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Happy Father’s Day: The Benefits of Being a Parent Can’t Be Measured

News

It’s true that the benefits of a parent cannot be measured or quantified in any meaningful way. It’s hard to put a price on the emotional commitment and special experience of raising a child as a parent, some of which may not even be realized by the parents themselves until afterwards. But it is undeniable that the experience of parenthood is a rewarding and special time in someone’s life.

An icon illustrating a parent and child
An icon illustrating a parent and child (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
For one thing, being a parent can you relive your childhood through your child. There are very few experiences in the world that are as intimate and vicarious as a parent who is raising their newborn child into an adult. Your child’s experiences become your experiences, their safety and learning becomes your priorities, and their success, ultimately, become your own success as a parent. You can rediscover the parts of your childhood that you may even have forgot as your child experiences them for the first time.
As a parent, you are also the center of the world for your child. This can be a tremendous source of self-confidence as well as incentive for self-improvement, to know that another human being sees you as their ultimate role model and will grow up in your footsteps. Just imagine the sense of wonder and awe with which you regarded your own parents when you were a child, and apply them to your child. That is the way they will see the world for a long time, with a constant sense of amazement and curiosity. The mundane becomes extraordinary and fantastic to a child, and a parent is part of the magic and the child’s discovery of the world.
In addition, parenting is a rewarding experience because you involved in the creation of a life and the raising of your child with your partner. There is a great amount of pressure, but also a sense of pride as your child’s characteristics and worldview will, in a large part, be derived from your interaction and education of them. All the things that you wish you had done in your childhood, or wish you had experienced or learned about earlier. These are all things that you can teach your child. As a parent, you are your child’s most important friend, teacher and role model. That is a tremendous source of empowerment and responsibility. But the reward you can get out of being a great parent is a new life in the world that you shaped with your words and actions. What you teach them becomes their most important life lessons, and your actions as a role model becomes the standard by which they live the rest of their lives.
So yes, the benefits of being a parent cannot be measured in conventional terms. But these benefits can definitely outweigh any worldly possession or unit of valuation. Parenthood is an emotional, spiritual, intellectual and educational experience that very few other experiences in the world can replace or even come close to imitating.
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Refinancing Through the HARP Program

Finance

HARP Refinance

If you owe more than your house is worth, and want to refinance to today’s low interest rates, you need to check out the HARP program. Millions of homeowners with underwater homes are finding relief in a new version of the Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP). Refinancing to lower interest rates could slash your monthly mortgage payment or shorten the time it takes to pay-off your mortgage.

The new HARP loosened qualification rules, making it it easier for underwater homeowners to qualify for a refinance. When HARP 2.0 was released in November 2011 you had to work with your original lender. Since March 2012, when Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac rolled out the automated underwriting systems, you can work with any participating HARP lender. That means more competition for your business and better rates for you

HARP 2.0’s Hurdles

There are two series of hurdles you must clear before you can refinance your loan under HARP 2.0. The first set of hurdles concerns the loan itself. The three key eligibility questions are:

  1. Is the loan owned by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac?
  2. If so, was the loan purchased by Fannie or Freddie on or before May 31, 2009?
  3. The loan was not refinanced under HARP before (some exceptions apply).

If you answer yes to these three questions, then your loan may be eligible for HARP.

Tip: If your loan is a FHA loan, then check out a FHA streamline refinance loan.

The second set of hurdles concerns your finances and property. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac set up the basic guidelines. There are two basic ways your loan can be processed:

  1. Manual Underwriting System: Only your original lender (who is also your current servicer) can process a HARP loan through the manual underwriting system.
  2. Automated Underwriting System: Any participating lender can process a HARP loan through the automated system.

Keep in mind that lenders are free to have stricter qualifying rules than the basic Fannie and Freddie requirements.

