Tag: Beginner Level

Win Guaranteed Free Jagoinvestor Book by activating your Moneysights Account

Posted on by Jagoinvestor

Do you want to a FREE book –  Jagoinvestor book (The name of the book is changed now and its now called “16 Personal Finance Principles Every Investor Should Know”) without spending even a penny from your pocket ? Believe me thats possible now. Yes, moneysights.com is making it happen. Moneysights is giving away the JagoInvestor Book worth Rs 499 for FREE, to each one of you who is going to open & activate an Online Mutual Fund Investment account with them. It’s a limited period offer. However, there is NO LIMIT on how many of you can get it! , if 100 people sign up , 100 will get it ! , if 1000 people sign up , all 1000 will get it and if 10,000 people sign up , all 10,000 will get it ! . No limits !

THIS OFFER IS CLOSED NOW

Free Jagoinvestor Book with Moneysights

But what does activation means?

Activation means sending the signed application form with mandatory supporting documents . Thats it. It’s that easy. All you need to do is get to a stage where you are ready for making transactions and you will get the book delivered to your doorstep once your account gets activated within 10 days of activation.

Are there any terms & conditions?

No. Everyone gets the book. However, you need to be careful that the signed application form along with the valid supporting documents should reach moneysight’s Bangalore office within 7 days from the date of form filling. Your application should be complete so as to get your account activated. Thats it. The only condition apart from this is that there is no condition 🙂

2 reasons why should you do it now?

  • You are getting the book for free
  • PLUS, its the tax-season. You may be planning & postponing your Tax-saving Mutual Fund investments. Now you don’t need to find another excuse to postpone your tax-saving investments.

There are 3 critical things that all participants should be doing while filling the form

  • Make sure that the name is full. It has to be complete name. For e.g. – Manish Chauhan’s name can’t be Manish (unless PAN card of individual has the name as Manish only)
  • Bank account name filed should contain the name as per bank records only
  • The correspondence & permanent addresses should also be accurate. The best way is to write the address as per the proof.

8 steps for winning assured Jagoinvestor Book for FREE ?

Step 1 Register with moneysights (click here) . If you are already registered, just login by clicking here
Step 2 Fill-up the account opening form online. Enter the promo code JAGOINVESTOR in the promo-code field (The offer is closed now)
Step 3 Submit the form
Step 4 Moneysights verifies the online application instantly & sends you the pre-filled application form
Step 5 Take a print out, fill-in requisite info & sign your application form carefully
Step 6 Enclose your application form & supporting documents in an envelope to send to moneysights office
Step 7 moneysights will verify the physical application form & supporting documents. If everything is in order,your account would be automatically activated
Step 8 You get the book delivered to your doorstep within 10 days

Let your friends know about this Offer

We want to spread this message to each and every person , so please share this news with your friends and anyone you know and they can also get a free book by opening an account with moneysights.com

I had done a review of moneysights.com some months back and now they offer online investments in mutual funds also. So you can open an account with them and start buying & selling mutual funds online with a click of a button. There are no account opening or transaction charges to be paid, so its 100% FREE. There are no limits on how many people can win the book, no random selections or no tricks. Just make sure your application is complete and documents are in order so that the account opening formalities are over. If your documents aren’t in order, then your account won’t be activated & you won’t get the book.

Are you going to open moneysights account and activate it soon ? Put your comments incase you are going to !

Why some agents pay your first year premium ?

Posted on by Jagoinvestor

While replying to some of the comments 2 days back, something caught my attention. One of the reader wanted my opinion on what he should do with his Jeevan Saral Policy for which the first premium was paid by the agent and future premiums were to be paid by him. As this happened recently in Jan 2012 only, the first premium had been invested (by agent) and he had to pay his future premiums (monthly). What caught my attention is that his agent paid his first month premium.

In addition to this i recently taken Lic Jeevan saral policy in the month of Jan 2012 (First premium payed by agent) and i need to pay from feburary 2012 thru ECS. After i read the article i realized the returns will 6 ~ 7%. My doubt is.. Do lic returns 6~7% any proof or evidence? If it is sure 6 ~ 7% what i need to do whether to continue or stop? (source)

You might be aware that many agents offer to pay first month premium and at times the whole first year premium. Many a times hungry investors shamelessly ask their agents if any pass-back can be earned out of it! So in such scenario, agents have to pay premiums from their own pocket. Now to many of us this whole “agent paying premium” might look very shocking and confusing because what can be the reason for an agent to pay your premium? So lets see why this happens.

Agents get commissions out of your premiums

One reason as to why an agent might be ready or eager or forced to pay your 1-2-3 months of premiums is because he earns commissions out of your premium. He earns around 25% of the premiums as commission in first year, 7.5% in 2nd and 3rd year and 5% for all the other years. Hence agents can safely afford to pay up to 25% of the premiums (which he gets back in form of commission) from his own pocket. So he can pay up to 3 months of premium without loosing any money.

