Bargaining 101

If you save money by paying less on consumer items, you could “earn” anywhere from $100 to $10,000 a year. It’s just a matter of learning how to negotiate on everything from shoes to salaries. The key to asking is to learn how to bargain without embarrassing yourself, your friends or your family. Here are a few successful strategies to try:

· Compare –Furniture, phone plans, electronics, jewelry and appliances are all highly negotiable. Find your desired item on a search robot such as Froogle.com, MySimon.com, NexTag.com and eBay.com or in sale circulars from the Sunday paper. Then print out the price, take it into your store and ask them to match it. Some stores, such as Wal-mart, will match competitor’s ads (even on food items).

· Compensate – If the salesman cannot match the price, then ask for other freebies such as complimentary delivery, free accessories, or an extended warranty.

· Continue – If the salesman grants extra perks, don’t stop there. After you’ve secured these, ask for the manager and ask her to match the competitor’s price.

· Counter – It never hurts to counter a price, if you ask for 20% off and they offer 10%, then counter with 15%. When it comes to salary negotiations, you shouldn’t accept the first offer. Most salaried professionals ask for 10% to 12% more than what they're offered, and often settle for 7% to 8% more. If you did this with your first salary, it could add up to $500,000 by the time you are 60 years old!

· Consideration – Don’t limit the odds of success by asking for too much. The store has to make a profit. Small appliances are usually marked up 30%, while larger ones such as washing machines are marginalized by only 15%. However, most large furniture items and jewelry are increased by a whopping 100%!

· Communication – Learn to say: “Is this your best price?” “Was this recently on sale and can I have the sale price?” “Do you think you could ask your manager, I’ll be happy to wait,” “Hmmm, this item is a little damaged (makeup on the collar, an already opened box, a ding or scratch) could it be marked down?” and last but not least, “Thank you, I’ll be back!”

Ellie Kay

America's Family Financial Expert (R)

http://www.elliekay.com/

Baby Wipes - Tell Your Friends!

Babies! I LOVE babies!

When I married my husband, Bob, I got a "three for one" deal that included a great guy--and two babies.Step-daughters, that is...add five more babies in seven years and you get a total of seven! Now, thanks to that original "three for one" deal, I'm a grandma (should I say step-grandma? I'm not old enough to be a grandma!). We have an adventurous grandson and a beautiful baby girl (who has Bob's eyes). One of the tips that helped Bob and I so much when we had all those babies (and three in diapers at once) was my homemade baby wipes recipe. I get more requests for the following recipe than I do for practically any other resource.

I know that it can save the average family about $300 a year and you know that the ingredients are safe. Plus, it's eco-friendly as well because you don't have to keep discarding baby wipe packaging! So share this with your friends, family and everyone who loves babies!

Ellie Kay's Baby Wipe Recipe (C) 2008

1 Round plastic container with lid (about 6 inches tall and wide enough to accommodate 1/2 roll of paper towels)
1 Roll of heavy-duty paper towels (no cheap store brands)
4 Tablespoons baby oil
4 Tablespoons baby shampoo
4 Tablespoons baby bath
1 to 2 cups of water (depending on the absorbency of the towel)

Cut a small X (about an inch long) in the plastic lid of the container. Cut the paper towels in half to make two short rolls of towels. Use one and save one. Put the first three ingredients in the bottom of the container and add one cup of water. Stir well. Place the paper towel, cut side up, in the water for a few minutes. Then turn it over, cut side down, to let the other side absorb the liquid. Let sit for five minutes. If the roll of paper towel still has dry portions on it, then keeping adding water, ½ cup at a time, at five minute intervals, until towels are completely damp (not dripping, just damp). After the center of the paper towel tube is wet, gently pull it out of the center of the towels. Pull the towels from the center, and thread through the X in the lid of the plastic container. Seal. Will keep fresh for up to one month.

Ellie Kay

America's Family Financial Expert (R)

www.elliekay.com

College Crunches - The Four Disciplines of Debt Free Education

When people ask me how we are putting our kids through college debt free, the answer is multi-fold. First, we train our children from a young age that going to school, doing your homework and getting good grades is their primary “job.” By teaching them a good work ethic, we are laying the groundwork for scholarships and more. Secondly, we send them to schools that we can afford or where they get the best scholarship offers to cover the most expenses. Thirdly, we have saved a modest amount of college money to help them pay their room and board and partial tuition in some cases. Lastly, but certainly not least, we require that they work part time in the summers or during the school year (through a work/study program or a regular job) in order to do their part in paying for college. By implementing these four disciplines, each of our children are set to graduate debt free. Of the three that are going to college now, we have over ½ million in scholarships and if the last two stay true to their goals, our kids would have garnered over a million dollars in scholarships by the time they are through with school.