When shopping for a HARP loan, here are some of the main points to look out for:

  • Credit Score Requirements: Fannie and Freddie have no minimum FICO score requirements. However, each lender has its own credit score requirements, so if you are denied by one lender, keep shopping.
  • Income Requirements: Your original lender can approve a loan with no debt to income ratio (DTI) requirement. However other lenders must qualify you based on  your DTI. The rule-of-thumb for a HARP loan is a 45% maximum DTI.
  • Timely Mortgage Payments: The HARP program allows for no late mortgage payments in the last 6 months and one late (30 days) payment in the preceding 6 months. However, some lenders do not allow any late payments.
  • Investment Properties Qualify: You can refinance a second home or rental property under HARP 2.0.
  • Fees: Lenders are not consistent in the fees or the interest rates they charge for HARP 2.0 loans. Some lenders charge a few hundred dollars for HARP 2.0 loan fees, and others charge thousands. It pays to shop around, so you can compare interest rates and fees.
  • Condos: While HARP guidelines for condos are tricky, many more condo owners will qualify for a loan under HARP 2.0 than under the first version of HARP.

Applying for HARP
First, go to the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Web sites to learn if either owns your loan and whether they bought your loan on or before May 31, 2009. If so, you can contact either your current mortgage servicer or shop around with the many lenders who are offering the HARP 2.0 loan. 

If your application is rejected, ask for the specific reason why. If you applied with your original lender, find out whether the lender used the manual or automated system. Request manual underwriting if your original lender turned you down based on automated underwriting, as it may result in your loan being approved.

It pays to shop for HARP 2.0 refinance. Many homeowners report one lender will reject their application, but another will offer them an attractive refinance. Second, lenders are not consistent in their offers. As mentioned, closing costs are all over the map. Interest rates vary, too.

Summary
HARP 2.0’s rules are technical. Each lender creates different overlays. If you believe you qualify for HARP 2.0, be persistent! The rules that are in place today could very well be expanded in the future. This is one instance in life where shopping can be the solution to your problem.

Making Extra Money Part 3: Product Selection

Finance

When you’re setting up a niche site, you need to monetize it.  You need to have a way to make money, or it’s a waste of time.

There are two main ways to do that:  AdSense or product promotion.   To set up an AdSense site, you write a bunch of articles, post them on a website with some Google ads, and wait for the money to roll in.

I don’t do that.

I don’t own a single AdSense site and have never set one up.  This article is not about setting up an Adsense site.

My niches site are all product-promotion sites.  I pick a product–generally an e-book or video course–and set up a site dedicated to it.

Naturally, picking a good product is an important part of the equation.

The most important part of product selection is that the product has an affiliate program. Without that, there’s no money to be made.     There are a lot of places to find affiliate programs.     Here are a few:

  • Amazon.   If you don’t live in one of the states that Amazon has dropped in retaliation for passing laws that attempt to circumvent the Supreme Court’s ruling on collecting sales tax, you can sign up as an associate and collect a commission on every referral you send that turns into a purchase.   That means you have a lot of product to choose from.   Unfortunately, your commission is small, so you need to promote fairly expensive products to get a decent return.   On the other hand, people trust Amazon, so that’s one less hurdle to making a sale.
  • Commission Junction.   These are the people managing affiliate programs for a large number of credit cards and banks.  If you’ve opened an account with INGDirect through one of my links, I got a commission for the referral. (Thank you!)   They have a lot of other products, too.
  • e-Junkie.  This one is a popular distribution system for bloggers.   It’s likely that, if you’ve bought an ebook from a blogger, e-Junkie handled the fulfillment process.   A lot of the products available there have an affiliate program, but that is up to the owner of the product.
  • ClickBank.  My favorite.   This is one of the largest affiliate networks specializing in electronic products, whether that’s membership sites, ebooks, or video courses.   Commissions are good, often 50-75%.   They also offer a 60 day guarantee of every product sold through their site, which helps soothe the wary customer.  This is the site I’ll be using for this series.

The first thing you need to do is sign up for whichever program you intend to use.