Because of the competition and wrong attitude of clients

Another reason why most of the agents are forced to do this is because of the competition in the agent business. If one agent does not offer the pass-back of premiums in form of paying the first few months of premiums then some other agent will and the agent will lose the customer and all the future commissions he might have earned. Even the customers want to choose agents based on how much commissions he can pass back to them rather than how he will serve his clients. While writing this article, I came across this yahoo answers link where the question topic was “Where Can I find a LIC agent who returns the commission?” and then these clients will blame agents for miss-selling.

Purely as a bait to the client

Who in India does not like the word FREE? When someone else pays your premium, you are so tempted to take it and ignore the fact if it’s really a worthy product or not. So if the agent feels that a client might be interested in a product, well and good. If he feels a little hesitation or sees that a client might get stopped because of some reason, then an offer of paying first few months premium is really an ace move. That really stumbles the client’s rational thinking ability.

Because it plays with clients psychology

It’s very simple. I don’t need to sell you anything, just start the policy and pay first 2 months premium. I tell you that “Sir, your policy is started, don’t worry for the first premium as I will pay it”. Then comes next month and then I say “Sir, I have already paid your two month premiums now all you need to do is continue it”… So this gives you a feeling that you already got 2 premium payments for FREE. This in a way attracts you to make future commitments and the agent had to part away for some of this first year premium commission, but in a long run, he will make money out of it.

Meeting targets and urge to win incentives

A lot of investors have no idea on this point, but companies have load of sales targets and even bigger incentives for meeting these targets. For example – Foreign trips for top 100 top Development officers, a CAR to the agent selling maximum policies and many more like these. So at times in order to meet these targets and be eligible for those incentives some agents pay the first year premiums for some of the client.

Conclusion

As this trend to pass-back commissions is totally disallowed by IRDA. Its illegal for agent to pay clients premium or give him excessive gifts to lure him in taking the policy. An agent should totally avoid paying his clients premium. Also as a client, one has to understand that it’s not in his best interest to ask an agent to pay their hard-earned money for your policy. In the case an agent is offering to pay your premiums please ignore it!

LIC Jeevan Ankur Review

Posted on by Jagoinvestor

LIC Jeevan Ankur (Plan 807) is the new traditional Children Plan from LIC. It has come at the right time when most of the people look for investing their money for tax savings and given the right time (markets doing bad), it is expected to get a lot of interest from parents looking for parking their money in something safe.

LIC Jeevan Ankur Policy

Jeevan Ankur is a traditional endowment plan where you pay regular premiums and at the end of the policy term the sum assured is paid along with loyalty additions declared at maturity. The nominee in this plan has to be your child (which makes sense), assuming that the plan is bought purely from the point of securing child’s future. (Learn how LIC Policies work)

If policyholder dies before Maturity

In case the policy holder dies before the maturity of the policy, the basic sum assured is payable immediately and a 10% of sum assured is payable each year till the end of the policy term as the income. This is a good option which makes sure some payment is made each year without fail. The premiums are not to be paid after policyholder’s death. Though there is no specific wording about this waiver of premium, it is very obvious.

If the nominee (child) dies before maturity

In this case, the policy holder can nominate another child and other benefits continue as it is. If there is no other child then, the benefits will continue and the maturity proceeds will go to legal heirs.

Optional Riders like Critical Illness and Accidental death benefit.

Apart from base plan in LIC Jeevan Ankur, you can also add two riders in this plan at extra cost. These riders are Critical Illness rider and Accidental Death rider.

Critical Illness rider: One can add critical illness rider for an amount in range of 50,000 to 5,00,000 and in case of diagnosis of some defined illness, an amount equal so critical illness sum assured will be paid. However this is available only if the policy holder age at maturity is below 60.

Accidental Death Rider: One can also get a rider called Accidental Death rider, which will pay additional sum assured in event of death . The maximum sum assured for accidental rider can be upto 50 lacs and the condition is that the maximum age at the time of maturity has to be 70 yrs.

Other Features of LIC Jeevan Ankur

  • There is option of regular premium payment and Single Premium (one time)
  • Minimum and Maximum age of the policy holder at the time of taking the policy has to be between 18-50 yrs and minimum and maximum age of child has to be 0-17 yrs
  • The maximum age of policy holder at maturity has to be 75 yrs.
  • The maximum policy term is 25 minus age of the child.
  • No loan facility will be available under this plan.

