Using his proprietary Money Map©, Jay drove the audience in Vancouver, British Columbia at InvestFest2009 around the world showing how the flow of money is temporarily sustainable while Central Banks are “printing” money with reckless abandon. 

Jay’s topics included: Money Creation, Real Estate market, Consumerism, International Trade, Government Action, Fiat Currency, Budget Deficit, Trade Deficit, Inflation, and the ugly condition of the U.S. economy.

Although the financial pundits claim that the credit freeze is thawing, Jay showed how the U.S. banks have yet to really resume lending to Joe and Jane Consumer.  Foreclosures have now transitioned from subprime “slime” loans to prime mortgages because well-meaning owners who have been current on their loans are walking away because of their home’s depressed value.  Why pay on a loan whose principal is thousands of dollars over the current market value?  Unemployment has risen to 9% with13.7 million people looking for work, a 25 year high.  Manufacturing contracted again last month, the 16th month in a a row of continued contraction.  Home prices continue to decline at a 19% annual rate.  In spite of the Fed (Federal Reserve) lowering short term interest rates to a mere 25 basis points, long term interest rates are rising as less buyers come to the table to buy U.S. government securities.

All of these problems are the result of excessive leverage.  Joe and Jane Consumer over-leveraged by purchasing a home they could not afford.  Mortgages were bundled together into Mortgaged Backed Securities (MBS) or Consolidated Debt Obligations (CDO) which were purchased by governments, hedge funds, and institutions around the world using additional leverage.  Lastly, insurance, known as Credit Default Swaps, was sold on these derivatives using even more leverage… all of this without any oversight or regulation… crazy!

In order to bail out financial institutions and auto companies, the U.S. is creating money out of thin air!  Although deflationary forces have dominated recently, all this new money in the system will ultimately result in high inflation and debasement of the U.S. dollar as the world’s Reserve Currency.

All is not lost, however.  Just like the Great Depression of the 1930’s, this financial crisis is one of the great opportunities, if not THE greatest opportunity in our lifetime.  And Jay can educate you on how to take advantage of it.  Please stay tuned for future updates from Jay.

To learn more and contact Jay, goto: http://www.meetthedreamteam.com/about.html 

Here is a good article to start off this post: http://finance.yahoo.com/focus-retirement/article/106381/Re-evaluating-Your-Retirement-Game-Plan?mod=retirement-preparation. The article goes through figures so that you can evaluate how much you will need in retirement in annual income. It is good to reevaluate your game plan right now because the stock market has done so poorly at this point. You may have very good buys which do not look as promising because the market has dropped on average about 40% in 2008. This caused a great deal of consternation with a great deal of people.

With a loss of that magnitude, it will cause many people to delay retiring and to recognize what will be important in retirement. This can be a good opportunity to evaluate what you want to do when you are no longer working. Make sure to sit down and talk with your financial advisor. It is recommended that you look over your retirement portfolio at least once a year to keep on track with your goals.

If you want to have steady income throughout your retirement regardless of the stock market, one suggestion may be to start a home based business. You can start building now before you retire so that you can develop a steady stream of income. One of the most important things for retired individuals is to keep busy and mentally active. It has been shown that those who do not remain physically and mentally active will not live as long and productive lives. Having a small home based business can be a challenge and a good reason to wake up everyday.

You can do whatever you want in retirement but to do that, you have to have a solid plan in place. This tumble in the stock market should be a ringing bell for you to watch what is happening with your own portfolio.

What is good about this article is that it gives you a few different ways that you can work on growing your wealth. Whenever you are investing for the long term, it is about creating a plan and then working that plan. As one of the tips goes in the article, if you get a raise, sock the money away because you do not need it to survive.

The most important thing to remember is that it is not about how much money you make but how much money you keep. If you have a high salary and no savings, you are going to be in big trouble if you lose that salary due to a layoff. You have no cushion because there will be rainy days at some point. A cushion can allow you to sleep better at night because you know if there are problems that you have something there to protect  you.

Do you track your spending? Most people are not able to remember where their money went once it hits the bank account. Many authors throughout the history of the financial world have said it is not normally the big purchases which hurt us but the consistent small ones such as the everyday Mocha at Starbucks. If this costs four dollars a day and you have one everyday, you are spending over a thousand dollars a year for the little luxury everyday.