If you’re not going with Clickbank, feel free to skip ahead to the section on keyword research.

Once you are signed up and logged in, click on the “Marketplace” link at the top of the screen.

Clickbank

From here, it’s just a matter of finding a good product to sell.   Here are the niches we’re going to be looking for:

  • Back pain
  • Bankruptcy
  • Conflict resolution at work
  • Detox diets
  • Fat kids
  • Foreclosure avoidance
  • Job hunting
  • Weddings
  • Writing sales copy

I’m going to look for one or two good products in each niche.  When that’s done we’ll narrow it down by consumer demand.

For now, go to advanced search.

CBSearch

Enter your keyword, pick the category and set the advanced search stats.     Gravity is the number of affiliates who have made sales in the last month.  I don’t like super-high numbers, but I also want to make sure that the item is sellable.  Over 10 and under 50 or so seems to be a good balance.

The average sale just ensures that I’ll make a decent amount of money when someone buys the product.   I usually aim for $25 or more in commissions per sale.  Also, further down, check the affiliate tools box.    That means the seller will have some resources for you to use.

This combination will give us 36 products to check out for back pain, unfortunately, none of the results are for back pain products.    After unchecking the affiliate tools and setting the gravity to greater than 1,  I’ve got 211 results.    Sorting by keyword relevance, I see three products, two of which look like something I’d be interested in promoting.   One has a 45% commission, the other is 55%.  The X-Pain Method has an initial commission of $34 and claims a 5% refund rate.   Back Pain, Sciatica, and Bulging Disc Relief pays $16, which will make it a potentially easier sale.  I’ll add both to the list for further research.

I’m not going to detail the search for the rest of the niches.  That would be repetitive.  You can see my selections here:

Now we’re going to go through a few steps for each of these products.

The Sales Page

We need to make sure the sales page doesn’t suck.    If the site doesn’t work, is hard to read or navigate, has a hard-to-find order button, or just doesn’t look professional, it’s getting cut.

  • Raw Foods is eliminated.  The sales video is horrible and the order link is at the bottom of several screens worth of nothing.  It’s a crap site.
  • The 7 day foreclosure-avoidance product is out.  Site’s down today.  I want reliability.
  • Management Training By The Book is out.  I don’t like typos on the sales page, especially in the page title.

The Email List

If it has an email subscription form, we’ll need to subscribe, then double-check to make sure our affiliate information isn’t getting dropped in the emails.   If it is, the seller is effectively stealing commissions.  In the interest of time and laziness, I’m going to eliminate anyone pushing for an email subscription.  It’s harder–and time-consuming–to monitor that.  On of my niche site had a seller completely drop their product.  Instead, they pushed for email subscriptions so they could promote other products as an affiliate.  Absolutely unethical.

  • Wedding speeches is eliminated for  throwing a mandatory email entry into the order process.  There’s no guarantee they are up to anything shady, but I’m taking the simple route.

Checkout and Credit

Finally, we’re going to visit the checkout page.  You need to do this from every links in the newsletter and the links on the sales page, just to make sure you’ll get your money.

The way to tell who’s being credited is to look at the bottom of the order page, under the payment information.   It should say [affiliate = xxx] where xxxis your ClickBank ID.   Anything else, and the product gets cut from the list.

When you are checking these, don’t click on every possible link at once.  That confuses the cookies. Do one at a time.  I tried to do it in one batch for this post and lost half of the cookies.  If it weren’t for the fact that I already own one of the products and bought it through my own link and got credited, I would have been talking undeserved trash about thieving companies.

Other Factors

Sometimes, when you’re examining a product, it just doesn’t feel right.  When that happens, drop it.  There are millions of other products you can promote.   In this case, I’m dropping the anger management program because, in my experience, angry people don’t think they are the problem.  Here’s a life tip:  If everyone else is a jerk, the problem probably isn’t everyone else.

