There are 6 things not to do when starting a business, so you have to know what you are doing, Becuase I have seen so many startup businesses fail, and I think this article will put you through.

1. Pick The Wrong Business

A lot of companies fail, 80% of companies fail in 5 years and that is because they picked the wrong business. Your business just trying to make money and if money is your only goal, you are not going to be successful. Look at any entrepreneur who starts off and just trying to make money they rarely do, or if you look at the most successful entrepreneur of all time, Oprah Winfrey, bill gates, steve jobs, whoever it is.

Look at why they got started, look at the early days of the reason starting their business, they don't think about the money in the first place, they just want to have a positive impact, they want to change the way something is done. It's not just to make money, now, making money is important, I am not saying you should start a charity, you have to make money to support yourself, your family, your community, live the lifestyle you want, money is going to be important.

But it's not the number "one" reason for starting this business, you have to be "passionate" about what you are doing.

2. Make The "Perfect Plan"

So many entrepreneurs before they get started they want to have the perfect plan, you have to have it all lined out, it's going to be a 100% perfect, let me tell you about what happened to my friend.

My friend spends a whole summer making his plan and as soon as he launched, everything changed, because his plan was wrong. Many entrepreneurs get focused on making the perfect plan that they don't start, the best thing you can do is plan a little and start.

When you get feedback and reaction and customers telling you what they like and don't like you will have to adapt anyway, so get the feedback as soon as possible, don't worry about making the perfect planned, don't wait until you have that perfect plan because so many people wait so long that they don't actually take any action at all, they give up on it because they can't figure out the perfect plan. You will never have the perfect plan at the start so don't waste your time planing, just start.

3. Spend Money

So many entrepreneurs have great ways on how to spend money, if I gave you a million dollars, you can find a million different ways to spend it. Now, many entrepreneurs are not great at making money, so stop trying to think about how to spend money.

You do not need money, you do not a website, you do not need an office, you do not need a car, you don't need business cards, you don't need anything. You need your hustle to get out there and start talking to customers. Stop trying to figure out ways to spend money, you do not need money to make money. You need to work, you need the hustle, you have to get out there and start talking to people.

It takes your time, you got to invest your time, but don't start investing your money, stop spending money until you are making some money.

5. Try To Do It Alone.

You can't do this alone, you cannot do this just on your own, you need people to help you and whether's that is having Volunteers or interns or having people who are working for you? Part-time, whether that is having a mastermind group of people that you connect with.

You can't do this alone, you need to be able to talk to people and you are not spending money at the start, you are not spending money on these people to start, but you can attract people, you can meet up with the mastermind group once a month.

You can have Volunteers or student interns helping you out. But don't try to do everything yourself, because running a business is a lot harder than one person can manage and if you want to do something big, you want to have a big impact, you want to change the world, you want to have a huge meaning and also make a lot of money in the process, you need to be able to reach out and not do everything yourself.

6. Jump Into The Wrong Partnership

So many entrepreneurs jump in the partnership. Maybe you met somebody over the weekend, you have this great business idea and there is 6 of you starting up. Don't jump in the bed with the wrong partner and I know that you want to surround yourself with like-minded people who have complementary skill sets. Then, when things get tough, that is when the partnership starts to crumble, that is when a lot of fights start to happen, being in the business partnerships is just as important as being in a marriage, you got to think about these people as I am getting married to this person.

Can I live with that, you are seeing them, how many hours of that day you are seeing them, probably more than you are going to see your husband or wife during the week? So he has to be somebody who has the same value as you, and the best way to try that out is to start working together on a small project. 

Before jumping together into the partnership, work on one small project together, see if you guys get along, see if you work well together, see if you share that same vision, see if you share the same value, it's so much more than just having complementary skill sets, if you are the business guy you need a coder, you don't just bring on any coder who can program what you need and give them shares in your business, it has to be somebody who you can get married to and work with for the rest of your life potentially.

I've gotten a lot of people who have asked me to write an article highlighting the pros and cons of being a real estate agent. Now, I want to start with the cons, because this is typically what most people will first come across

Cons 1. Negative Criticism

You will voice to somebody say hey I am thinking about being a real estate agent and they will negatively pour out the doubt or insecurities, no one will ever tell you to go for it, that you will be successful.