Surrender value and Paid up of Jeevan Ankur Policy

To surrender this policy or making it a paid up is very similar to other endowment policies, where it attains the surrender value only after the premium payment for minimum 3 yrs and the surrender value will start from 30% of the premium paid (excluding the first year premium). In case of paid up policy, you will get your premiums at the end of the maturity period.

Returns from LIC Jeevan Ankur Policy

Just like other endowment policies even LIC Jeevan Ankur seems to provide lot of features and bundles things in such a way that it’s too tempting, but from investment point of view, its returns are not something to cheer about. Consider this example- If 30 yr old male wants to take a 10 lacs sum assured policy for a 20 yr tenure , the premium would be Rs 41,350 per year (as per the chart on LIC website). Assuming that the payment is done on yearly basis and the sum assured is above 5 lacs, the rebate’s would be 5% (2% + 3%) so the final premium would be around Rs 40,000 per year. So if a guy pays 40,000 per year for next 20 yrs he would then get 10 lacs as sum assured and loyalty additions extra. Loyalty additions generally range from 10%-20% of Sum assured, assuming its 20%, the final maturity proceeds would be Rs 12,00,000 .

So if you pay Rs 40,000 per year for next 20 yrs and get back only Rs 12,00,000 , the final return (IRR) turns out to be only 3.7% CAGR return over long-term. Note that the actual IRR would depend on the tenure , if you take the case of 10 yr tenure , then the IRR would be different , but overall the returns from this policy is extremelly low.

Best returns only if death is premature

The policy return would really work out well if the policy holder death is premature, the early, the better. Assume that in the same example as above, if the policy holder dies after paying 2 premiums in that case, the total outgo would be Just Rs 80,000, but his family would get Rs 10 lacs and Rs 1 lac per year as income. This looks very attractive but note that this is the situation whose chances are very less and just because of this point, you can’t buy the policy.

Look at Liquidity also

The only thing which most of the people concentrate is returns from the policy, but one of the parameters to look at is liquidity of the policy too. The biggest nightmare can happen if you need your money from the policy after 2 yr or 5 yrs or 10 yrs. In that case the money you get back is horribly low and that’s where most of the people feel the pinch.

Should you buy Jeevan Ankur?

I am really trying now a days to let you decide on such questions. As I have done this short review its enough for you to decide if you want this policy or not. The returns over long-term are guaranteed only to certain level and a lot depends on loyalty additions. If it’s not good every year, then returns can be extremely bad, else it might be okay. I personally don’t see a reason to invest in this policy. A plain term plan and SIP in balanced funds looks better option to me from returns point of view and definitely from liquidity and simplicity point of view. I hope you liked this review of LIC jeevan ankur

Equifax Credit Report – A new credit score in India

Posted on by Jagoinvestor

Today we will look at Equifax Credit Report given by Equifax – a worldwide credit bureau. It has started giving credit reports and credit scores in India just like CIBIL (read about CIBIL Credit report). CIBIL was the first credit bureau in India that initiated giving credit scores for individuals. Banks and other lending institutions have started looking at these individual credit reports before approving any sort of loans and hence these credit reports have become the backbone in deciding whether or not you will be given any loan now or in future.

What is Equifax Credit Report

Equifax credit report is a consolidated report given by Equifax Credit Information Services Ltd. This report contains details of your past and current credit behaviour. It also has the details about all the outstanding loans and enquires done in the past. Equifax is the second credit bureau in India to provide such credit reports after CIBIL. Just like CIBIL, Equifax Credit Bureau also provides CIR (credit report) and Credit Score + CIR. If you just want a credit report (without score) it would cost Rs 138, however if you need Credit Score (comes with CIR), it would cost Rs 400.

Equifax Credit Report is said to be more useful as it is represented with graphs, pictorial description and better colour coding as compared to CIBIL reports and hence should be more user-friendly for the individual as well as loan/credit approving authority to understand the minutes. As much as 150+ institutions share the data with Equifax regarding their customers credit behaviour (CIBIL has 500) and it has past 48 months of credit history.

What does Equifax Credit Report Contain ?

Your credit report has many components and gives a full overview of different parts of your credit behaviour . Lets see which are those –

1. Identification and Contact Section: Confirm application information with access to the consumer’s name, date of birth/age, address and ID information

2. Credit Summary: Get a quick overview of consumer’s key credit characteristics.

3. Recent Activity: Helps you quickly access consumer’s recent activity including accounts which have gone delinquent, new accounts that have been opened, etc.

4. Account Details Section: Account-wise details of the consumer’s repayment history.

5. Inquiries Section: Details the Inquiries made on a consumer.

What is Equifax Credit Score ?

Equifax Credit Score is a numerical score ranging from 1 to 999 that is assigned to each person. This credit score will determine how good or bad your score is. Higher the credit score, better your repaying capability is. “The risk score is designed to predict the likelihood of a customer defaulting over the next 12-month period. An account is said to be a default when it crosses the 90 days mark of no payments. The score will help banks monitor their loan portfolios,” says Samir Bhatia, managing director and chief executive officer, Equifax.

