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  1. H

    New Credit Card Spending Trends

    For those with businesses that process credit card payments, what changes have you observed in the spending habits of your customers who use credit cards vs. paying by cash or check? As we all know, people are saving a lot more in the past year. I would deduce that as part of that trend...
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    Property Tax Increases

    REAL ESTATE TAXES | REGS 
    Question: Is a 50% increase in property taxes every three years normal? I’m just wondering if this is normal, or if there are municipalities out there that are actually able to stabilize their budgets a whole lot better. Granted, I live in Cook County (suburbs of Chicago, IL), which I know...
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    Rental Pitfalls

    REAL ESTATE 
    I’m finally ready to take the plunge into making some passive income on my real estate, starting with my own home. My goal is to get at least 1, preferably 2 of my bedrooms rented out by the end of the year. Maybe I could even rent out my basement down the road. I’m looking to rent each room...
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    Bankruptcy Alternatives

    Question: What alternatives are there to bankruptcy? First, I’d like to thank everyone here who has helped me with my carpet cleaning business. It has been very helpful in riding out this economy as long as I have been able to, when my industry has crashed, for the most part. That said...
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    Changing My Business Premise

    Question: Is it possible to change the basic premise of a pre-existing business? If so, how? I was re-reading the sticky topic on having a successful business premise and thinking about how my carpet cleaning business provides value for people. 1) My business makes people feel better about...
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    Working With Purpose

    MINDSET 
    I had an interesting discussion with a new acquaintance, who sounded like a positive thinker, about growing my carpet cleaning business. He suggested that perhaps part of the reason why I’m dissatisfied with my business is not so much because it’s not my life’s passion, but that I’m not...
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    Riding Out This Economy

    I’m not sure if this is the right forum for this discussion, so if a moderator needs to move it, I understand. From what I heard, one of the differences between success and failure in building wealth, is the ability to ride out the dips in the economy, stock market, or whatever your vehicle...
  8. H

    Price-Based Marketing

    MARKETING 
    For the past six months, I’ve been trying a new approach to marketing my carpet cleaning business: price-based marketing. In the past, I’ve used ineffective value-based marketing, focusing on educating the prospects and cleaning for the health of the home. Despite the lack of success, I was...
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    More Progress

    EXECUTION 
    First, some good news. I just got finished going over the numbers for the second quarter with my accountant, and I managed to survive without having to dip into my savings. Perhaps that’s not a fastlane mindset, but I’m relieved to know that my tax burden was relatively minimal beyond social...
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    What I Have Learned Here

    OFF-TOPIC 
    AroundTheWorld asked me to create a topic about the lessons I have learned on my road to building wealth, so here it is. Being in the S-quadrant, many will probably disagree with my lessons, but oh well. 1) Know what I want, how to get what I want, and if the benefits outweigh the effort to...
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    Investing in Metals

    INVESTING 
    I’ve heard a lot of talk lately about people investing in metals (gold/silver) to hedge against inflation. However, I have relatively little knowledge on the subject, so I have a few questions about it. I tried looking at older topics, but they didn’t seem basic enough for me. 1) How does...
  12. H

    Value of Health Insurance

    OFF-TOPIC 
    My impression is that the value of health insurance is the investment in the prevention of a complete financial meltdown, in the event that you survive a health-related catastrophe. My question is, “How much is that insurance worth (in dollars)?†The impetus for my question is another...
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    Restructuring Loans

    REAL ESTATE 
    Recently, I successfully restructured my payments on my small business loan to save $500/month (which is a lot to me). It got me thinking, could/should I do that with my other loans? Even if I could save $100/month, that would be worth it. However, there’s a few concerns I would have about...
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    Getting Ahead

    OFF-TOPIC 
    A few months ago, I took my brother into my home after he lost his full-time job and condo, due to a foreclosure. We went job hunting and found a small part-time job, so that he could get car insurance again, and drive around for more opportunities. It was my hope that the part-time job would...
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    Business Listing Websites

    For the past few months, I’ve been trying to get reviews for my business listed on kudzu and yelp. So far, I haven’t been able to get a single review. Any thoughts on why that might be? My first thought was that perhaps I’m not doing enough to make my clients want to help my business...
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    Delaying Emotional Gratification

    MINDSET 
    How do I justify delaying emotional gratification for myself? I looked up some older topics on delaying gratification as a component to building wealth, but they seemed to focus more on delaying the acquisition of material goods, rather than delaying emotional gratification. Sometimes...
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    How Can I Get a Small Business Loan?

    Good news! I survived my first two years in business for myself, and am actually doing okay right now. Some new pricing packages have really saved me in this economy. When I purchased the business, I had to pay a higher interest rate for the loan. Now that I’ve been in business for two...
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    Using Great Credit In This Economy

    As of April 2, 2009, I will have been in business for 2 years, and have developed my business credit, in addition to my already 750+ personal credit score. From what I’ve heard, “2 years†is the magic number banks are looking for before they are even willing to talk to me. How can I use...
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    The Craziest Thing I’ve Ever Heard

    OFF-TOPIC 
    I’ve been accused of being high on more than one occasion for repeating things I thought I heard, but this one takes the cake. Now, I don’t watch the news, because it’s too negative, even for my cynical taste, so I don’t know the context of this story I just heard. Some telemarketer...
  20. H

    Outsourcing Marketing

    MARKETING 
    Question: How do you outsource marketing? Instead of discussing specific marketing techniques, which has been done ad nauseum on these forums, I thought a different approach would be in order for this topic. One of the very few things that I have found to work for my business is a monthly...
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