Everyone's will be like "you, being a real estate agent" get out of here. A lot of people who never done it or have failed will tell you to get out of here, you'll never going to hear something negative from somebody who's done it and actually been on the other side of success when it comes to doing something entrepreneurial or real estate.

You will be doubted, you will be told all of the possibilities or negative possibilities in particular about being a realtor

You are going to being told you can't do it, you are too young, blah blah blah, whatever it is, so be ready and that is the con, you will face a lot of criticism and negative criticism because it is a career. unfortunately where the majority of people do become a statistic and they fail. That is just the facts, if you look it up I think it's 87% of realtor within their first 2 years are out of the business, there is a reason the other 13% are still there, now, out of that 13% only a small percentage are actually really successful.

Cons 2. Easy To Get In.

This is also a con because you are going to be surrounded with people who are average or mediocre and whose advice will not be the best, so I am going to heed you with this warning and say make sure that you follow advice from the right people.

Cons 3. You Are An Independent Contractor

For a lot of people that work against them, "here is why" you suddenly get into this career where you don't have a boss or somebody yelling down your throat, you don't have to clock in a 9-to-5 setting. So, some people are like well, that is great, I have freedoms, I can do anything I want. Majority of people take that the wrong way and instead of actually buckling down and working more, they end up working less.

Cons 4. Lack Of Proper Training.

When you get a regular 9-to-5 job where you go to the special section or special career with a doctor, engineer, lawyer, whatever, you will receive a certain amount of formal training whether from your company or some sort of Avenue. That is the lack of real estate.

But with that being said, we are now in a different area now, you can come to this site and learn about real estate for free or go to youtube and few others source and get a ton of free training.

Here come the Pro

Pro 1. The Barrier Entry Is Very Low

The label real estate is an easy job, people look at it and they think it's easy, yeah, it is a direct sales job you have to talk to people and clients, but that is not the way it's packed up and sold. Is package up as an easy job, "but it's not" if you get into the business that cold hard reality is going to slap you in the face.

You will be seeing million dollar listing and some people just get on the phone and they negotiate and then they make thousands of dollars, you'll ask yourself a question, what is going on here? What I am doing wrong?

Pro 2. You Can Change Your Life In 6 Month

You can climb any kind of corporate ladder, you can just go straight to the top based on your production, so if you product you get paid, if you work on your skills and you make your learning curve shrink, and you start getting everything quickly and you can start getting sales and working hard, you can literally change your life in 6 month or a year guaranteed.

There are few other avenues on this planet right now and it's a little bit easier with the internet, however, there are few careers that you can get into and have that kind of success right away.

Pro 3. You Have To Learn At Least Basic Sale Skills

Do you think it's just about persuading people, no, a lot of people will have a difficult time making a decision, but with proper persuasion techniques and skill, you can get them out of their own way, help them make a decision and when they benefit, you also benefit? Nothing sweeter than that, and it's a skill that very few people have.



That is it for real estate, and if you have any thoughts or observations, feel free to use the comment box below.

Today we are going to be looking at the differences credit cards and charge cards and some of the pros and cons of that and this was actually suggested by one of our ready. Well, currently the only issuer of general use charge cards in the United State is American Express.

All the others have been resigns, there are some stores that issue store cards that are charge cards rather than credit card. They're just for use in that store they do not carry the logo of these Mastercard, Amex or whatever.

• American Express is actually the only issuer of general-purpose charge cards. 

Let Get into the article

What is the different between credit cards and charge cards?

Let's first talk about payment and credit limits

The way a credit card works is that you spend money on it and then at the end of the month you get a bill and you have typically around 21 days to pay that bill until your due date. When you get to the due date you have to at least pay the minimum payment which is normally at least $25 or a percentage, if you owe a lot of money it changes to a percentage.

If you owe several thousand dollars it could be like a hundred bocks or something. You have to at least pay the minimum payment and then if you don't pay the rest, that gets rolled over to the next month and it's charge interest on it. Typically around 20%, to 15% or 25%. 

If you don't pay the minimum payment then you will get hit with a late payment fee.