Equifax Credit Score

What makes Equifax Credit Score ?

A credit score depends on almost 600 different kind of variables which affect your equifax credit score , but the top most variables are

  • Past credit payment history
  • Current credit usability
  • Number of credit cards you hold
  • Number of secured loans you have
  • Number of unsecured loans
  • Demographic variables such as address
  • Your Income

Who can get credit score ?

Equifax Credit score is available to anyone – whether he has any credit history or not. Unlike CIBIL who scores only for those individuals who have some kind of credit history in the past, Equifax scores individuals with no past credit history as the individual being assessed will have some kind of score based on parameters like address, city and income level.

How much does Equifax Credit Report cost ?

It would cost Rs. 138 to get a credit report and Rs 400 to get your Credit Score (along with Credit report). However those who want to monitor it throughout the year can choose an option to get their Equifax credit report 4 times a year for Rs 1,000. Those who are looking for any kind of loan can choose this option as they can monitor their report every quarter.

How to apply for Equifax Credit Report ?

You can follow these 6 steps by step procedure to apply for Equifax credit Report

1 : Download and fill in this equifax credit report application form

2 : Attach a self-attested copy of Identity Proof (Pan Card, voters ID card, driving license, passport)

3 : Attach an address Proof (electricity bill, Telephone Bill,Credit card or Bank Statement, Gas Utility Bill, Ration Card)

4 : Make a demand draft depending on what you want. ( Credit information report (CIR) will cost Rs 138 , Credit Score (with CIR) will cost Rs 400 and a 1 yr subscription with credit score every quarter will cost Rs 1,000)

5 : Send the above documents through Courier/ Regular Post/ Speed Post to – “Equifax Credit Information Services Private Limited , Office Number 2 Ground Floor, Lotus Estate, Madhusudan Mills, Near Peninsula Corporate Park, Shankar Rao Naram Path, Lower Parel, Mumbai – 400013 . Maharashtra , India”

6 : Post receipt and validation of documents, the credit report shall be sent via courier or postal service within 7 working days on a best effort basis.

Other Points to remember

  • All photo copies should be self-attested
  • Please ensure that ID card numbers and photographs are clear and visible.
  • All bills should be within 3 months from the current date.
  • All ID proof documents with validity dates should be valid at the time of sending the request.
  • The name and address on the documents should be of the requestor
  • The address should be clear and visible

Wrong information in your Equifax Credit Report

Incase you find some mistakes in your credit report or any kind of mistakes , you can raise a Dispute resolution with Equifax by filling this Dispute Resolution Form . All you need to do is fill up the form , attach the required documents mentioned in their website and send it to them. Equifax will followup with the banks and try to resolve the dispute.

Equifax Credit Score vs CIBIL score – What it means for you

Now there are two credit bureaus in India, CIBIL and Equifax – So the obvious question is, “Which one is better?” and Does it make sense to have credit score from both the companies? You will be surprised to know that in India many banks are already looking at more than one credit report and are expected to look at multiple sources of information before lending to anyone. So having a credit report and credit score from two credit bureaus will help a lot. So if you have good credit score with both CIBIL and Equifax, it really works in your favour as it’s a double confirmation for the banks that you are a good customer.

Whereas if you have a bad score – “god save you”… It would be extremely tough to get a loan in that case. Also incase there is any discrepancies in the scores then banks can give more weightage to one score and less to other or just choose one score which it feels right. So incase you want to check your Equifax credit report go ahead and apply for it.

Jagoinvestor Book available for Pre-Order on Flipkart

Posted on by Jagoinvestor

Hi Readers . My upcoming Book Jagoinvestor with CNBC Network 18 is now available for PRE-ORDER on flipkart and crossword website. The date of launch as mentioned on Crossword site is 28th Jan. The cost of the book stands at Rs 374 at flipkart and Rs 364 on crossword website. If you pre-order it before launch, you will be among those to get the book first in your hands.

Share & Win a signed Book Contest (10 random winners)

We are running a contest where you stand to win a signed copy of Jagoinvestor Book by Author (thats me) by sharing it on twitter, facebook or on email to your friends. We will choose 5 random winners from the first 100 people and another 5 random winners out of rest of those who share about it. once you share about the Book , all you need to do is register yourself.  those who help in sharing the message about Jagoinvestor Book and we will send the copy of book to him very soon. All you need to do is share about the book by click on the link below and share the message on twitter or facebook. You can also share about the book manually on your twitter and facebook

This Contest is Over now

Can you help in Book Promotion

Jagoinvestor BookI am looking for readers who can help me market the book through various means. Incase you can help us in promotion of the book in any ways by mass mailing to your friends, colleagues, sharing it on your forum, writing about the book on your blog, Please contact me . I would be happy to talk to you on that

How to find your Income Tax Refund Status Online

Posted on by Jagoinvestor

Do you know how to find your income tax refund status online? Yes, there is a simple way of finding out the status of your income tax return online. A lot of people are clueless about the refund status!

