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Joseph Tan is one of the most truthful guys who shared his property investment experience. Most property investors would properly brag about how superb property investment is, a smaller group who are willing to admit their failures would curse on it. But believe it or not, Joseph Tan's story actually covers the majority of how a property investor in this region would experience after some time i.e. from the 2nd to 5th property. Basically he wasn't fully equipped with proper tools to start with but yet making great returns in his first 3 properties. However, the 4th one turned out to be a big lesson and he is sharing it with all. (details in Alan Tan's blog ) If disaster like this happened on the 4th or 5th property, it usually break even with previous earned profit or at worst became an expensive lesson. But for some who faced it on the 2nd or 3rd property, it usually crash their whole personal finance portfolio. Those who managed to stay alive had to start all over.

" Cost " is the money you paid in order to get something you want in return. " Strategy " can be simplified as the methods you use in achieving a goal . Strategy cost is the money you MAY have to pay if you use certain methods but NOT necessary ... depends on how it turns out. For example, When buying shares in stock market, you will have to pay some broker fees, stamp duty and clearing fee etc. Those are the real cost incurred. The way to calculate cost is usually fix, pre-arranged and agreed up front. Putting these fees aside, right after you bought a share at $1.00 the immediate buy back price is usually lower i.e. $0.99. The difference between this buy and sell price can be seen as strategy cost . You don't really pay this 1 cent. If the price goes up and you earn money, you earn 1 cent less. If the price goes down and you lose money, you lose 1 cent more. So strategically you are 1 cent disadvantage to the market. Some may say this is future co

It was mentioned before Malaysia's government initiative to charge RM50 tax on credit card to 'reduce' debt is a plain zany act . When confronted by many institutions and experts, Najib ( some of his photos here ) even goes public exercising his power to enforce his budget 2010 . Just in case you haven't heard, the time to pay this RM50 tax is the same as your annual fee due month . So if your cards are due in December 2010, you can hold it for another year before cancelling it out. But if your cards are due in Jan 2010, you better find out when the statement date is. You HAVE TO cancel your cards before the statement is generated. Once this RM50 tax is imposed, the banks will NOT be able to waive it for you even if you cancel your cards AFTER the statement is printed. So far I only know UOB and EON banks will waive this RM50 tax for real. You have to use your EON cards for 36 times to waive this RM50 tax. Normally you will have to use 24 times to waive its annua

Although Fix Deposit rate stays at 2% for 1 month and 2.5% for 12 months but generally FD interests are 'starting' to rise. This is inline with the speculation that interest rates will be raised by Bank Negara ... and its just a matter of time. This trend will affect both FD rate and BLR. Three Banks have the lowest BLR since mid 2009 : 5.25% The Royal Bank of Scotland Berhad Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ (Malaysia) Berhad J.P.Morgan Chase Bank Berhad But most loans come in terms like BLR + or - another numbers. Remember to compare your own true and effective loan rate including fee++ before deciding on a loan package. Usually these lowest BLR banks also offer less attractive effective final rates ie. BLR - a lower number. Some other deals that follow strictly on BLR on the other hand, would be great to deal with these banks. The highest saving account interest is 1.88% Mudharabah Basic Savings Account-i by CIMB Bank Berhad minimum deposit RM 20 interest calculated daily

In an earlier article , a myth was broken where it says " getting loan will Decrease your liquidating options " so if you have the cash to buy the whole thing, you should go ahead and buy it and NOT getting a loan. Because once you get a loan, you will end up disposing your item Slower and get back Less worth - which is the opposite of liquidation. That message has disturbed a lot of old friends who have been using loan successfully in their property investment. They have been borrowing loan in their investment for more than 10-20 years and almost always successful getting back a bigger return as a result of the loans. If loan is not a good thing or not liquidating, what has happened in the past 10-20 years, they just got lucky ? Loan or any form of effective borrowing, is a leverage tool. Lets take a look at the same example used in last article; You have the option to buy an property for $100,000 and you could also get a loan where the interest is 5% for the next 10 y

One of the commonly spread concepts in investment is that " Timing is Everything ". The mother of all laws in investment is " Buy Low Sell High ", hence knowing WHEN to buy and WHEN to sell is key to everything. Although this seems very logical and correct but it may NOT be the Best strategy one should apply in investment, especially in personal finance. Timing is indeed very important but it doesn't have to be " Everything " . Timing can be further categorized into (1) timing the exact moment and (2) timing a general period. For example, is current market just over its peak now vs generally the market is still rather high now. While it seems impossible to predict the exact future but its always simpler to get a sense of what may happen next . I predict that The sun will rise tomorrow morning vs The sun will be seen at 7:23am after the clouds are cleared off in 13 minutes If an investor is Correct All The Time, focusing solely on timing would be a

You may have heard people are claiming its better to get a car loan than buying it with cash even if you could, especially from those car salesmen. Likewise, property investment gurus say that its better to get a home loan. These are some of the key reasons why they say loan is better than cash; Liquidity - keep your money with you, you may need it in future. Income tax department may come 'disturb' you seeing that you have loads of cash. buying stuff with loan usually gets more gifts. It shouldn't be too hard to realize the main reasons why people pursue you to get a loan is because they may get a share of the interest you are paying. For example, car salesmen earn double the commission when they sell you a car with loan. Property agents want you to buy more property with the limited money you have hence they can earn multiple commission instead of just once. Other than that, most others who pursue the same are most properly are just due to ignorance. This situation

I was once young and naive. Banks are so big, earn so much money that they wouldn't bother to cheat my money. Its safe to leave everything to them and they will take good care of my money, especially when I am not a big user ... but ... Notice in this statement that previous left over balance is only 1 cent. As a matter of fact, this account has been having 1 cent balance for 2-3 months. Recently I had to use up to RM 100 so that I can use ALL the points to exchange for food voucher before cancelling it. Suddenly there is a finance chargees of 22 cents. How in the world can there be a 22 cents finance charges out of a 1 cent balance ? The finance charge is 16%. After digging out the whole Eon team including the highest management demanding for an explanation, no one can answer that except apologizing and waiving the said ridiculous calculated fee. I couldn't help to think how many people out there have been abused by such system bug ? 22 cents x 10 million EON credit c

Cash flow is money in your hand where you can USE right now to buy food and petrol. Asset is something that is worth some value but may not be CONSUMED directly like a house and car. Although there may be more complication like cash is part of asset and the correct wordings for this topic is liquidated vs non-liquidated assets etc. But if we simplify personal finance as much as possible, cash is cash and asset indicate non liquidated net asset . Many people who are good with their personal finance numbers always asked which is more important ? Maintain a positive Cash Flow or increase net Asset ? Well, the simple and direct answer is: Cash Flow is more Urgent and Asset is more Important Enough cash flow is important for you to live on. At the moment cash ran out, you may start to suffer so much that your personal emotion may kick in affecting all your other judgement; Including selling your asset way under its value. So what if you have a billion dollar castle in a desert whi