Chard Card

Now, on the charge card it's the same, you spend money on it, and at the end of the month you are sent a bill or a bill is generated online on the website, and you have to pay that bill, you typically have around 21 days until the due date when the bill is due

• But you have to pay it in full, if you don't pay the whole bill, even if you pay let say 95% of it, you will get hit with a late payment fee, now, with American Express their late payment fee it's a $27 and if you pay like twice within a six-month period it goes up to $38.

You get hit with quite a large late payment fee even if you only missed say $1, maybe you owe $1,000 and you only pay $999 and just miss $1, you will still have to pay $38.

Amex has introduced some payment plan options for large purchases, called pay overtime, it has been experimenting with credit cards style stuff on its charge card, I guess they're finding some way to compete when there are many other charge cards around and they want to stay relevant and give people more options and compete with other issuers.

They do have some options on their charge cards to pay overtimes, but typically the basics of a charge care are, you spend money on it and you pay it in full at the end of the month.

What About the Credit Limits on these Cards

With credit cards they have credit limits. And these credit limits normally each issuers cards will have minimum credit limits, for example, Capital One platinum minimum credit limits is $200.

Chase Sapphire preferred minimum credit limit is $10,000, if your credit score income is high enough and you qualify for the card you will be given a minimum let's say for the sapphires card you are given a minimum of $10,000 credit limit on it, if your credit score and your income is higher, they can give you $15,000 or $20,000 or they will first give you the $10,000 then over time as they see you are always paying off on time, they will raise your credit.

With Charge Cards

It works differently, there is no preset spending limit and they don't call it a credit limit, they call it a spending limit, and it's not preset. Now, Amex doesn't say how they work it out but bloggers like us and some people know.

The spending limit would be three times your highest balance that you have paid off in full over the most recent six month period. 

In 6 months let's say your highest balance was $2,000, but you didn't pay it in full, so then they would go to your next balance that you did pay in full, say $1,800 and they would times that by 3 which would get you $5,400 and that would be your spending limit.

• Then let's say if another month you spend $3,000 on your Amex charge card and you paid it all off, then they would increase your spending limit to $9,000 because that is three times the highest balance in that six-month period.

That is how it is believed that it's worked out, obviously these algorithms general kept secret and sometimes change as well, but that is current consensus on it.

No preset spending limit does not mean that there isn't a limit. There is, Amex does have a tool on its website that you can use to see if a purchase will go through. So, you can use this tool and you can type in an amount and it will tell you if it'll go through or not.

I don't recommend you just testing this tool going higher and higher to see where your spending limit is at, don't start at $5,000 you go $6,000, $7,000, test again and again because Amex looks at this kind of behavior and will get suspicious of you. Only use it if you actually genuinely have a purchases that you want to make and you want to see if the purchases will go through.

If you do want to make a very large purchase on an Amex charge card that is over your spending limits, and it is over the limit that you have used the tool to find, you can actually call them up, and usually, if you provide proof of funds, they will actually pre-approve that purchase.

Charge Cards Pros

They can encourage better financial responsibility because you know that you have to pay it back at the end of the month, so people generally do not spend as irresponsibly on them because they know they have to pay it back.

Credit Card Pros

Whereas credit cards do give you the flexibility that if in general, you spend responsibly but then you have one bad month let's say you're self-employ you don't have any clients that month, you could use a credit card just to get yourself through hard times and then next month you pay it back,

Credit cards are more flexible, charge cards you have to pay them off every month. I think charge cards are good for businesses, especially people who are let's say business travelers who put like $5,000 business class ticket on the card and then their company pays them back and they're able to pay it off immediately.

Credit cards definitely are going to be better for people who are less secure financially, who want sometimes borrow a little bit on their card, I don't recommend borrowing on cards because the APR is so high, but sometimes you hit on hard times and you have to do it, there is no choice.



That is basically the rundown on some of the keys on credit cards and charge cards

Today we're going to talk about what factors can affect your credit score and how to deal with them, so once you have your first credit card, you are going to build your credit score in order to access high credit lines and get other better credit cards in the future

There are 5 factors which can actually affect your credit score and those are 

1. Payment History (Which Affect 35% of Your Credit Score)
2. Credit Utilization (That is the amount of money you owe as a percentage of a total credit line, that affects 30% of your credit score)
3. Credit History (That affect 15% of your credit score)
4. Credit Inquiries (That affect 10%)
5. Type of Credit Used (That affect 10%)

Let's look at each of these factors in details

1. Payment History (Which Affect 35% of Your Credit Score)

That is a 35% of how your credit score is figured out, so that is the largest factor, and that is determined by how frequently you meet your credit card payments, so if you miss one payment it can have quite a big impact on your score.