  • Another important factor is the sales page itself.  If it doesn’t make you want to buy the product, why would anyone else?
  • Amazing Cover Letters is eliminated because it’s too easy to overlook the buy link.  If I have to hunt for it, it’s losing customers.
  • Amazing Wedding Planning is getting eliminated because I don’t like the sales page.  The buy link is easy to overlook, and it doesn’t compel me to buy.

Now we’re down to 10 products in 6 niches.    At this point, we’re comfortable with the sales pages and we know that they are crediting commissions.   As it stands right now, all of the products are worth promoting.

We’ll make the final determination after doing some heavy keyword research in the next installment.   That’s where we’ll find out how hard it is to compete.

Any questions?

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2011 Goals

Life

It’s that time of the year when people make public promises to themselves that last almost as long as the hangover most of them are going to earn tonight, otherwise known as New Year’s Resolutions.

Not a fan.

I am, however a fan of planning out some concrete goals and doing my best to meet them.     I do this through a series of 30 day projects.  I set a goal that can be reached in 30 days, and push for it.   I tend to make my goals fairly aggressive, and I tend to meet them.

Here were my goals and results for 2010:

  • January:   Wake up at 5am AND read to my kids every night before bed. These were easy goals to meet.    A year later, I am still getting up much earlier than I ever have, even if it’s not 5AM.   I write better late at night than I do early in the morning, anyway.    I’m not still reading to my kids every night, but we are making progress on teaching my four-year-old to read.
  • February:  Do 100 push-ups at one time by the end of the month. I accomplished this in 22 days.    I also had a secret project that involved doing something sweet for my wife every day.  By the end of the month, she was convinced I had done something horrible that I was trying to make up for.
  • March:  Do 100 sit-ups at one time by the end of the month. It took me a week, but I found out how bad sit-ups are for your back.   Pure failure.
  • April:  Spring Cleaning.  I will declutter every room in my house this month. We missed one room and one closet, but made a lot of charities happy.
  • May:  Have a sit-down dinner with my family, at the dining room table at least 3 times per week. We managed this one and enjoyed it, but we haven’t managed to keep it up.   I’ll have to try this again.
  • June:  No computer use, while anyone else in the family is awake, except for household necessities, such as bills. This one worked well and improved the quality of our interaction.  I’m not quite this strict about it, but my computer use has gone down dramatically while my family is awake.
  • July:  Write fiction every day. I don’t think I wrote more than a few pages of fiction, but I did write every day.
  • August:  Buy nothing new this month. We came very close to doing this one perfectly.  It wasn’t easy.
  • September:  Attempt to learn a new language. Total bomb.  I never even got started.
  • October:   No yelling at the kids. Have you ever thought about trying this with a a two-year-old and a four-year-old?  We never got started.
  • November:  No complaining.  Not at home, not at work. I didn’t make this an actual month, but I’ve been trying to complain much less.  I think it’s been working.
  • December:  I will have done 14 projects this year.  December is a month off. As planned, I took December off.

So I missed 4 months of projects.   This year, I’m going to modify my overall plan and only do 6 projects, every other month.   That will give me a month off to either relax or incorporate the goal into my ongoing habits without any stress.

Here are my goals:

