Money Making Schemes

Nagesh answers:

Yes, they can be a very good idea – a great way to get on the housing ladder and avoid paying exorbitant amounts of rent.

But, if you can’t afford a deposit for a mortgage then you may still encounter problems with part buy/part rent and shared ownership or staircasing. You’ll still need to take a mortgage out for the share you’re initially buying, which will necessitate funds for a deposit, albeit a smaller one than if you were buying outright. You’ll also need to come up with about £5,000 to cover the cost of administration, solicitor’s and surveyor’s fees, plus because many shared ownership properties are on new private developments or in purpose-built blocks, you have to be careful of hidden service charges which you’ll be obliged to pay as a leaseholder, and depending on the precise development you could be looking at an extra couple of hundred pounds added to your monthly outgoings. My first flat was on a private estate and I paid £2,200 a year to cover things like maintainence, repairs, seasonal repainting of all the communal interiors and fences, rubbish collection, security and other sundries.
You generally need to have an income of about £22,000 before you’ll be considered for shared ownership by most agents.

Get in touch with your local council who can direct you to their housing options advisor, who’ll be able to give more precise professional help. Also visit Homebuy, the government’s official website for shared ownership properties, and Housing Options, the London area agent for Homebuy: http://www.homebuy.org.uk

Nagesh answers:

Just tell your parents and let them sort it.

Nagesh answers:

Why, oh why, isn’t the housing benefit automatically paid to the landlord. It’s obvious the dodgy tenants aren’t going to use this money to pay their rent, and leave the landlord with a mortgage to pay and no rent coming in. I can quite see why your blood is boiling. Report this situation to your local council housing benefit office – this is obvious fraud as your tenant has received the money to pay his rent and used it for his own benefit. You wont be able to claim anything back as he’s already had the money but you can put a spanner in his works by reporting him and getting his benefit stopped. You should have reported this as soon as he stopped paying the rent as you are obliged to report any changes in circumstances. There’s no bigger change than he’s using the money for himself. Cheeky sod – he’s one tenant you will be glad to be rid of. I sympathise.

Nagesh answers:

Lies, damned lies and statistics.

Why compare Britain and America? Why not America and Canada? They have more guns than Americans and far, far fewer murders. They have state handouts and medical care for all and they have far fewer of the social ills of their neighbour. And what on earth makes you think that Britain has a generous system of handouts anyway? The disparity between rich and poor here is equivalent to a third world nation. Why not compare it with Sweden or Japan, that both have generous welfare systems and lower crime rates, low drug addiction, low teenage pregnancies, fewer people in prison, etc., etc. It is an empirical fact that more equal societies are healthier societies with far greater levels of trust and co operation. Every serious scientific study in this field shows that when wealth is more evenly distributed, everyone is happier.

Why have you focused on property crime, when it is clear that America has a far higher proportion of violent crime? Is it really higher here, or are the statistics masked, in that those who commit violence against another to gain their property in America are put into another category? Is mugging a violent crime or a property crime over there? Perhaps there is such a disparity because in America they are more inclined to hurt you to get what they want.

Don’t paint this picture of Britain being a nation of generous handouts, it’s just not true. Over here, if your children have an income, it is taken off your benefits. You can get by on the amount of money offered if you only eat twice a day, do not run a car, do not go out socially, keep the heating off for most of the day (even in winter), cut your own hair, and spend less than £100 a year on clothes and shoes. Forget it if you want to decorate, buy new furniture or take holidays. Anyone on benefits that can do more than this is working illegally and/or stealing.

I would like to know what kind of food programmes you are talking about, as the only thing I know about is meals on wheels for the disabled/elderly who can’t get out to buy their own food or are unable to cook. If you are able bodied, money for food comes out of your benefits. A quick look at the Shelter website gives a clear picture of the state of our Government’s housing programme, which is woefully inadequate. It would not be such a problem if Thatcher’s government hadn’t sold off social housing in their ‘right to buy’ scheme. Now there is a chronic shortage of suitable housing for the disadvantaged, and 860,000 empty properties here that can’t be sold in a collapsed housing market. Scotland doesn’t have as much of a homelessness problem as England, but then if you are out on the streets in winter there, you would freeze to death anyway. Problem solved.

In America, the vast majority of the homeless are Vietnam veterans with psychological problems, a testament to American mental health services, and of a nation that is quite prepared to forget the people who served their country and are now on the scrapheap. All too many of the people in American prisons should really be under mental health treatment, but they find execution chambers much more cost effective. In Britain the NHS is very good, it covers everybody and costs 7% of the nation’s GDP. In America their system costs 15% of their GDP and over 43 million are not covered. (The Wal Mart company costs the American taxpayer $1.5 billion in the provision of Medicaid and food welfare programmes to its employees.) The working poor of America have to either go without medical care they can’t afford, or rely on British charities (that were designed to bring medical assistance to third world countries) to get the care they need. I’m very happy with the choice and service I get from my local NHS area health authority.

As for education, I wish the British Government would just leave the system alone, stop fiddling with it and let teachers get on with teaching. The American system is hardly one that we would want to follow. Targets and testing is cheapening the whole learning experience, and the results are children that are never taught how to think for themselves. Some of them look at a bunch of statistics and never ask ‘is this true or have these figures been manipulated’? Hmmm…..

Nagesh answers:

Depends on what type of products you’re interested in importing. Your best bet is to read as many blogs on importing as you can find – start with:
http://www.businessopportunitiesandideas.co.uk/resources/top-100/business-blogs

Be careful and realize that a lot of advertised money-making schemes are scams – so don’t give any website personal information about yourself until you’ve done your research and are certain they’re legitimate.
Here’s an article on Entrepreneur.com about how to start an import/export business:
http://www.entrepreneur.com/startingabusiness/businessideas/startupkits/article41846.html

Google can be your friend in searching the web while participating in blogs and business
networks can help you identify people you’d like to connect with for a business relationship.
Using Google, you’ll find sites like:
http://www.alibaba.com/trade/search?SearchText=india&IndexArea=product_en&src=yahooshortcut for manufacturers in India,
http://www.chinesewholesaler.com/ for Chinese wholesalers,
and http://www.pakistanibusiness.com/sitemap.htm for businesses in Pakistan.

You could also try Linkedin.com and Spoke.com for networking opportunities.