Tag Archives: Practical
Practical Tips For Your Home Owner’s Insurance
Practical Tips For Your Home Owner’s Insurance
Almost every single day there are people visiting insurance sites and paying far too much money for their homeowners’ insurance. You can set your clock by it. Do not expect the insurance companies to protect you on this one, though. This is all down to you — and that’s exactly why you need to read these tips.
Having a working burglar alarm that is monitored at a central station or can contact the police right away will help lower the cost of homeowner’s insurance. It could lower the price by as much as 5%. You would need to prove that you have the alarm hooked up at your home by providing the bill to your insurance company.
Lower homeowner insurance premiums with a security system. Be sure to choose a system that is monitored from a central location. This gives proof that your home carries a lower risk and allows the insurance company to give you a discount, sometimes of 5 percent or more. Be sure to keep all security system paperwork, as you may be required to provide copies to your insurance company.
When considering insurance for your home, keep in mind that having your mortgage paid off can actually effect your premium amount. Insurance companies will commonly reward you with a lower premium if your mortgage is paid off, because it is generally thought that a home will be better taken care of if it is fully owned.
Many people are surprised that when they pay off their mortgage, their home insurance rates drop. There is a dramatic drop in the cost of home insurance when you own your home outright. This is likely due to the fact that insurers think that if you own it, you are likely to take better care of it.
To lower your annual premiums, install up to date smoke alarms and security systems in your home. Insurance companies give significant discounts to home owners who take steps to protect their home, and these are among the most cost efficient ways to do that. Provide proof of your alarms or security system to your insurance company in order to receive your discounts.
When considering insurance for your home, be aware of how certain possessions may affect your rates. Having a pool or skateboard ramp may bring hours of joy and fun to your family and friends, however they can make a large impact on your rates. Check with multiple providers and consider if it is worth it to have these recreational items.
Take care of any landscaping problems such as diseased or damaged trees to prevent potentially expensive damages. Your home owner’s insurance policy may or may not cover damages to your property or others resulting from a fallen tree, so removing landscape features that are dangerous or unstable can protect you from out-of-pocket expenses.
By using tips like these focused on homeowners’ insurance, you will begin to understand how this type of insurance works and how you can save a lot of money without having to give up on the coverage features you need. Always make sure that you’ve learned about insurance before you sign on.
Simplicity as a Life-style: 10 Practical Steps
Simplicity as a Life-style: 10 Practical Steps
There is a relatively new phenomenon in North America called ‘voluntary simplicity.’ The term ‘voluntary simplicity’ is used to describe a process whereby people opt out of the harried life of modern day living, and chose to live a life of frugality. Frugality in this sense doesn’t mean poverty rather, it means, enjoying the virtue of getting good value for every minute of your life energy and from everything you have the use of. Frugal is characterised by or reflective of economy in the expenditure of resources.
Simplicity means making time for yourself in a hectic world. You clear out what is superfluous and make room for a life of passion, depth, and joy. As people become more and more stressed out from the pace of modern life and as we become increasingly concerned about the price of our over-consumption of the planet’s resources, the movement to living in a state of ‘mindfulness’ has increasing interest as a chosen life-style. To be mindful means to dwell deeply in the present moment knowing there is only one opportunity and it will never come again.
Voluntary simplicity comes from within. It is a social movement of a more sustainable, gratifying, and spiritually connected existence. Voluntary simplicity is a matter of personal responsibility and conscious awareness of how we live on the planet. It means identifying the difference between our needs and our wants. Needs are those things that are necessary for our survival – food, clothing, and shelter. Wants are all the other things we desire and to a large extent are driven by media advertising. Simplicity as a life-style is the identifiable difference between needs and wants, and the awareness of the cost in terms of our life force energy and our willingness to pay the price.
Pursuing a Life of Simplicity
The Chinese pictograph for ‘busy’ is composed of two characters: heart and killing. When I first read this, I thought of the many people who are ‘too busy’ to make that phone call to someone they love and then one day it is too late; the many children who get gifts and/or money instead of their parents’ time and then one day they leave home and it is too late; the many times we have an opportunity to touch someone’s life with kindness but we are ‘too busy’ and the moment never comes again and it is too late.
