When I worked as a mortgage broker, I made a substantial portion of my income from remortgaging my clients properties, mostly just helping out those rate tarts that wanted a cheaper deal for the next 2,3 or 5 years, but sometimes I would do a remortgage as part of a debt-restructuring exercise, rolling up much more expensive loans and credit cards into a cheaper rate on the new mortgage. Now when the base rate was between for instance 5%, this pretty much always made sense, as the reversionar... Read Full Story

When I worked as a mortgage broker I dealt with a broad cross section of society on a daily basis, some professionals, some civil servants and teachers and quite a few tradesmen. Now you would think that the more educated the clients were the better they would be with their personal finances, not so. What I discovered whilst dealing with the various clients I dealt with was that some people just seem to have a natural instinct for personal finances, and others seemed to need a helping hand. ... Read Full Story

In my quest for financial freedom, I have chosen to achieve this by being an entrepreneur and starting my own business. This is nothing new to me having been involved in a successful internet business during 2004/2005 and then running my own mortgage brokerage business from 2006-2008. However, I’m sure there are many out there that have always had jobs, and though they may have no desire to run their own business, if their ultimate goal is financial freedom, then I would suggest that this co... Read Full Story

I was in my local branch of Natwest Bank today, I won’t bore  you with the mudanity of what I was doing – opening a business savings account if you must know – but I had a very interesting chat with the business adviser in the branch who deals with all aspects of their products, savings, investments, mortgages and so on. He informed me that he had received an internal memo recently from Natwests’ in house economic forecasters stating that they felt the current low interest rates which mo... Read Full Story

I have many friends who are employed, mostly it seems by large corporates or the government, through jobs in teaching, the health service or other government departments. They all seem fairly happy with their lot, most of them don’t earn huge amounts of money, but seem happy with the (perceived) job security, paid holidays and pension scheme. I have first hand experience of going through a business failure and seeing how it affects one’s personal finances, not to mention one’s private life! I... Read Full Story

I remember earlier in the year reading an article in the paper (I think it was The Times) about house prices and how they would plumment about 25% during 2009-2010. This seems not to be the case now, as there was a story in the news last week that house prices were rising again. I suspect that this rise is simply the result of some good marketing/selling by the estate agents of this country, and also the result of the efforts being made by the govt to get the banks lending again. I however, e... Read Full Story

By taking a quick look at the Big Mac Index courtesy of The Economist, it would seem that Thailand is the cheapest place to retire to. Of course, some people’s tastes may have graduated beyond that of a Big Mac and fries by the time they reach retirement age, so with this in mind, what other factors should one look at when searching for a cheap place to retire to? Cost of property I’m sure some people from over in Scandinavia may well look at the Big Mac Index and think that retiring to the U... Read Full Story

Early retirement is still a concept in use today, primarily to describe the ability to retire before the standard retirement age of 65 in the UK, though these days people tend to talk more about financial freedom as opposed to saying they want to take early retirement. If you are looking to achieve financial freedom or take early retirement, then you will need to do some planning, it won’t just happen otherwise. First thing that you need to do is set yourself a goal. When I used to work... Read Full Story

With the credit crunch having turned into a recession, I’m sure there are many out there that are wishing to cut down on everyday expenses, so here’s my tips for frugal living. However, don’t think that being more frugal is the only way to beat the recession - the optimum strategy to beat the recession is to play a good offence and a good defence. So cut your costs down by following my frugal living tips, but also look to increase your income by following these simple ways t... Read Full Story

There are a host of ways to make money online, but many of them are not that simple, for instance, if you wanted to setup as a competitor to Expedia, it would be pretty difficult to do on a shoe string, actually it would be impossible. However, if you have a love for travel and fancy yourself as a internet entrepreneur, then there are ways you can make money, hell, you can even get yourself signed up as a partner of Expedia and sell their products for a commission. This is what is known in th... Read Full Story