Now, one can just enter their PAN number and the Assessment year for which the refund status is to be known and get the status update on a click of a button.

check your income tax refund status online

How to check Income tax refund Status Online

All you need to do is go to this website and enter your PAN number and choose the Assessment year and click on submit. This will give you the current status of your income tax refund. You can also track the status of the income tax refund by contacting the help desk of SBI’s at toll free number: 18004259760 or email them at [email protected]or refunds@incometaxindia.gov.in

Note that the income tax refund is valid only if you file your income tax return on time. If you delay the income tax return filing, in that case you will lose the interest on your refund money. I hope you know that filing your tax return online helps one to get tax refund faster than offline return filing.

What can be different types of Income tax refund Status?

1. Change in address

A lot of income tax refunds get dispatched at right time, but they go back because of the change in address. A lot of people keep moving from one place to another and because of this the income tax refund status shows “Refund Cheque returned because of change in address” reason in the status.

Look that the snapshot below

income tax refund wrong address status

2. Cheque Encashed Status

In case one has already en-cashed the cheque which has come for income tax refund, and then he will see the following message in the status box. If you see this and haven’t already got the cheque – you are in problem!

There can be other status also depending on the situation. The above two status’s were just for demo purpose.

income tax refund encashed status

Some Important Points about Income Tax Refund

  • The State Bank of India (SBI) is the refund banker to the Income Tax Department (ITD). So State bank of India sends the income tax refunds
  • Refunds are generated in two modes i.e., ECS and paper. If the taxpayer has selected mode of refund as ECS (direct credit in the bank account of the taxpayer) at the time of submission of income return the taxpayer’s bank A/c (at least 10 digits ) and MICR code of bank branch and communication address are mandatory. For taxpayers who have not opted for ECS refund will be disbursed by cheque or demand draft. For generation of refund through paper cheque bank account no, correct address is mandatory.
  • The status of the refund would be available for tax payers, only 10 days after the refund has been sent by the Assessing Officer to the refund banker.
  • Refund status can be viewed only if you have received an acknowledgement from the IT department of having received the ITR form.

Did you check your Income tax refund status? If No, then check it soon and let us know what is the status?

Download a Comprehensive Term Insurance EBook – FREE

Posted on by Jagoinvestor

Today we are publishing our first ebook give away. We listed down all the possible things a person want to know about a term plan and made ebook out of it. You can see the cover page of the Term insurance ebook here . Its a 19 page ebook with different term plan related points structured in a easy to understand language. Any one who wants to know about term insurance plan in detail can download this free ebook and read it.

Free term insurance ebook jagoinvestor

You can also give this free term plan e-book to your Spouse who is not on this blog or to those friends and office colleagues who are not ready to go online to read about term plans . This ebook focuses only on term plans and has been written using very simple language. Let me quickly summarize what this e-book contains

Contents of Free Term Insurance Ebook

1. What is Term Plan
2. Tax benefit in Term Plan
3. What is an ideal cover for you?
4. For how long should one take a term plan?
5. What are riders and what do they mean?
6. But term plan does not return the money?
7. Return of Premium Term Plan, is it worth?
8. Free look up period
9. What do premiums depend on?
10. Online or Offline Term Plan
11. Why Premiums for Online term plan are so cheap?
12. What is the best frequency of premium — Yearly, monthly or One-time?
13. Important points while filling up the forms
14. Exclusions in Term plan
15. Servicing and Delay in getting the policy
16. NRI’s guide to Term Plan
17. Agents Commission and why you should not ask a pass-back
18. Will more than one company pay the claim?
19. What to look into a Company – Claim Settlement
20. Complaining about some issue in term plan
21. Give clear directions and process to your family about claim.

Share to Download this Ebook

If you want this ebook. All you need to click on the button below to share it on your twitter or Facebook
All you need to do is click on the button below and share it on your twitter OR Facebook. This will help us reach more people and your friends will also get to know about it. For some users this was not working earliar , but now the issue is fixed and it will work. Incase you are not able to download the ebook, mail me with proof of sharing and I will email you the ebook

THIS EBOOK IS NOT AVAILABLE NOW

Why we created this Free Ebook

We are planning to give away a lot of Free Ebooks like these in this year and we are working on those ebooks . A lot of people do not come online to read about financial matters , but those should not miss out on these useful information, With your help we can reach out to those people and you can be a helping hand in spreading these useful ebook to those. So now its time you pass on these useful ebooks for others. Its your bit of spreading financial literacy.