Meet Minimum Payment or Pay In Full Each Month

Always pay your credit card bill in full on time and actually you don't have to pay your bill in full to make sure your credit history is all positive information, you just have to meet the minimum payment each month which is normally between $25 to $35. Depending on the card.

Don't Pay Interest

Because if you don't pay your bill in full you are going to end up paying interest which sort of defeats the object of all the credit card, it's dept you're paying interest on, that can be 20% per year, you don't really want to pay interest because I don't want you to pay interest and if you are looking at taking out debt, a credit card is not the way to do it, it's better to get a loan.

My recommendation is you should pay your credit card bill in full every month, otherwise, you are doing it wrong.

Let's look at a couple of ways to make sure you pay your credit card bill in full every month.

Safeguard Money In A Saving Account To Pay Your Credit Card

One way I like to use is to decide how much you intend to charge to a particular card that month, let's say $200, then first move $200 into a saving account, make the purchases using your card and once you hit $200 on the card that month. Don't use it again, until the end of the month and return to making purchases on your debit card or with cash then when the bill comes around you have the money in your savings account you compared immediately.

Direct Debit To Pay Minimum Payment

To make sure you never miss your minimum, to never get that negative information on your account is to set up a direct debit to your checking account to pay the minimum payment on your credit card usually around $25 and this will ensure you never have to pay any late fees and also never have that negative information on your credit report.

2. Credit Utilization (That affect 30% of your credit score)

Credit utilization is basically the amount of money you owe as a percentage of your overall credit line across all the credit card that you have in your possession. This is called credit utilization, so here's an example,

• Credit Line:  $1,000
• Owes:          $500
• Credit Utilization: 50%

If a person has access to a credit line of $1,000, this could be one card with $1,000 or two cards that are $500 each, doesn't matter, and they owe $500 on that credit cards out of that $1,000 total, they have a 50% credit utilization, because 500 is 50% of 1,000. 

• Credit Line:  $4,000
• Owes:          $500
• Credit Utilization: 25%

But if another person has access to a total credit line of $4,000 across one or more cards and they owe $1,000 across one or more cards even though they owe more money than the first person, that credit utilization is actually lower, it's only 25%, because 1000 is 25% of 4000, so they are in a better situation maintaining probably a better credit score than the first person even though they owe more money then that first person.

What Should You do?

Maintain Low Credit Utilization - 30% Or Lower Is Good

Typically it's advisable to maintain credit utilization of 30% or low in order to avoid this factor having a negative impact on your credit score and if you are preparing to apply for a new credit card or another financial product then it's advisable to go even below 10%

But don't forget credit utilization is measured as a percentage of all the lines of credit you have access to added together, 

Apply For Credit Limit Increase

One way to lower your credit utilization could be to apply for a credit limit increase or even get an extra credit card in order to increase the overall credit line you have access to while keeping your spending the same. But your credit utilization will drop and you will have a positive impact on your credit score.

3. Credit History (This affect 15% of your credit score)

This is something young people or new immigrant to the United State will struggle with, the card simply hasn't been open long enough thus they have a negative influence on the credit score, luckily this only accounts for 15% of how your score is worked out.

Let Me Explain

Keep Credit Accounts Open

Even if you don't use them anymore, keep your credit accounts open. This factor is measured by the average age of all the cards across all your accounts that you have, so if you've sort of graduated from a basic card to a more premium card, keep the basic card open even if you never use it.

Let's say you start with the Capital One Platinum like a lot of people do, once you get some other cards don't close that account down, keep it open maybe you buy a coffee with it once a month, pay it off immediately especially if there is no annual fee on that card, it's not going to hurt to keep it open and that is your oldest card, so it'll make the average length of your credit card account longer.