Priorities
In any discussion of college costs, it’s important to keep priorities straight:
Parents need to leave yourself some fun money for retirement. How else can you afford that mechanical bull riding lesson and those parasailing flights (been there, done that, LOVE it)?
I really believe that you, as a parent, should try to avoid borrowing on your future in order to pay for your child’s future. After all that information we had earlier in this chapter about investments for retirement, why would you want to take one of your greatest investments and leverage it for college expenses? Yet millions of parents make that devastating financial choice every year. I’m talking about avoiding any college funding plan that includes a home equity loan, a HELOC (home equity line of credit) or refinancing of an existing home mortgage. These options reduce the amount of equity in your home, increasing the risk of possible foreclosure and you incur costs in interest charges that may cost you more if the term on the new mortgage is greater than the remaining term on the existing mortgage. For example, if there is ten years left on the mortgage and parents get a new 30 year loan. Furthermore, if parents choose to pull out enough money in equity for the first year of for four years of college all at once, then parents paying interest on money that won’t be needed until the upcoming sophomore, junior and senior years. Instead, look at the following options to pay for college.

The College Mantra
When I began a young adult, got married and began having kids (in that order) I was first exposed to the whole idea of “the college my child gets accepted to.” As a mom of many who has already launched a few college bound kiddos, I’m still hearing, “What college did they get accepted into?” The part of that question that amazes me is that the answer that is most impressive are also the most expensive (Columbia, Harvard, Stanford, Yale, etc). These schools have averages four year costs of $188,000 (Columbia); $240,000 (Harvard); $186,000 (Stanford) $193,000 (Yale). While an average of 40% of the students who attend either get financial aid, grants or scholarships, they only average out to assistance of $9600 per year. This leaves a boatload that the student and mom/dad owe for college. Most of this is usually in loans of some kind. So then the average student graduating from some of the most prestigious colleges have student loans upwards to $100,000.
So why is the question: What college did they get accepted into?
The question should be: What college did they get accepted into that they can afford?
Why do you want to leverage your future (through HELOCS or loans) or leverage their future (through massive consumer debt) when it will take many years of earning power, for them to pay back those loans? One of the most common problems I hear of have to do with the burden of dual student loans in a marriage.
http://www.myplan.com/education/db/ug/ug_4.php?id=186131

I'm doing what I can to help families minimize student loan debt so that both the parents and the graduates can have a better quality of life with more flexibility once they start those new careers. For more practical aspects of very specific ways you can pay for college. Please email assistant@elliekay.com and put "College Crunches" in the subject line. Our offices will send you a wonderful resource file that I wrote to help you fund a quality education for a fraction of the debt.

Ellie Kay

"America's Family Financial Expert" (R)

www.elliekay.com

Money Savings Kids!

Well, my kids are getting in on the money savings act--literally! Jonathan went to Texas to visit his older brother, Daniel. While he was there, Daniel and his fiancee', Jenn, decided to give Jonathan "the" money savings tips talk. The took some tips from one of my books and make a short film about savings money! So funny!

Please enjoy watching "The Hendersons" as they teach their son about saving money!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=omPIoJcp6rw

You'll see that the apple doesn't fall far from the money tree!

Ellie Kay
"America's Family Financial Expert" (R)
http://www.elliekay.com/

Homes - To Buy or Not to Buy?

My husband, Bob and I lived on military bases for the first dozen years of our marriage. When you move eleven times in thirteen years it doesn't make sense to buy! When we finally settled one place long enough to purchase our first home, we were thrilled and had "imposter syndrome" for the first month or so. We kept waiting for the "real" owners to show up and kick us out of the house! Alas, it was a dream come true and we truly enjoyed that home. Now...I know what some of you are thinking--is that a picture of my house? No, it's not, it's just one of the many, many gorgeous homes that are on the market in America. We sold that first home and the next year property values plummeted in the area. Not all Americans are having such good timing in buying and selling.

Last week the average fixed rate mortgage was at its highest since last October , 2007, with a 30 year averaging 6.32%, up from 6.09% but still below last year's rate of 6.74%. It appears that the rate will continue to creep upward, so if you were thinking of buying a home, now would probably be a good time. It can turn from a buyers market to a sellers market in a relatively short amount of time as those extra properties are purchased and taken off the market.

If you are considering buying a home, shop carefully for lenders and be sure that you negotiate, negotiate, negotiate with the LENDER as well as the SELLER. When discussing closing costs and fees, make sure that you don't over pay. Here are four key areas to keep in mind when negotiating fees and costs with your lender:

Don’t Pay for Inflated Credit-Report and Courier Fees - Some lenders are charging up to $65 for pulling your credit report. That is unusually high, considering the fact that credit reporting bureaus only charge $6 to $18 per report. Using the same tactics, some lenders charge courier fees for shipping your closing documents for as much as $100, while the majority of overnight express services only charge $22. Tell your lender, up front, that you refuse to pay any more than the going rate for these services.