Jagoinvestor Book with CNBC – Network 18

Posted on by Jagoinvestor

I am happy to break the news today about my first upcoming book on personal finance called “Jago Investor” (The name of the book is changed now and its now called “16 Personal Finance Principles Every Investor Should Know“) with CNBC Network 18. It has been a long time I was waiting for this to be out in the market, but finally I got a go ahead to break the news to my blog readers. No, the book is not in talks – It’s going to hit the market (soon) this month itself. So you just have to wait for couple of more days to grab your copy.

OLD NAME & COVER PAGE

Jagoinvestor book

NEW UPDATED BOOK WITH CHANGED NAME

16 personal finance principles every investor should know Financial Planning Book in India - Personal Finance Book in India
Pre order Book

Some time in early 2010

I got a mail from CNBC sometime in 2010 about authoring a book on personal finance and I happily agreed. Since then I worked on the book, I was in Bangalore that time working with YAHOO (yea guys – I was an IT guy) and then I moved to Pune to start on my own. I worked on the book in last 1.5 yrs and now it’s complete.

The Vision of Jagoinvestor Book

It was a tough task to select what the book should be all about – but I was sure that it should not be a typical book . It should not be a book which does not leave an impact on someone who reads it. I wanted to make sure that a person who reads the book really introspects about his financial life. I wanted the book to make a person shake a bit after reading it. So the book had to awake a person reading it and make him feel “Now, I should do something for my financial life”. With that vision I have written the book. It’s about the principles of personal finance and how a person should think in different areas of financial life. I will it becomes one of the best personal finance book in India.

The book is not about financial products and how they work – NO! You can get it anywhere. I have talked about very important things which really matter. It works on your thinking level and makes you think in a more quality way rather than just increasing your knowledge. I have tried my best to keep the language simple along with numerous examples and images/tables to convey the concept. I have written this book considering myself as the reader. There is another version of this book which comes with a CD which contains 13 financial calculators and 2-3 templates.

Buy the Book (Click Here)

Book Chapters

Now let me introduce you to the book contents in crisp and short points.

Chapter 1 This chapter talks about early investing and how you lose a lot of wealth just because you don’t start your wealth creation on time. I have shown numerous examples/graphs which will give a clear idea on how powerful early investing can be.
Chapter 2 The second chapter talks about the protection of your family (Life Insurance). It also shows you right way of finding the required cover and how much your current cover will be able to sustain your loved ones. While this might look like “products talk” It’s actually not!.
Chapter 3 The 3rd chapter is all about Goals setting and how your should look at it . How goal based/linked investing can do better for you and improve your financial life style.
Chapter 4 This chapter clears the myth people have about equity and debt in general. It shows you reasoning/proof about how equity is not risky in long-term and how debt is extremely risky in long-term.
Chapter 5 This chapter talks mostly on the psychological aspects of your financial thinking and how your decisions are shaped up because of the way you think about money. This chapter has been contributed mostly by Nandish and he has really done amazing work.
Chapter 6 This chapter talks about how you can make your financial life more simple and robust using some simple rearrangements. This is mostly overlooked by indian investors who focus a lot on returns only.
Chapter 7 This chapter ends the book and it talks about 10 commandants you should incorporate in your financial life to make sure you become a better investor.

Thanks to you

If I had to thank only one person who made this book a success, it would be you. From past 4 yrs you have bombarded me with your doubts/questions and this has only made me learn and learn. This book does not belong to me alone its creation of this whole community and each one of you who is part of this blog from several years now. It did not take shape just in a day – it happened over years – slowly and gradually. I would like to say Thanks to you all for believing in jagoinvestor and really making it happen. We have a lot of things coming up in 2012 and our commitment is to give you guys more and more with each passing day.

Different Kind of Loans In India against securities

Posted on by Jagoinvestor

What are the different types of loans you can take in India ? Do you always think about Personal loan when you want a loan? A lot of people despite having different kind of assets go for personal loan even if they have other options where they can mortgage an existing asset and take a loan at lower interest rate. In this article I will give you 5 alternatives to personal loans and tell you a little bit about each.

Personal Loan

Before we move forward let us understand a basic rule of lending. There are two kind of loans , Secured Loan and Unsecured Loan. Secured loan is a loan where a lender has access to some kind of asset so that incase you run away, he can liquidate the asset and take his full or partial money back, as there is a sense of security in secured loans, you have to pay a lower rate of interest on these loans. However an Unsecured loan is a loan where the lender has no access to any asset and incase you run away, bank has no way to get back that loan , that’s the reason you have to pay very high interest rates on these loans, Personal loan and credit card are examples of these loans. The biggest reason why someone should go for these alternative loans is that the processing of these loans are much faster and better interest rates compared to a personal loan. So now lets see some alternatives to personal loan incase you posses an asset.

