portfolio as they are considered safer than stocks a... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | How much does taking a Microeconomics course help you understand the field of investing? | Not much at all, especially an introductory level Microeconomics class. There are a few reasons for this: That's not to say that Economics isn't worth studying. I loved both my Micro and Macro class. But I probably got more useful investing knowledge from a class on linear regression. |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | I don't understand all this techincal jargon | Note: While I think the above is a reasonable interpretation, I'm not about to take legal responsibility for it since I'm not a lawyer, if you need serious advice get a professional opinion through appropriate channels. |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Should I buy a house because Mortgage rates are low | The simple answer is that you are correct. You should not purchase a house until you are financially stable enough to do so. A house is an asset that you must maintain, and it can be expensive to do so. Over the long term, you will generally save money by purchasing. However, in any given year you may spend much more ... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Should I buy a house because Mortgage rates are low | There is a significant tie between housing prices and mortgage rates. As such, don't assume low mortgage rates mean you will be financially better off if you buy now, since housing prices are inversely correlated with mortgage rates. This isn't a huge correlation - it's R-squared is a bit under 20%, at a 1.5-2 year l... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | Should I buy a house because Mortgage rates are low | How can people afford 10% mortgage? Part of the history of housing prices was the non-bubble component of the bubble. To be clear, there was a housing bubble and crash. Let me offer some simple math to illustrate my point - This is what happened on the way down. A middle class earner, $60K/yr couple, using 25% of thei... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | Should I buy a house because Mortgage rates are low | As of now in 2016, is is safe to assume that mortgage rates would/should not get back to 10%? What would the rates be in future is speculation. It depends on quite a few things, overall economy, demand / supply, liquidity in market etc ... Chances are less that rates would show a dramatic rise in near future. Does this... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Should I buy a house because Mortgage rates are low | Reasons for no: In your first sentence you say something interesting: rates low - prices high. Actually those 2 are reversely correlated, imagine if rates would be 5% higher-very few people could buy at current prices so prices would drop. Also you need to keep in mind the rate of inflation that was much higher durin... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Paying tax for freelance work while travelling | Having freelanced myself in South America I could give you a sound advice BUT you would first need to answer some questions. 1) How long do you plan on being in South America? At the end of 2017 will you be back in Ireland or still being in South America? In other words was is your country of residence for tax purpose... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | How is not paying off mortgage better in normal circumstances? | The reason is that although the American economy is functioning normally, mortgage rates are stupid-low, and are below a prudent expectation of long-term (30 year) rates of return in the market. I manage endowments, so I say "prudent" in the context of endowment investment, which is the picture of caution and subject... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | How is not paying off mortgage better in normal circumstances? | Lets do the math, using your numbers. We start off with $100K, a desire to buy a house and invest, and 30 years to do it. Scenario #1 We buy a house for $100K mortgage at 5% interest over 30 years. Monthly payment ends up being $536.82/month. We then take the $100K we still have and invest it in stocks, earning an ave... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | How is not paying off mortgage better in normal circumstances? | There are several reasons: |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | How is not paying off mortgage better in normal circumstances? | In some respects the analysis for this question is similar to comparing a "safe" return on a government bond vs. holding the stock market. Typically, the stock market's expected return will be higher -- i.e., there's a positive equity risk premium -- vs. a government bond (assuming it's held to maturity). There's no gu... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | How is not paying off mortgage better in normal circumstances? | One way of looking at it is that your equity in your house is an investment in a particular class of asset, and investing further in that asset class may drive you away from, rather than towards, your preferred asset mix. It's pretty common here in New Zealand for people's only investments to be their homes and rental ... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | How is not paying off mortgage better in normal circumstances? | Certainly there are people who do pay off their homes. Others do not. It's a question of risk tolerance and preference. Some considerations relevant to this question: Taxes - Interest on a mortgage is tax deductible. Particularly for high earners, this is a significant incentive to maintain a mortgage balance and p... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | Teaching school kids about money - what are the real life examples of math, budgeting, finance? | I am a numbers guy, the math is great. Instead of "jane was twice her son's age when he married, and is now 1.5 times his age....." questions in math class, I think the math problems should mostly have dollar/pound signs in front of them. In general, I like the idea of relating to the kids' situations as much as possi... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | Teaching school kids about money - what are the real life examples of math, budgeting, finance? | If these are children that may be employed, in a few years, it may well be worth walking them through some basics of the deductions around employment, some basic taxes, uses of banks, and give them enough of a basis in how the economy of the world works. For example, if you get a job and get paid $10/hour, that may so... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Teaching school kids about money - what are the real life examples of math, budgeting, finance? | My education on this topic at this age range was a little more free-form. We were given a weeklong project in the 6th grade, which I remember pretty clearly: Fast forward 6 years (we were 12). You are about to be kicked out of your parents' house with the clothes on your back, $1,000 cash in your pocket, your high... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Has the likelihood of getting a lower interest rate by calling & asking been reduced by recent credit card regulations? | I don't know that this can actually be answered objectively. Maybe it can with some serious research. (Read: data on what the issuers have been doing since the law went into affect.) Personally, I think the weak economy and general problems with easy credit are a bigger issue than the new rules. Supposedly, there is... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Is there a country that uses the term “dollar” for currency without also using “cents” as fractional monetary units? | Going through the list of economies that currently use the dollar, all of them list cents as a fractional unit. In Hong Kong and Taiwan, the 1/100 fractional unit is still called a cent, but it's no longer in circulation in coin form and only finds use in financial markets or electronic payments. In countries like Mal... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | Is there a country that uses the term “dollar” for currency without also using “cents” as fractional monetary units? | Wikipedia has a nice list of currencies that use "cents" and currencies that use 1/100th division that is not called "cent". Cent means "100" in Latin (and French, and probably all the Roman family of languages), so if the currency is divided by 100 subunits - it will likely to be called "cent" or something similar in ... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | Are real estate prices memory-less? | For various reasons, real estate prices exhibit far more memory than stock prices. The primary reason for this is that real estate is much less liquid. Transaction costs for stock trading are on the order of 10 basis points (0.1%), whereas a real estate transaction will typically have total costs (including title, la... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Are real estate prices memory-less? | No, at least not with specific houses. When I bought my current house, our realtor looked at the previous selling price of this house, along with the prices at which it had been placed on the market. These values influenced the amount we offered for the house. I'm sure it also influenced the amount the house had been l... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Are real estate prices memory-less? | Housing prices are set by different criteria. It can become memoryless the same as the stock if the criteria used to set its price in the past is no longer valid. For example, take Phoenix or Las Vegas - in the past these were considered attractive investments because of the economical growth and the climate of the are... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Are real estate prices memory-less? | I would argue no. It's easy to correlate home prices based on size, neighborhood, school district, condition and other factors, such as property taxes. In fact, real estate people and government assessors use those characteristics to assess property value. The demographics of a home will drive desirability/demand for t... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | What is the rationale behind stock markets retreating due to S&P having a negative outlook on the USA? | Many of the major indices retreated today because of this news. Why? How do the rising budget deficits and debt relate to the stock markets? It does seem strange that there is a correlation between government debt and the stock market. But I could see many reasons for the reaction. The downgrade by S&P may make... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | What is the rationale behind stock markets retreating due to S&P having a negative outlook on the USA? | Many of the major indices retreated today because of this news. Why? How do the rising budget deficits and debt relate to the stock markets? The major reason for the market retreating is the uncertainty regarding the US Dollar. If the US credit rating drops that will have an inflationary effect on the currency (a... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | What is the rationale behind stock markets retreating due to S&P having a negative outlook on the USA? | When people (even people in the media) say: "The stock market is up because of X" or "The stock market is down because of Y", they are often engaging in what Nicolas Taleb calls the narrative falacy. They see the market has moved in one direction or another, they open their newspaper, pick a headline that provides a pl... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | What is the rationale behind stock markets retreating due to S&P having a negative outlook on the USA? | If you spoke in front of a group of people in 2001 about the possibility of be lowered, you would be written off as a kook. Now S&P is talking about a negative credit outlook -- scary stuff. It's scary because a base assumption in any risk model is that US Treasury debt is utterly reliable and comes with zero default r... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | What is the rationale behind stock markets retreating due to S&P having a negative outlook on the USA? | I think a big part of the issue is ignorance. For instance, the US govt cannot default on its loans, yet you keep hearing people speak as if it could. The US govt also does not have to borrow to pay for anything, it creates its own money whenever it wants. These 2 facts often evade many people, and they feel the US gov... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | As an investor or speculator, how might one respond to QE3 taper? | Any answer for what to do in a taper will assume ceteris paribus because how markets initially react when they suspect a taper may immediately change depending on what data are released after the taper. For instance, I've seen Soros and a few other hedge fund managers hold shorts when expecting a taper because the theo... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | As an investor or speculator, how might one respond to QE3 taper? | As I tell all my clients... remember WHY you are investing in the first. Make a plan and stick to it. Find a strategy and perfect it. A profit is not a profit until you take it. the same goes with a loss. You never loose till you sell for less than what you paid. Stop jumping for one market to the next, find one stra... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Does a stay at home mom need term life insurance? | The way to think about this is: what would happen to the family if stay-at-home Mom were to die. You obviously can't do anything about the loss, grief and trauma, but think about the financial implications. Assuming that Dad continues to work, and that the child is young, you are going to have to find someone to take c... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Does a stay at home mom need term life insurance? | Absolutely! Just because a spouse doesn't have a taxable income, doesn't mean they aren't providing real, tangible benefit to the family economy with an important job. As tragic as it is to consider losing your spouse, are you truly in a position to replace everything they do you for you? Knowing what they do for you... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Does a stay at home mom need term life insurance? | We asked the same question earlier this year as my wife is a SAHM with 2 young boys (5 and under). If something happened to her I'd have to quit work or change careers to stay home to raise them or something. We ended up getting a decent 20 year level TERM policy that will cover the care of both boys for many of their ... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | Does a stay at home mom need term life insurance? | Another source of insurance can be through the working spouses employment. Some companies do provide free or low cost coverage for spouses without a need for a physical exam. The risk is that it might not be available at the amount you want, and that if the main spouse switches companies it might not be available with ... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | Clarification of Inflation according to Forbes | I think you're missing Simon Moore's point. His point is that, due to low inflation, the returns on almost all asset classes should be less than they have been historically, so we shouldn't rebalance our portfolio or withdraw from the market and hold cash based on the assumption that stocks (or any other asset) seem to... |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Clarification of Inflation according to Forbes | Inflation can be a misleading indicator. Partly because it is not measured as a function of the change in prices of everything in the economy, just the basket of goods deemed essential. The other problem is that several things operate on it, the supply of money, the total quantity of goods being exchanged, and the sup... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Buying a foreclosed property | Usually... I think that's overstating the case. You CAN get a bargain (especially if the place is in not-so-great condition), but not every foreclosure will be a good deal even if it is priced well below its most recently appraised value. As the buyer it's your responsibility to determine whether it's priced well or n... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Buying a foreclosed property | No, it is not true. It depends on the market, the banks' inventory, the original debt that was owed, etc etc. The banks generally want to recover their money, so in case of underwater properties they may end up hold a property for years until prices bounce back (as it happened during the last crisis when many houses we... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | Buying a foreclosed property | That may depend largely in which country you are in, the legislation in that country and the state of the economy and property market (more specifically) at the time of the foreclosure. In Australia, where we do not have non-recourse loans (except in SMSFs) the banks are obliged to recoup as much as possible for the mo... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | Buying a foreclosed property | Like most other things, this is "sometimes," but not always true. Sometimes banks will be willing to sell at a discount, sometimes they will hold out for "full price." But if you want a discount, this is a good place to "look." |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Optimal Asset Allocation | Generally a diversified portfolio will give you a better overall return --a couple of factors that may address what you are looking at - 1) Correlation - The correlation between your two funds is still very high -- it's partially a function of how global economies are related and many companies are now multi-national. ... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Optimal Asset Allocation | There are some good answers about the benefits of diversification, but I'm going to go into what is going on mathematically with what you are attempting. I was always under the assumption that as long as two securities are less than perfectly correlated (i.e. 1), that the standard deviation/risk would be less than if I... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Optimal Asset Allocation | There are a couple of reasons to diversify your assets. First, since we cannot predict which of our investments will perform best, we want to "cast our net" broadly enough to have something invested in what's going to be performing well. Second, diversification isn't intended to provide the highest returns, but rather ... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | Optimal Asset Allocation | When you have multiple assets available and a risk-free asset (cash or borrowing) you will always end up blending them if you have a reasonable objective function. However, you seem to have constrained yourself to 100% investment. Combine that with the fact that you are considering only two assets and you can easily ... |
Utilize your financial knowledge, give your answer or opinion to the input question or subject . Answer format is not limited. | How to take advantage of record high household debt in Canada? | Some ideas: |
Offer your insights or judgment on the input financial query or topic using your financial expertise. Reply as normal question answering | Is investing exlusively in a small-cap index fund a wise investment? | In a word, no. Diversification is the first rule of investing. Your plan has poor diversification because it ignores most of the economy (large cap stocks). This means for the expected return your portfolio would get, you would bear an unnecessarily large amount of risk. Large cap and small cap stocks take turns out... |
Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open. | Is investing exlusively in a small-cap index fund a wise investment? | Stock portfolios have diversifiable risk and undiversifiable risk. The market rewards investors for taking undiversifiable risk (e.g. owning an index of oil producing companies) and does not reward investors for assuming diversifiable risk (e.g. owning a single oil producing company). The market will not provide inve... |
Share your insights or perspective on the financial matter presented in the input. | Is investing exlusively in a small-cap index fund a wise investment? | If the OP is saving 33% if his/her current income, he/she doesn't want or need yet more income from investments right now. The advice on "diversifying" in the other answers is the standard "investment advisor" response to beginner's questions, and has two advantages for the advisor: (1) they won't get sued for giving b... |
Offer your thoughts or opinion on the input financial query or topic using your financial background. | What to ask Warren Buffet at the Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting? | For whatever it's worth, when I went to the meeting a couple of years ago, the question and answer segment is mostly students asking how to pick a stock or what book they should read. I'm sure someone else will ask but it would be interesting to hear their take on the Syrian refugee situation in Europe and how it may ... |
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