Interview with Stephen Young
Stephen has been working as a programmer, architect and manager for the last 12 years so he has a strong bias towards helping junior programmers and software development teams improve and perform to the best of their ability. He discusses the ins and outs of being a top programmer, gives helpful tips for future and current programmers, managers and entrepreneurs as well as letting us in on how he has learnt from past experiences, to become more and more successful. Since Stephen was young he has always preferred teaching himself, rather than having a structured syllabus. This formed an obsession for constantly doing research and finding answers to the complicated things in life. Over time he noticed that he was forming connections and finding patterns in unrelated fields and u
read more
Role of a Certified Financial Planner®
What is the Role of a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER® What is the role of a CERTFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER® regarding Investments?
read more
Iaan van Niekerk & Christine Meintjes interview
Iaan van Niekerk and Christine Meintjes discuss their entrepreneurial journey, sharing their success stories as well as lessons they have learnt along the way. They are a passionate entrepreneurial power team with so much knowledge to share. Christine tells us more about what it’s like to be one of South Africa’s top wedding photographers, shooting more than 200 weddings all over the world. She also discusses the ins and outs of having one of the most successful blogs in South Africa The Pretty Blog. Iaan is the founder of a successful web developing company, Plus Plus Minus. He tells us more about the business sides of things as well as sharing beneficial business advice to all entrepreneurs. This power team tell us more about the importance of a social media presence
read more
Buying property as an investment
One of the questions I get asked on a daily basis is, whether property is a good investment or not. This answer has so many variables, it’s really something you would have to look at on a case for case basis, but let’s look at some guiding principles that can help you make the right choice. Let’s say you find a house at a MARKET VALUE of R1000 000 and you take out a 90% bond (with a 9% interest rate) on the house, as most banks are not giving a full 100% bond anymore over a period of let’s say 25 years. First off you are going to have the following costs: Transfer cost on R1000 000 will cost you about R33 000 Bond Registration cost of R900 000 will cost about R20 000 Let’s look at the future costs of the house: The R900 000 bond over 25 years at an interest rate of 9%
read more
Charl Norman interviewed by Grant van Zyl
Charl Norman shares his story of success as an award winning consumer internet and digital media entrepreneur. With 13 years of digital experience, starting his first online community (Zoopedup.com) while still in high school, he discusses the the ins and outs of the tech world as well as sharing beneficial business advice to all entrepreneurs. Charl is a firm believer in hard work and determination and it has truly paid off for him. He is currently a Founder of OnNet, a digital agency with a technology focus helping brands like Media24, Shoprite Checkers and Cell C reach their customers across all platforms. Charl also managed operations for Blueworld Communities (BWC), a company that he founded with partners. BWC operates online communities in the entertainment, mo
read more
Making tax work for you for retirement
Now that we have been through the foundations of investing, through understanding how important asset classes and asset allocation is in setting up the right Unit Trust that will best suit you. We can now move our attention onto retirement investing and what options are available for us all to invest into regarding this. Before I start, I want to just point out that many people start investing or planning for this process without an end goal in mind, and I find this to be counterproductive. The reason being, is if you don’t know how much money you need every month during retirement, how do you know how much money you need to save every month towards retirement. So the first thing I would like to point out in this post is, before you read any more investment advice, first determine in
read more
The best unit trusts to suit your needs
Investment philosophy and ethics There is no one-size-fits-all option when it comes to unit trusts, as we all have different personalities and investment goals. Start by looking at the top asset managers in your country with excellent reputations. In South Africa, we recommend looking at Allan Gray, Coronation, Prudential and Investec to get you started. Then do some research on each company’s investment philosophy (how they buy and sell asset classes or shares to make you money) and see if you agree with their philosophy or not. After all, there's no point in investing in companies when you don’t believe in their ethics or investment philosophy. Age is important The younger you are, the more risk you are able to take when selecting a unit trust. The reason for thi
read more
Understanding Unit Trusts
Today we are going to discuss Unit Trusts and how Unit Trusts work. If you haven’t read my last 2 articles on Asset Classes and Asset Allocation, I recommend that you have a quick read through those first as they form the foundation for this post and for your best understanding of Unit Trusts. I assure you that understanding Asset Classes and Asset Allocation, will change investing for you forever. I am going to start at the very beginning and break down what Unit Trusts are. Unit trusts are when companies like Allan Gray (Asset Managers) buy Asset Classes on behalf of us in bulk and at a much lower price or a better interest rate on bonds etc. They then take the different Asset Classes and combine them into what we call Funds. For example all Asset Managers will have what we ca
read more
Investment Value
How do you know if the investment has any value? The value of your investment is determined by the value of the underlying assets in your investment and the asset price change or if you buy or sell off units during the period of the investment. Your investment value can change depending on the underlying assets in the investment When the price of the units you own changes, this can affect your investment in a positive or a negative way. However the scenario that you are optimistic for is for your unit trust to earn returns through capital growth, which will then effect the value of your investment in a positive way. If the underlying assets are volatile, then the price of the units can fluctuate during the investment period. The most important thing to keep in mind is as long as
read more
Understanding Return & Unit Price
Understanding Unit Trust Returns Maximize your capital growth in your investment Some investments focus purely on getting the best possible capital growth by investing in assets that the fund managers feel will grow over time. How they do this is by looking for assets that offer a great value for money, or that they feel they are getting at a discounted price to what they are worth. The fund managers will then hold onto these assets for some time, until the underlying assets get to a point that they are worth more than what they were purchased for and then sell them off at a profit. Maximize your possible income growth on an investment Certain investments or unit trusts main goal is to not necessarily achieve capital growth, but rather create a reliable or steady stream of income thr
read more
About Unit Trusts
Key Benefits of Investing into Unit Trusts Investing in a unit trust is a pretty cost-effective option When you invest into Unit Trusts, you are able to put your funds together with other investors in order to purchase units or shares in other companies. By doing this you no longer have to fork out big amounts of money to buy shares and get the same diversification. Asset Managers will also be able to pool all Investor’s funds together and negotiate better rates for shares in companies or the different asset classes. You can spread your investment risk By buying into Unit Trusts you increase your exposure to a wider range of investments at a much lower price. Not only do you get a lower price, but it also simplifies your investing opportunity into various asset
read more
Become an Investment Specialist Today!