1. Loan against Gold

Lets me start with the best option to take a secured loan in India. You can pledge your Gold jewellery and take a loan from Banks and companies like Muthoot Finance or Mannapuram Gold. The best thing about gold loan is that the processing is extremely fast (from few hours to 2-3 days) depending on your case. The way it works in Gold loan is like this – The higher the margin of safety you leave , the lower the interest rate. Here is an example , if you have gold worth Rs 10 lacs and you are ready to pledge it for a loan of just 5 lacs, then you are leaving a comfortable margin of Rs 5 lacs for Bank (incase you run away or gold prices decline) . So in this case you will get a very good interest rate offer , but if you take a loan which is 80% or 90% of the worth , then you will be asked for a very high interest rate. Generally the interest rate asked is between 12% – 15% .

There are no pre-processing charges or too much documentation involved in gold loan, in most of the cases the only thing required is your address and id proof. that’s all and you can get a loan within 24 hours easily .

2. Loan against your Insurance Policies (LIC/SBI)

Lets talk about LIC policies here. You can also get a loan on your LIC policy incase its eligible for loan (most of them are) . But to get loan on your LIC policy, it should have a SURRENDER VALUE, which happens only after payment of 3 yearly premiums. Only after that you can avail for a loan which would be around 90% of Surrender Value. Lets see an example – Ajay has a LIC endowment policy which has a yearly premium of Rs 50,000 . He has paid 10 years premium (total 5 lac) , the surrender value of his LIC policy is around 3 lacs at the moment. So he can get a loan of around 2.7 lacs.

One can take a loan either from LIC itself (recommended) or from banks, for which they will have to pledge their LIC policy totally to them. So incase they are not able to pay the loan, their LIC policy will be surrendered and company will take their money back. The best part of these loans is that you get it only at an interest rate of 9-10%. So if you have a LIC policy and it has a respectable Surrender Value , then you can take Loan against these policies and not take personal loan which has hefty interest rates. Check the loan amount available on your LIC policy by just sending this SMS – ASKLIC YOUR-POLICY-NUMBER LOAN to 56677

3. Loan against Fixed deposits

Incase you have a Fixed Deposit for long-term and would not like to break it in times of emergency, you always have an option to take a loan against that Fixed Deposit. The interest rate you will have to pay on that loan should be 1-2% higher than the interest rate earned on the FD and the loan amount available to you would be around 75% – 80% of the FD current Worth. For an example – suppose you have a FD which has its current worth at 10 lacs and you are earning 10% on that FD , then you can get around 8 lacs of loan at 12% interest rate . This is one good option incase you do not want to break the FD and also want to take a loan.

4. Loan against Property

You can also take loan against your property (Residential and Commercial) . Banks give loan upto 50% of market value of the property or 30-40 times your monthly income . The interest rate charges is in range of 13-16% depending on how big the loan is and how much margin you can leave. Loan against property is generally recommended for those who want a big amount as loan for purposes like expansion of business, wedding or some big-ticket expenses. Incase you need just 2-3 lacs of loan then it’s not recommended.

There can be processing and prepayment charges in these loan against properties (LAP) . A good place to compare the loans against property is policybazaar page . Public sectors banks like Bank of Baroda, SBI banks are known to not charge the prepayment penalties and have lower processing charges . All the loans against property comes at FIXED interest rates.

5. Loan against Other investments

Shares and Mutual Funds – There are loans offered against Mutual Funds and Shares , but there is a list of approved Funds and Shares which can get loan, also as the values of shares and mutual funds are highly volatile, there is high level of margin required on it , Means that if you have shares worth Rs 10 lacs , the amount of loan you can get is much lower than 10 lacs.

Public Provident Fund – You can get loan on your PPF account also , but there are some restrictions , you can only get loan from the 3rd year to the 6th year and the amount of loan will be only 25% of the balance in the account 2 yrs back . For example – If you want to take the loan in 5th year after opening your PPF account , then you will only get loan of 25% of the balance in 3rd year , if the balance was just Rs 2,00,00 in 3rd year, then you can only take loan of Rs 50,000 .

So I hope you have got a clear understanding of what options do you have incase you want to take loan against your assets. Note that the lower interest rates are one of the reasons why you should go for these alternative loans, but the bigger reason can be fast processing of these loans in case of emergencies.