Don’t Pay for Document Prep and Administration Fees - The origination fee should include these services, so don’t pay them! Ask your lender to waive these fees.

When You Buy A Home: Don’t Pay for Yield Spread Premiums - Lenders increase your interest rate slightly to include origination and other fees so you don’t have to pay them out-of-pocket at closing but some lenders and mortgage brokers are double dipping—by charging both the fees and the higher interest rate. Ask your broker directly if a firm charges you a yield spread premium. If so, you shouldn’t pay any additional fees.


Don’t Pay for Padded Title Insurance Fees - When you are shopping for lenders, look for all the above, plus look out for those who don’t tack on a lot of extra charges for services such as title search and document preparation. Theses can add hundreds of dollars to your closing costs and they really should be included in the price of title insurance, which depending on where you live, can be as high as $6,000.

Ellie Kay
America's Family Financial Expert (R)
www.elliekay.com

Twice As Stimulating!

The check is in the mail. The check is in the mail. Oops!

Can you remember the check you waited the longest to receive? Maybe it was your college roommate who borrowed $300 and "promised" to repay you within the month--some three years later you're still waiting. Or, it might be a deadbeat relative who is always wanting to borrow "just the rent money" and amazingly seems to be near homelessness without your check. But the next time you see him, he's driving a new Mercedes--that's a check you're never going to see.

Well, this year, Uncle Sam really DOES have the check in the mail--sometimes twice! Through June 6, the U.S. Treasury had sent 66.6 million payments totaling about $56.8 billion. Altogether, an estimated 130 million payments will be made this year. A hand full of people are getting a SECOND stimulus check in the mail. Don't take that as God's way of telling you to put the money down on a new Mercedes!

If that happens to YOU, then don't think it's a windfall from a doubly generous Sammy. The IRS will eventually catch their mistake and come back after you for the money. If you get the check, write "void" on the back of it (under the endorsement section) photocopy it for your records and return it to the IRS with a note indicating it was a "erroneous stimulus check." You should mail it to your regional IRS office where you filed your return http://www.irs.gov/file/content/0,,id=105693,00.html
This isn't just a matter of being honest, it's a matter of saving a huge headache in the future when you've spent the second check and the IRS is wanting it back post haste!

So much for twice as stimulating!

Ellie Kay
America's Family Financial Expert (R)
www.elliekay.com

Organic Foods for Less

This is a picture of one of the cutest babies you'll ever see. When I showed Joshua a picture of his niece and told him we call her "our little tomato" he immediately asked, "Is she organic?"
There's obviously been a wee bit too much emphasis on organic groceries in the Kay house. But we're not alone in our quest for healthy food at a bargain. More and more families are purchasing “fair trade” or organic products and there are cheaper ways to get more in this area.
• Spot the ripoff – Look for the products marked “certified organic” in order to make sure you are getting what you pay for. In the produce section, grocers are required to stock the organic produce in a separate section so that the water run-off from misting machines won’t contaminate organic items with pesticide residue.
• Organic Sections – Just because a product is in the organic section of the produce area or aisles does not mean it is organic. Look be misled, for example, by the “all natural yogurt” in the organic section of the dairy case—unless it’s marked “certified organic” it probably is not.
• Web Coupons – I’ve noticed a huge increase in the number of coupons for organic products in recent years as their popularity increases. Conduct a product name search on the Web to find these valuable coupons including the following brands: Annie’s Homegrown, Earthbound Farm, Health Valley, Organic Valley, Stonyfield Farm, and Muir’s.
• Shop Discount Stores – Walmart and Sams have an entire new line of organics and those sections are expanding all the time. Ask the sales associates where the organic products are located because sometimes they are hard to find.
• Buy Generic – One of the really cool things about the interest in organics is the natural continuation of store brands. Look for these generic brands (which go on sale, too) and save even more.
• Food Co-ops – These are great sources of discounts on organic products. To find a local co-op, go to www.coopdirectory.org or www.localharvest.org/food-coops.
• The Food Mile – In the grocery industry there is a term known as the “food mile” which indicates how many miles food has to travel to end up in your local store. The shorter the food mile, the less expensive the product. Buy items with the shortest food mile.
• Buy Produce in Season – Oftentimes, the shortest food mile will be indicated by buying produce in season. By eating (and freezing or canning) your food in season you can save money today and tomorrow.
• Compare Online Grocers – There might be lower prices for staples that you need found online at some of the best organic grocers. Go to www.sunorganic.com, www.diamondorganics.com, www.urbanorganic.com or www.doortodoororganic.com
• Go to the Farm! – By going to an organic farm in your part of the world, you can save even more and buy the freshest organics possible. For a complete list go to www.LocalHarvest.org/organic-farms

So whether you are buying baby tomatoes, canned or fresh--follow these tips and you'll save money!

Ellie Kay
America's Family Financial Expert (R)
www.elliekay.com