This article is meant for you to think through your life and see where you can lower your spending or be more frugal. It will make you happier in the end by doing some of these things

A good website for recipes you can use with your everyday cooking is: http://www.cookinglight.com/. If you have friends who cook, they probably have heard of Cooking Light. This website can be the basis for you eating healthy and enjoying eating. If you start a diet but do not enjoy your food, you will have less likelihood to continue on the diet or with the healthy eating. Enjoying what you eat but using less butter and other ingredients such as this allows you to intake less calories. Healthy eating starts with how you shop and choosing good recipes will allow you to do that.

You may want to look into MILA. This is called “a Miracle Seed”, according to the following website: http://manifesting-wealth.com/. You can add this to many of the foods you have everyday. Here are some of the following examples from that same website: shakes, different juices, veggies, or breakfast cereals. The reason to put this into your food is that you can receive great health benefits: more calcium than whole milk, more iron than spinach, and more potassium than bananas to name a few.

Remember that you should have a regular eating schedule. If you do this and eat smaller meals more often, this will help lower your body’s need for calories. Often, we can get so busy that we forget to eat. The body then craves food and we tend to overeat. By you taking the time to plan your day and eating in advance, your body will not go through a need for food followed by overconsumption. It will allow your body to remain much more on track and this helps your energy level.

New Year’s is when most resolutions are made but the thing to remember is that you can set a resolution or goal for yourself everyday. This just seemed to be the perfect time to talk about setting goals since so many people do this at this particular time of the year.

When you create a resolution, you will want to create a plan to correspond with that as well. Many people might say that they want to be in better health. Well, how are you going to get yourself into better health? This is where the plan comes into the picture. You decide that you will see a trainer twice a week at the gym and will cut down the amount of soda pop you intake. That is a silly example but can make sense.

Follow this plan. Tell others about your plan so that you can be held accountable by more than just yourself. Make sure that you are doing something daily to do for this. Be wiling to change if necessary: this must be a plan that is not iron-clad because there are always situations which come up and you may have to change plans.

New Year’s Resolutions can be good but many people do not end up succeeding because they do not create the plan to see the chances in their lives. You can make the change happen by making the plan.

If you pay it forward, you will find that this will come back to help you. One way it can come back is to think about what you want to get out of volunteering. Think about your goals for business and let’s use an example that you want to gain more leadership skills. One way to build these leadership skills can be to find an opportunity with a nonprofit where you are put in the position of being a leader. Maybe you are a site coordinator for a group of volunteers or you become a board member for a volunteer. Both of these different opportunities would offer you the chance to develop your leadership skills. You are developing skills that can be used in your home business.

If you have a particular interest in an industry or field, use the following website: http://www.volunteermatch.org/. Oftentimes people will volunteer for the big names such as Habitat for Humanity or other organizations everyone has heard of. What about the small nonprofit where you may fit in perfectly? This website can help you find the perfect match so that you can really pursue a passion of yours while getting out and volunteering at the same time. This can allow you to pursue a passion and see whether you may want to start a home business around that particular field or industry as well.

You can build up your home business by talking with others in the community about yourself and being self employed when doing good things in the community. That is often one of the first questions asked when you meet a new person: what do you do? This can be another source of leads and it comes simply through new conversations with new people.

These are all good ways you can pay it forward and benefit your home business at the same time.

You need to track your marketing. One of the benefits of Internet marketing is that you can track where your traffic came from. Whatever web service you use, you can find a good traffic analyzer. How can you know how to improve your site if you don’t know where your traffic is coming from? Here is a Google search for different traffic analyzers you can use that offer free trials. Each person may have different needs for their website and analyzing traffic. Using a tool such as this can allow you to change your strategies towards Internet marketing in general.

When looking through the Internet about marketing and other topics, I came across this resource: http://internetmarketingformommies.com/how-to-succeed-in-internet-marketing-set-up-a-step-by-step-internet-marketing-action-plan/. Within this blog post, it talks about setting up an Internet marketing action plan. If you want to set up a marketing action plan and do this in conjunction with others, this is a good resource to visit.