  • January: I’m going to do Tim Ferriss’s Slow-Carb diet.  Yes, it’s a fad diet, but it beats the constant stream of garbage I eat now.   The basic plan is to avoid anything white; no bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, or sugar.   That’s accompanied by a targeted supplement regimen and a timed exercise plan to manipulate my metabolism.    I’m not adding any aerobic exercise to my day, because I want this to be as controlled an experiment as possible.   If it’s working at the end of the month, I will keep it going.    It’s time to not be fat anymore.
  • March: In February, I managed to get myself able to do 100 pushups in a single set.   In March, I hurt my back trying to do the same with sit-ups and that killed my workout habit.   This March, I’m going to do the 100 pushups challenge again, but this time, I’m going for perfect pushups.   Last year, they got sloppy after about 80.  This year, that won’t be good enough.
  • May: I’m going to do at least 30 days of the Couch to 5k running program.  It’s a 9 week program.   As a 30 day project, it’s designed to establish the habit.  When I tried picking up running last year, my knees were causing problems.  Hopefully, my January project will mitigate that this year.
  • July: I’m going to pick up a new language.  This is the failed plan from September 2010.   I’ve narrowed it down to either Spanish, Swedish, or Italian.  One is useful, one is a part of my heritage, and one is for fun.   At the moment, I’m undecided.
  • September: Undecided.  I am leaning towards a “nice” month.  30 days of doing something nice, for someone, somewhere.   If I go this route, I’ve got 9 months to plan, because that’s a lot of things to do.
  • November: Absolutely undecided.    Any suggestions?

That’s my plan for the new year.   Six specific goals, each lasting 30 days.    I could definitely use some help for September and November.   Please give me some suggestions in the comments.

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5 Personal Safety Apps that Could Save Your Life

Life

Image representing iPhone as depicted in Crunc...
Image via CrunchBase

No one likes to think about the possibility of dying too young. But knowing that potential exists, you take the smart step of protecting those you love by carrying term life insurance. But what about preventing the worst? Did you know your iPhone or Android device can call for help or record vital information if you ever find yourself in a life-threatening situation? Here are five personal safety apps that could save your life.

1) myGuardianAngel

Once this app allows you to reach all of your emergency contacts with the push of one button. You enter the contact information for anyone you would want to get in touch with if you were in any sort of emergency as soon as you download it. If you are in an emergency, the app will call your contacts, send them an e-mail with your GPS location and immediately begin recording audio and video from your phone.

2) StaySafe

This app is good for anyone who works or travels alone. You can schedule the app to automatically notify friends or family after a certain period of time when your phone is inactive. For example, you can estimate how long you expect to drive from one location to another on your own and then the phone will contact someone automatically if you are out of contact longer than expected. That way your friends will know to send help because something is wrong, even if you aren’t in a position to contact them yourself. StaySafe sends your contacts a detailed GPS location for you so that they can easily find you and bring help.

3) RESCUE

This full-service app can help you on the scene as well as notify your emergency contacts for you. If you are in trouble, you can trigger the app to sound a loud alarm that might frighten off anyone who might be planning to do you harm. The alarm can also help someone find you if you are lost or unable to move from your current location. When the alarm is triggered, the app will also send immediate notifications to your emergency contact list so that they can begin to send help right away. Emergency services such as the police and fire department can also be set for notification through the RESCUE app.

4) Night Recorder

This is a good app to have when you need to make a quick recording of your surroundings for any reason. The app can be set to begin recording at a touch. If you are stranded, you could create a recording by speaking about the landmarks you can see and explaining how you got to your current location. The recorder can then send an email of your recording to anyone on your contact list.

5) iWitness

With this app, you can instantly make video or audio recordings of your situation so that there is a permanent first-hand record of everything that happens. It is a handy tool for anyone who has been in a car accident or involved in a medical emergency because you can go back and look at the video to see exactly what happened if there is any question about it later. The app will also contact emergency services or your personal emergency contacts if you are in trouble. The built-in GPS locator will transmit your exact location so that people can find you quickly and easily.

Post by Term Life Insurance News

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Cutting Healthcare Costs

Finance

It’s not a secret that health care can be expensive.  Many people pay two and three digit bills for their prescriptions.   A visit to the doctor’s office can hurt the budget.  Glasses cost hundreds of dollars?  How can you cut this cost?

Drugs

If possible, go generic*.  There is no difference between Trazorel and trazadone, aside from the cost.   Wal-mart, Target, and many other stores offer common generic prescriptions for $4-5.   When you are talking to your doctor, ask if there is an drug option that has an available generic.  When you are talking to your pharmacist, ask if there is a generic alternative available.

