Debts Beyond The Grave

Investigations by the United States’ authorities have found out something disturbing, nothing can make you safe from identity thieves, not even death. According to recent data, the new stolen IDs used the personal information and SS numbers of over 2 million people who have already passed away. These thieves use the identities to get credit cards and cell phone services.

Moreover, not all the perpetrators were intending to use the identity of a dead person, in fact, 1.6 million of the SSN they had no idea belonged to a deceased citizen. They only intended to use the numbers to create a phony name and a fake identity to manipulate dealers.

Every year crooks would use 2.5 million fake identities they have stolen from deceased victims. Investigations are able to match these stolen identities to about 100 million transactions from January to March of last year.

Dr. Stephen Coggeshall, ID Analytics chief technology officer says that these cases pose a large problem for organizations and businesses and most especially for the remaining family members of these deceased that would inherit the account and the liability. He further states that it is important that the living relatives should monitor the accounts of their dead loved ones, in case they were being used by these identity crooks.

According to data, these cases would happen at least 2,000 times in a day; criminals would purchase online and use a fake ID belonging to someone who has already passed away. The ID Analytics’ ID Network is now being used by authorities to be able to identify whether someone is using a dead person’s name to transact loans, credit card, cell phone purchases, rents and other financial businesses.

So far, about 800,000 of the identities have been identified to have been used knowingly by crooks.

2 Bad Habits to Break to Increase Savings

Your power of will should not be held liable to pay for your important liabilities and monthly bills. Furthermore, also the choice of how much to deposit on your emergency savings fund should not rest on the same criterion. Willpower is not enough to keep you going with your financial duties.

According to David Bach the author of a book entitled The Automatic Millionaire relying on your willpower will just lead to the mismanagement of your life’s choices. Some people would try to reason out that their lack of organization or their lack of financial support that’s why they fall astray in their finances, and tend to pay late. Late payments mean you paying a more expensive debt; this is because companies would require a $39 fee from clients who fail to pay on time, not only that, there is also an additional interest charge that is added up in the debt as well.

Bach advices that important bills should be made on time and also, you should never fail to make a monthly savings deposit for your and your family’s future need. Automatic payment is the answer to avoid making late payments.

You should get on track on your payments, make a schedule of tentative dates you can pay your due, subtract the due date by a week and make that your target date to settle accounts. Another solution is to make automatic payments via online banking.When you break away from the bad habit of paying your fees late, you can just sit back and relax because you will only have to pay lesser amount of debt.

Ulzheimer has another concern, paying only the minimum amount on a credit card. This is not very good for the credit card borrower. Paying only the minimum will roll over about 97% of the remaining amount and will just be another addition to the interest you have to pay.

You should make sure that you set your automatic payments (if you decide to pay automatically) larger than the minimum amount.

The Power of Debt

The recession suffered by the United States has left many businesses declaring bankruptcy, led to companies closing, people losing jobs and some being forced to being overwhelmed with debt.

A person being engulfed by debt would very well blame everyone and everything in his surroundings for his struggling situation. Being overwhelmed by debt has a chain effect in a person’s financial situation. He gets bad credit, he has to sell his assets, pawn his car, and his family might start bickering about money, and so on.

The damage has already been done and there is no use to continue pointing fingers to whoever should be blamed for the predicament that the country is facing financially. The best thing to do is to move on, and to try anew in rebuilding your life. But this is the difficult part.

Though the knowledge you need to get back up on your feet is easy to comprehend, they are hard to follow because they need consistency and self-discipline. The basic building block of being successful is knowing how to use debt to your advantage.

Getting a loan or borrowing money can get you a large liability you have to give back in the future; you can become lucrative if you know how to handle it to your advantage. You have to think like a businessman. When a company is going to borrow money, the big question they ask themselves is if the loan will gain them more money in the future.

When you borrow money you should ask yourself is what you are going to do with the money will benefit you and gain you more money, or will it do more harm than good?

Investing for college is one very good reason for loaning. Whenever you want to get a car, you should first weigh whether it is going to benefit you more than it will cost you to purchase the item.

But according to experts the best things you should invest in are schooling and a good household. It is best to think twice when you want to loan for a car or for health related circumstances.

Good management of your liabilities is the best way to start in your road to financial recovery, while smart borrowing is the key for a good and worry-free life.

Homes Act to Provide More Affordable Housing in California

The state leaders of California are discussing whether or not they should tax homebuyers to be able to provide more affordable housing for those who cannot buy or even rent a house.

One-third of homeowners in the United States have more mortgage debts than the cost of their houses. These families are drowning in debts and having problems with their housing.

When a family loses a house to the bank, then they begin to compete with other families in renting apartments or small houses, which have limited living space. There is a one in a million chance that these families rent a good apartment considering the fact that they most likely have poor credit and no savings left.

California’s state policy makers know that their constituents still cannot afford to buy a house. As a result of the elimination of Redevelopment Agencies, $1 billion was deducted from the funds for annual affordable housing. Also, this caused Californians who earn a small income to struggle from finding an affordable housing that is adequate for their small budget.

Now, there is a bill called Housing Opportunity and Market Stabilization Act (HOMeS Act) or also known as SB 1220. This bill suggests a $75 addition to all real estate transactions in California, and the earnings would be used to fund affordable housing.

This bill is criticized by many and they say that the $75 could damage California’s weak housing market.

Despite criticisms, the $75 would actually accumulate and reach $400 million to $1 billion annually. Consequently, this could already finance a lot of houses to be given to families and individuals who earn little or who have no homes.

Over the years, Californians have been considered as trendsetters of the state because of, for instance, living a healthy lifestyle or taking care of the environment. Now, California might make a new trend in helping its constituents through providing more affordable housing.

Borrowers Must Challenge Credit Card Debt Charges

It is recommended that every borrower must challenge credit card lawsuits, according to Felix Salmon, who is a Reuters blogger.

This recommendation is to some extent valid. For instance, the case of Bank of America and its credit card division showed that creditors have the capacity to force collection bureaus to pursue debts that are not valid. This consequently puts the collection bureau into greater jeopardy than Bank of America imagined it would be in itself.

If the debt is in reality not valid, then it would seem right for the consumer to challenge a lawsuit.

In contrast, Salmon’s recommendation becomes odd when he said that borrowers must not be afraid to require a proof out the upright feeling that they must pay off their outstanding debt.

This is not in the best interest of a lot of persons who are in some way associated with the consumer.

First is the creditor, who gave the loan to the borrower for him to use in whatever he thinks he should buy.

Second is the collection bureau, which now has the responsibility to take care of a borrower who believes he is not to blame for the liability he made.

Third are the borrowers who pay their credit card debts in good time.

Fourth are the borrowers who have to sort out higher costs because of the consequences of poor retail debt.

In addition, Salmon has a poor conclusion. He said that if all persons begin to challenge the lawsuits as a whole, then that will certainly lessen the advantages, to the financial institutions, of advertising written-off debt to corrupt collection bureaus as a whole.

However, it is probably unreasonable to classify collection bureaus who buy credit card debt as corrupt. It weakens a significant component of the receivables management business. Also, it weakens the business that places persons to work in all types of profitable settings.