4. Credit Inquiries (That affect 10%)

There're 2 types of credit inquiries, 

• Hard credit inquiries
• Soft credit inquiries.

Hard Credit Inquiries Occur When A Lender Checks Your Credit

Hard credit inquiries are the type you need to worry about and they occur when a lender checks your credit report in order to make a lending decision. Eg, when you apply for a credit card or loan

Soft Credit Inquiries Occur When You Self Check Or Non-Lending Related Check

Soft inquiries occur when you check your credit yourself or a company checks your credit as part of a background check or you're pre-approved for a credit card.

Soft = No Permission

Soft inquiries can occur without your permission.

Hard = Require Your Permission

Hard credit inquiries definitely generally won't and these hard credit inquiries can cause your score to drop by between 2 and 4 points per time, but it'll usually rebound after a few months. People say 6 months sometimes shorter.

Multiple hard credit inquiries in a short time can give the impression you are desperate for credit and that can cause significant damage,

Limite To 1 To 2 Times Per Year

By limiting these hard inquiries to every 6 months or so you allow your score to recover.

5. Type of Credit Used (That affect 10%)

Diversifying your credit accounts can help you improve your credit score, this is the least crucial of all these factors but I am going to talk about it anyway, even though many people really won't consider this when looking at how to deal with a credit score.

There are 3 types of credit accounts

Revolving Accounts E.G. Credit Cards

Where you make a payment each month, different payments each month depending on how much you spend, you can choose how much to pay back and how much interest, if you don't pay in full and I am talking about credit cards the most common type of revolving credit account is a credit card

Installment E.G. Mortgage, Auto Loan

Where you pay a fixed amount each month until the balance is paid off, mortgage, an auto loan is a good example of that.

Open E.G. Cellphone, Charge Card

Where you pay what you owe in full each month, but the amount might vary, so a cellphone account or a charge card, like those American Express charge cards.

Only revolving and installment account will report to the credit agencies on a monthly basis, and generally open accounts like the cell phone bill, etc, will only report if you miss a payment, so they only report negative information, so they really don't help you improve your score.

But making sure you keep up to date with your phone bill, your electricity, but all those other things will help you maintain and keep negative information across your score, but they won't help your score grow.

What should you do?

Well, you could consider opening another installment credit account ie, an auto loan or mortgage, but a lot of these are big life decisions, getting a mortgage you know that is not something you would do just to improve your report, so most people don't really need to worry about these things it's good that you know about it.

If you do get a mortgage you know that getting a mortgage or an auto loan will have a positive impact on your credit report as long as you always pay it off on time.


That is the 5 factors that affect your credit score. 

Today we are going to look at how to check your credit score for free online. Now, there are some websites that will let you check your credit for a fee, in my opinion, you should never need to use these, there are enough free options out there for a free credit score and credit report.

First of all, many credit card gives you access to some credit score that can give you a rough idea of where you are at, like the credit wire system from Capital One.

Capital One's credit checker used to be really inaccurate, but it's got a lot better since they updated it.



You can see it gives me a score of 744 and some information about factors affecting my score, although I wouldn't call this a full credit report. I got access to this by having the capital One Platinum card. If you have an American Express, Bank of American or discover card, you can access your FICO on their websites

Actually, in the case of Discover, you can use their system to check your score even if you don't have a Discover card.

FICO scores are the type of score that about 90% of lenders use to make their decisions.

Let's have a look at a couple, here's my score on American Express. I get access to it through having the American Express SPG credit card, 



You can see it just gives you the score not much other info and it's higher than the score I have from Capital One

Let's look at the discovered system. I don't have a discover card but you can use their system anyway, just go to creditscorecard.com, and provide your social security number.

Now, let's have a look



You can see discover gives me a bit of other info about how many accounts I have open utilization, etc, and the factors pulling my score down.

Now, let's look at the resource that gives you a free credit score and credit report, creditkarma.com, now, there are other sites that do this like creditsesame, but credit karma is the one that I've always used, so let look at that.



Credit Karma gives you scores from two different credit reporting bureaus TransUnion and Equifax, you can see these scores are different, that is because different banks and credit card companies report through different bureaus.

Credit karma actually gives you a full credit report from these two credit bureaus, but there is one more called Experian and you can get a free credit report from there website. If you want a FICO score from them you have to pay $4.99 and it isn't really necessary since you can get it for free elsewhere.