Get the price match.   The Cub Foods pharmacy near me matches the Target generic drug price, giving us $4 generics for the asking.   This is often an unpublicized deal, so make sure you ask. If your pharmacy will not match nearby prices, consider going elsewhere.

See if there is a 90 day plan.  Many insurance companies sponsor a 90 day prescription plan that gives you a 90 supply of drugs for the 60 costs as long as you are willing to accept the drugs by mail.   For expensive prescriptions, this 33% discount can be a substantial savings.

Physician

Does your clinic offer online consultations with your doctor or nurses?   Some clinics offer a chat or email option to talk to your doctor without requiring a visit that will add fees and copays to your expense sheet.   Most clinics and hospitals have a free nurse line for basic questions, like “When is my baby‘s fever dangerous?”  It’s a great chance to save some money.  I know, from personal experience, that they won’t be shy if they feel you need to come in, but they generally won’t try to convince you to come in if aspirin will fix the problem.

Stay in-network.   Check with your insurance company to make sure the doctor you want to see if in your network and therefore, available at the cheapest out-of-pocket price.  If not, and you really want that doctor, ask your insurance company if they accept nominations for the network and ask your doctor if he’d be interested in being nominated.

Stay home for your cold.  Don’t go to the doctor for every minor problem. The best remedy a doctor can give your for your cold will reduce it to a seven day malady.  On the other hand, if you do nothing, it will go away in about a week.  Why waste the money?   This counts double for the emergency room and urgent care.  Strep throat is not an emergency.  Wait until morning and go to the clinic, paying the lower fees instead of the large ER costs.   Make an appointment for a doctor visit, if possible.  Urgent care is billed the same as a regular visit, but most insurance plans double or triple the copay for urgent care visits.

Cash Flow

A Health Savings Account(HSA) is a pre-tax account to save for qualifying medical expenses similar to a Flexible Savings Account(FSA).  The main differences are that HSAs are only available for people with high-deductible insurance plans and do not have to be spent on medical expenses.  Non-qualifying expenses move from pre-tax to post-tax, meaning you will be charged federal income tax for non-qualifying withdrawals.  FSAs are “use it or lose it” plans.  If you don’t use it, it will go away, usually at the end of the year.  That makes December a great time to stock up on over-the-counter medicines and possibly replace your eyeglasses, as both of those are qualifying expenses.    Find out if you have either option available.   If you use either one, set aside a place to store every imaginable medical receipt, so you can be reimbursed.  Make sure you understand the FSA-eligible expenses.

An Ounce of Prevention

Get routine checkups.  The earlier you find a problem, the more options you have. This goes for everything from cancer screenings to blood tests.  Get a physical every year and know what is happening with your body.  We may be living in the future, but replacement parts are still hard to come by.

Maintain Your Health

It’s cheaper to be healthy.  Eat right, exercise, quit smoking.

I enjoy a good meal.  It’s one of my favorite things.  I won’t cut rich foods out of my diet, so we reduced portions.  Beyond the first few bites, the flavor isn’t nearly as enjoyable or even noticeable.  There’s no more enjoyment for huge servings than small ones.

Get more exercise, even if it’s just a 2o minute walks twice a week parking on the far side of the parking lot, or taking the stairs instead of the elevator.

Vision

Go online.  This one is worth a write-up all by itself.  I have 6 pairs of prescription glasses–all varieties of frames and coatings–that have cost a grand total of about $150.  There is no noticeable difference between my cheapies and the designer alternatives.   While I work on the write-up, the best site to introduce you to the concept of online glasses is GlassyEyes.  Reviews, coupons, and discount likes.  They have step-by-step instructions on turning an intimidating idea into a simple and cheap solution to an expensive problem.

How do you save money on health care?

* There are no generics available on new drugs until the initial patent expires.   This gives the pharmaceutical companies a change to recoup their research and development costs.  Without this patent period, new private drug research would evaporate.   Don’t hate the brand names, but don’t show undue loyalty.