How are your keywords? For whatever website you have, it is essential that you focus on getting traffic through the search engines. You can decide to pay for your traffic (pay per click) or focus on keywords and search engine results (organic search results). A good resource to focus on what keywords to use for your website is here. 

Internet marketing has a distinct advantage over other forms of advertising: tracking is much simpler and this is something to take advantage of. The analysis will allow you to see how you are getting your traffic and see if you are getting any search engine traffic and from what keywords. This can allow you to modify your methods for getting traffic if necessary.

Are you working out currently? There are so many different way to push your body and it is such a good thing for you. Look at what the Mayo Clinic has to say about working out. Working out improves your spirits and positive spirit counts for a lot. You can manage your weight much better and it helps improve your sex life as well.

Sleep can improve as well from exercise in the same article quoted in the above paragraph. Many Americans struggle from lack of sleep and some think it is almost 50% of adult Americans who fit within this category. If you take care of yourself by eating right and working out, this will improve your sleep. If your sleep improves, you will feel even more rested everyday.

Think about that. You so often hear of a vicious cycle where one bad thing can lead to another and can lead to another. Think about this as a vicious cycle turned upside down. Where else can you focus on working out, eating right and then that translates into better sleep? Then the better sleep makes you feel better and more rested and you can continue to improve your daily life.

Health is paramount to what you can accomplish everyday. You may be able to have a good day when you are tired but eventually sleep deprivation and not taking care of yourself will catch up to you. Think about that and visit the two links to see where you can make the changes in your life.  

Any home based business will potentially want to market its products both online and offline. If you are thinking about a home based business, marketing is your business. Now there are benefits to marketing online versus offline. If you market online, you can market 24 x 7 without having to always be at your computer. You will likely find a larger audience online than you can find in your community if you spend a good deal of time doing offline marketing.

Use this website as an idea when you are starting your home based business and do not know much about Internet marketing. Any person will not know a great deal at first but it is essential that you learn as much as possible about this subject as quickly as possible.  Without a strong knowledge of this topic, how do you know that your marketing will actually pay off? By gaining a solid grasp of the marketing end of the Internet, you will assure yourself that you are working hard but you are working smart. You can understand where to put the time in so that you can see good returns on your time invested into marketing so that you can get prospects flowing to your website.

Here is another good point to think about why Internet marketing goes hand in hand with the success of your home business. You can have a good home based business and may be able to run it effectively but why would anyone use that business if they do not know about it? That is where the importance of Internet marketing comes in. You are working to get your message across to others who can either use your product or service or may be looking for a similar opportunity such that you are already running. In the end, marketing is the key that drives the engine. It comes down to a funnel and the more people entering the top of the sales funnel means the more sales coming out the bottom.

If you have been following what has been happening with the economy in the last few months, you may wonder what effect some of these different events have on your life.

A good question many people have is why did the price of gas go down so much? This is a pretty difficult question to answer but here is a simple answer for the fall. It has to do with supply and demand. With the world going through a global recession, it causes the demand for gas to go down. This has caused the price of a barrel of gas to drop from a high of $147 down to its current level of roughly $45. OPEC has struggled with this as witnessed by this story: http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/081217/af_opec_meeting.html. The price of a barrel of gas has dropped so rapidly that it led to prices dropping a record 1.7% in October. It blew away the previous record of 1%. This can help you since you have to pay less for the goods you buy every month.

With the economy also struggling, the Federal Reserve has also lowered the prime rate down to .25%: http://money.cnn.com/2008/12/16/markets/dollarwrite/index.htm  As a result, interest rates have gone down. This will lower the interest rate on your home equity line or any line of credit if you are tied to the prime rate. This does not have as much effect potentially on mortgage rates for first mortgages because those are tied to the performance of mortgage bonds.

How does this then affect you? Price of gas will probably go up at some point. If you are thinking about a truck, you may want to look at the following article:   http://www.tampagasprices.com/news/Government_lowers_2009_gasoline_price_forecast_to_237_a_ga/8941_338175/index.aspx. The price of gas may increase some, especially when you consider that they are dropping so much and production is being dropped. With interest rates on home equity lines going down, you can expect to pay less interest every month on the money you have borrowed. Understanding some of these facts can help you make more informed choices when you are making major purchases.