But this site is useful for checking how many hard pulls you have on your account since Experian is one of the three major credit bureaus and although banks aren't that open about which agency they use, chase and Amex have been known to favor experience, an experience often ends up showing the hardest pull.

Those are the link

Discover Credit Score Checker: https://www.creditscorecard.com
Credit Karma: https://www.creditkarma.com
Experian Credit Report: https://www.experian.com



So, guys, there are a few online resources for checking your credit score

First and foremost the most important reason why we look at our credit report instead of our credit scores is that a report is actually what the score is based off, and so what the reports are going to tell us are the different types of inquiries that are going to be on your report 

If you are not aware, there are three major credit bureaus. 

1. TransUnion
2. Equifax
3. Experian

If you are not aware by law, these three major credit bureaus actually have to give you a free credit report once a year and so what I do like to recommend to people is every 4 months to look at one of these credit bureaus, and so if you start with let's say in January with transUnion, 4 From there in May you can look at Experian

Then 4 months again in September you can look at Equifax and then by that point in January again you will hit that one-year mark with TransUnion.

So, that can help you make sure that there are not some crazy discrepancies in between that whole year instead of just waiting once a year to actually look at your reports.

When you actually go to the websites which are going to be called annualcreditreport.com

When you go there in the very bottom it's going to say fill out a request for a free credit report, it's going to ask for your personal information and some questions to make sure that it is you requesting this report.

Once you actually get the report for that one credit bureau, just go through it to make sure there's noting whack that doesn't make any sense because if they are on there, you want to make sure you contact that Bureau and inform them right away, say hey this is not something I inquire or did, so you want to get those rectified as soon as possible.

You can also look at the different inquiries that you put on there based off of the things that maybe you're requesting your credit card or looking at a home loan and you also want to look at the things that are negatively impacting your credit report which can be delinquencies or something that just hasn't been paid in a very long time.

The reason why this is really important to do every four months is because this will help protect you from that identity theft that we're talking about, if you've heard a lot of stories, there's a lot of data out there with your personal information so you want to make sure that you're protecting yourself in your financial future from any of that kind of stuff happening by those thieves getting that information and utilizing it against you, because a lot of people don't monitor their own identity.



This is how you check your credit report, hopefully, these were helpful

All lawyers are not the same, I have seen people ask this question all the time, they say how do you find a good lawyer? And how do you know a good lawyer from a bad?, Well, let me give you some hints

1. Advertising

Any lawyer who advertises on TV is not the right lawyer for you. That is a lawyer that is going to just want your case to try to settle it quickly to put money in their pocket, and not represent you fully which is what is needed when you are injured in a case. 

2. Know Who You Are Dealing With.

You want to make sure that you are dealing with a lawyer, most of these firms have caseworkers and those caseworkers have incentives to settle your case and they get paid more money for settling your cases early, regardless of the value, so you have to be very careful about who you are dealing with.

Make sure you go in and have an interview and talk to a lawyer, find out if that lawyer has success in trial, now, that may seem very odd to you, because 95% of the cases don't go to trial and I am sure you heard that from your neighbors and from lawyers you may know.

Why do you need a lawyer that goes to trial, well, the reason is that, when you are using an insurance company or a corporation, they only worry about the money, they don't care about your case, they don't care about who you are, they don't care about your injuries. So, make sure that your lawyer has success at trial. 

3. Check Out That Lawyer

Also, check out that lawyer, 

1. Has the lawyer been grieved, 
2. Has that lawyer had a malpractice claim, 
3. Has that lawyer does it gotten awards or she gotten awards

You can find that out and their sources, super lawyers, best lawyers in American, legal 500. there is a lot of services that could give you that information, that is really important when you choose a lawyer.

When some lawyer file their cases and when the defendants, when the corporations and the insurance companies see their name, they know what their track record is, they know what kind of success they had. This is another thing, you can go to the lawyer's website, and if they are not talking about the cases they've handled and the successes that they've had.

Guess what, they haven't had any, otherwise, they'd be on there, so choose your lawyer very carefully, it's a huge decision, all lawyers are not the same, do your homework.