As we search for meaning in our lives, we start to become aware of the emptiness and shallowness of a life based on materialism and consumerism. We become aware of the tremendous expenditure of our ‘life force energy’ to just keep up with the daily ‘rat race.’ We start the search for a life of deeper meaning and ask ourselves ‘what gives us joy?’ We realise we don’t know and can’t answer the question but we feel a yearning in our hearts for a sense of connection, a sense of purpose, and the sense that our life matters. The question demands an answer. We discover that all the myths such as: get a job, get married, have children, buy a mortgage with a two-car garage, and you will be happy, makes us wonder what is the matter with us when we feel the increasing futility of it all. The emphasis on externally meeting our needs leaves a ‘hole in our soul’ as we consume more and more and feel less and less satisfied. Consume by definition means to do away with completely; destroy – to spend wastefully; and squander – use up. Is consumed by our meaningless and frenzied consumerism a description that all too closely resembles most our lives?
What we don’t realise is that we are spiritual beings, in a physical body, having a human experience, and when we don’t connect the internal (spiritual) and the external (physical), our lives increasingly lose a sense of balance or harmony. There is literally no distinction between the outer and the inner when our lives are in balance, and as we seek this stability, where do we start? We start by examining our expectations and assumptions including the belief systems that drive us to live our lives ‘zombie-like’ without determining whether or not we want to play this game. We move towards consciously asking the questions about how much of our ‘life force energy’ we are prepared to exchange for the material goods we consume. This expenditure of ‘life force energy’ includes the storing, cleaning, insurance costs, maintaining, etc. all the stuff that clutters our lives.
Practical Steps to Simplifying Your Life
1. Reuse paper bags, envelopes, newspapers, etc. Newspapers and shredded paper make excellent mulch in the garden. The mulch will break down over a period of time and add humus to the soil. (Don’t use coloured flyers.)
2. Have a Buy Nothing Day.
3. Carve some space for ‘mindful living’ so that you have time for ‘beingness’ rather than ‘doingness.’
4. Find friends who know the glass is half-full or in other words, find friends who share the same value system as you do.
5. Grow your own food or buy as much as possible from local growers.
6. Use non-toxic products such as borax, vinegar, baking soda, lemon, and salt in your home, yard, and garden.
7. Before you buy something, write the item down on a note and if you still want it after a month, purchase it then.
8. Decide what is really working in your life and let go of that which no longer serves you.
9. Surround yourself with what you really need and love.
10. Go Organic. Organic gardening is not only about the avoidance of chemicals, but in the
larger picture, it is organic living using Nature’s laws.
Cheap Auto Insurance – A Practical Solution for Reducing Car Expenses
Cheap Auto Insurance – A Practical Solution for Reducing Car Expenses
In today’s world auto insurance is a necessity for any one with a car. I believe you will agree with me when saying that having a car is an expense on its own. Not to mention the
Fuel prices these days. So what actually can be done to cut costs from your car payments?
One of the easiest, quickest, safest and cost efficient ways to save money is getting cheap auto insurance rates. Some will say that their insurance payments are relatively low. That may be true but keep in mind that over 35% of auto insurance policy holders are overpaying their insurance and don’t even know about it.
The competition among insurance companies these days is huge due to a simple fact; the amount of cars in the world is constantly growing, meaning more insurance is needed. Some people insure 2 or even 3 cars through the same insurance company and aren’t aware that if they demand an additional discount they will easily get it and even if they don’t, no worries, there are lots of other reliable companies that will give them a better rate.
There are plenty of ways of saving hundreds of dollars from your annual premium. The first step is getting a quote. Filling out a quote should be done correctly and the cheapest and fastest way to get free quotes is online. Correct comparison is the key to great rates and it’s needless to say you should compare quotes from at least 3 different companies (the more the better). There are organizations which provide unbiased services helping you compare 1000 of bids from different auto insurance companies with filling out just one form. These systems can come in handy and save hours of quote comparison.
Ways To Save
The following are a few tested strategies you can apply for saving 0 – 0 from your premium. The more tips you apply the more you can save, believe it or not saving couldn’t be easier.
- Raise your deductibles
- Reduce coverage on older cars
- Compare male and female as main drivers
- If you haven’t had an accident – negotiate a discount
- Take a defensive driving course and let the insurance company know that you have
- Install anti theft devices
- Ask for a discount if you have more than one type of insurance from the same company
- Check for low mileage discounts
All in all it is important to understand that there are more than enough ways to save money, all you need to do is get started and it doesn’t require much effort or time. If you take a close look at what your payments are all about you will see that you could cut costs daily if you just give it a bit of time and correct calculation.