Online transfer to your Public Provident Fund (PPF) account

Posted on by Jagoinvestor

Do you want to invest in your Public Provident Fund (PPF) account online without going to the bank physically? If YES, then there is a good news for you. You can transfer money to your Public Provident Fund Online netbanking. Whatever we are going to talk in this article is applicable to Public Provident fund in State bank of India. If you have a PPF account in post office of other banks , then first you will have to transfer your PPF account to SBI and then you can add your PPF account to your bank account as beneficiary and then transfer the money to PPF account anytime with a click ! .

Please note that this online transfer is possible only if the PPF account is at SBI , if it is opened at Post Office , then it would not be possible, because only SBI is authorised to get online payments for PPF.  Many people have their PPF , spouse PPF and children PPF account, they can add any number of PPF accounts for online payment.

Steps for Online Transfer in PPF account

Step 1 : Add Public Provident Fund account as Beneficiary Account

The first step is to add your PPF account to your Bank account as third-party so that you can do a money transfer to them. I am using ICICI account screenshots, but all the steps must be same for other banks also.

Public Provident Fund Online

Step 2 : Choose the SBI branch Address

Next step is to choose the exact location of the BANK where the account was open . Note that if you opened a PPF account at a SBI branch where netbanking is not available , it will not be listed.

Public Provident Fund Online

The best thing about have the bank account and PPF account linked is that you can also view the PPF details and balance at a single place .

Step 3 : Add your PPF account as the Payee Account number

The last step is to add your PPF account as the Payee Account number and then click on the confirmation link . In ICICI you will first get an activation code which you will have to put to activate the account for first time .

Public Provident Fund Online
Once you have completed these 3 steps you can see your PPF account as the 3rd party account where you can transfer the money just like you send it to any account.

Steps for State Bank of India (SBI)

Option 1 : If your PPF account and Bank account is at same branch

Incase you have your PPF account and SBI bank at the same branch, then you can see your PPF account already linked with your Bank account and you can transfer the money. Prasoon shares his personal experience

I already had an account in SBI, New Delhi. I went to SBI, Hyderabad for opening a PPF account. They asked for existing SBI account number, which I provided. Also, I submitted PAN card and Bank statement copy as proof documents. It took some 15-20 minutes to get a PPF passbook.

Now a pleasant surprise –

When I came back home and logged with my saving account user ID, I was able to see my PPF account under account section. I was able to see transaction I have done till then.

Also, there is no need to add PPF account as Third Party in this case. As the PPF account appears as separate account, I can transfer amount using fund transfer (not third-party transfer). Good thing is that, this transaction is real-time and the PPF account gets updated at the same time. Also, I am able to download statements, just like with normal account.

If you are not able to see the PPF account as “linked account” , then call customer care and ask them to activate it, if that does not work , then try to add your PPF account as the beneficiary account like I explained above . If even that does not work then try to go to your branch and then ask them to link the account to your bank account.

Option 2 : If your PPF account and Bank account are NOT at same branch

If your SBI Bank account and PPF account are not in same branch/city , then as the first step you can try to add your PPF account to your Bank account as third-party to do a money transfer. If that does not work then you can go to your Branch and ask them to link your PPF account to your bank account . Mostly this should work.

Netbanking works with all the Banks

As of now we know that this online transfer is working with ICICI , SBI , IDBI , Bank Of Baroda , IDBI bak, Union Bank of India . So with this information we can conclude that any bank which supports NEFT transaction can be used to transfer the money to SBI PPF account, by adding it as third party beneficiary. Let us know if this works for you.

But your Public Provident Fund account is not in SBI ?

Incase your PPF account is with Post Office or a non-SBI bank ,then may be its a great time to transfer your PPF account to SBI account ,all you need to do is submit a form for transfer of your PPF account. It will be one time task , so do it .

How to claim tax benefits

If you transfer the money to your PPF account online then you can do two things . First is to get your PPF passbook updated at your branch about the money transfer , you will get the PPF passbook updated and show it as your proof for claiming tax benefits. The other thing you can do is take the print out of your bank statement which will show the credit of the money to your PPF account. I am not sure but may be this is possible with SBI bank only . You can use this statement as proof to claim tax benefit.

NRI’s should make use of this online transfer facility

I think the best use of this facility can be made by NRI’s , who are already have a Public Provident Fund account , but could not go to bank branch to invest in PPF and waiting for information like this.

Just try this option with Rs 500

If you are wondering if this whole netbanking will work or not , I can tell you that there are countless number of investors already doing this and I am sure you will hear from other fellow readers that they are already doing this. It would be a great idea to test this by adding your PPF account and then test a transfer of Rs 500 and confirm once that it really got transferred .

Where you looking for information like this ? Will you test this with your Public provident Fund account and do a test transfer ! , please update your comments about it in comments section .

Thanks to Jayaprakash for sending me these screenshots and also confirming that he was able to transfer money from his ICICI bank to his PPF account.