Yes you can become an investment specialist today! After going through Asset Classes last week, there is just one quick thing we need to look at before we move on to investing into Unit Trusts. I touched on Asset Allocation briefly in the last post, so in this post I will go through Asset Allocation in a little more detail so that you can build a better understanding and knowledge base. Asset Allocation: Asset Allocation is how you divide your investments between the Asset Classes. So it is deciding how much cash, bonds, property and equity you want in your investment. Asset Allocation is, in my opinion, one of the most important decisions you make when it comes to investing and achieving your investment goals. Before you go ahead and select which bonds, equity etc you want
read more
Investments 101: Stocks
Now that we have touched on the foundation of investments namely; COMPUND INTEREST, INFLATION and TIME, I hope that you have a better understanding of why it’s so important to start investing. Today we will have a brief look at some investment options and over the next few weeks I am going to tackle one investment vehicle / opportunity at a time. The reason for this is not to overwhelm you with too much information in one very long post that 99% of people will not ever bother to read (let’s be honest), but also to highlight each option on its own for what it is. I like to call this investments 101, so you can get a very broad overview of investing and hopefully start to understand how things work. Please keep in mind that the posts over the next few weeks are going to give you
read more
Making Time Work For You With Investments
Today I am going to give you some handy tips to help you think through investments and financial planning in a simple and basic way. Now that we have touched on Compound Interest and the EFFECTS of Inflation in the last two articles, we can move on to a practical example of how the two work hand in hand with each other and with spending time in the market and not trying to time the market. The example below illustrates not only the importance of compound interest and inflation, but also how to use TIME to your advantage when it comes to investing. I really wish that they taught this to us this in school… Let’s take a basic example and say we have John and Max. John and Max are wanting to invest some money into exactly the same investment that gives a return of 10% and also has
read more
Compound Interest
My first few blog posts will deal with the foundation of finance. Once you understand these foundations, it will make a huge change in your life and outlook on money. One of my favourite things in the world is called compound interest, yes I know I am a nerd, but it really gets my blood boiling, as it is a huge phenomenon. I think I am not the only one who shares this fascination on compound interest. Albert Einsten once said: Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it, earns it … he who doesn’t … pays it. My goal in this article is to get us all very comfortable around compound interest and its capability of changing your life. I think the best way I can illustrate this without going into too much financial jargon is to create a picture
read more
Introduction to Investing
What is investing all about? With this post let’s go right back to the very beginning of the ABC, DOE RAY ME of investing and let’s chat about what Investing is all about. When we invest money, what our main objective is, is to buy something that you believe will give you a bigger return than if you had to keep your hard earned money in your bank account or in many cases under your pillow. Let’s look at Investment return and the possible risk linked to that. When we talk about investment return what we’re talking about is the possible profit that you can make in buying something at a certain price and then hopefully selling it later at a higher price. The profit that you earn on the investment is known as the return on the investment. Have you ever heard of the phrase, h
read more
Investment Return
How Do Investments Earn Return / Profit? When you start to invest, the money that you will invest is called capital. On the other hand the objects that you own, like a house, shares and Unit Trusts are what we call assets. So the money that you have is capital and the objects that you own are assets. If the price of your assets increase over the period that you own them, your capital that you have invested into the assets will then also increase. You could also get certain assets, (that I call bounce assets) that not only grow in value, but also produce an income stream during the growth phase. The income stream could be means of interest payments or dividend payments if the companies perform well over a particular period. If you combine the capital growth and the income that you
read more
Understanding the Balance Between Risk and Return
Understanding the Balancing Between Risk and Return Video Player Certain asset classes have the potential to deliver a great return/profit over a number of years; however the same asset classes also have the potential volatile returns over the short term, depending on how the asset classes respond to what is going on in the economy at any given time. So the high risk asset classes like equity’s are investments that you would ideally like to invest in over a longer period of time. On the other hand you can also get certain asset classes that are less risky, but the no risk no reward phrase comes into the equation on these asset classes, as the returns are much lower. A typical asset class that will fall into this bracket would be cash/money market.
read more
Investment Risk
What is the risk of losing your hard-earned money? Well in life there are no true guarantees, so when you enter into any form of investment you need to understand that you can do your best to calculate the risk and to make the best informed decision in entering into the investment or not. But at the end of the day there are certain uncertainties that can arise and change the picture completely. This is why, in my opinion; you want to have the experts in control of the situation, if it ever does arise. So when you enter into an investment you have to come to terms with the fact that there is a certain amount of risk involved, and each investment will have a different level of risk attached to it. However keep in mind the old phrase that if it sounds too good to be true, it most prob
read more
Leave a Reply