Everyone knows how expensive buying a house can be. While the price for a house can vary per location, type of house, and state, it is regardless still expensive. The thought of spending that much on a house is just depressing!

Your first step is to save for a down payment. The more money you are able to pay, greater chances you will be able to negotiate a lower price for your home. Also, you’ll be able to save more on loans.

As you save, continue to remember that you will need extra funds for all of the extra costs, such as closing costs. A excellent guideline is to save about 20% of the value of tee home.

Don’t procrastinate saving, start now; you will be so glad you did! Consider opening a savings account with a high compound interest rate. This way, your money will stay separate from your regular checking account where you could spend it, and it the amount will really grow monthly if you have a excellent interest rate. Add to this saving account monthly, and you will be pleased with the results.  Read more... (322 words, estimated 1:17 mins reading time)

PPI claims have cost the payment protection insurance industry millions of pounds over recent years. But why are people reclaiming the money they have spent on such policies in the first place?

Let’s start by examining the product itself. Payment Protection Insurance, as its name might suggest, is designed to protect those who take it out. It is essentially a type of insurance for consumers taking out mortgages, credit cards, hire buy agreements, loans and other financial products. The concept of PPI is that the consumer is protected if circumstances that are not their fault, (such as a cut in income caused by redundancy or illness) mean they find themselves unable to meet their monthly repayments. This, surely, sounds like a wonderful concept? And in theory, it really is.

The issue surrounding PPI claims isn’t the product itself but the way in which it has been sold, or rather mis-sold, to potentially millions of consumers. It recently emerged that numerous consumers had been made to believe that PPI would either increase their chances of successfully applying for their loan or other financial product. In other cases, consumers had been told that PPI was compulsory.  Read more... (342 words, estimated 1:22 mins reading time)