Rules For Rebels: Young Professional

Showing posts with label Young Professional. Show all posts

JobVent.Com Job Review Site No Longer Up - Anyone Have Recommendations For Others?

JobVent.Com Not What It Used to Be

I know this channel is typically about making money online, doing your own thing, and not working for the man or being part of the machine. That said it's often a necessity to hold down a 9 to 5 when your first getting things rolling working for yourself.

Years ago there was a great site called JobVent.Com. It was essentially a Yelp but for employees to rank the companies they work for in terms of whether they liked the job functions, the company atmosphere and attitude, and their managers. It was helpful as oftentimes working for the same company may be a totally different experience whether you work in the San Francisco office as opposed to say working in the Chicago office. This site was a wonderful way to get some inside help at deciding whether you want to take a job at a particular company.

Several years ago however Job Vent, was purchased or taken over by GlassDoor. Not sure if they were worried about getting sued or what but all the sudden this site JobVent, which honest reviews about what people didn't like about certain companies, those great and honest reviews were deleted and it seems all that's allowed to remain up there is positive posts, we don't seem to get both sides of the coin in terms of honest reviews.

I myself am self employed, however my girlfriend is currently looking for a job. I try to get her to get her own hustle going, I've offered to coach her and help her get started but unfortunately she doesn't have that entreprenurial grind within her. Nothing wrong with that it's just not her cup of tea.

Anyhow, as I've been assisting her with her job search I've found a true lack of a site which has honest reviews of potential employers.

If anyone is looking for a project to take on or an idea for a site to rollout, I think a site which honestly reviews companies and what it's like to work for them is definately needed in the marketplace, and not just some cookie cutter site that says every place is rainbows and sunshine, an place where people can be brutally honest about what they like and do not like about their employer.

Anyone up for the challenge? If anyone sets out to create something like this please revisit this post and leave a comment below showing us what you've put together.

How Maintaining A Good Credit Score Can Help You Start A Business For Free

Did you know a good credit score can allow you to start a business for FREE??? Well maybe not for free, you will eventually have to pay back the money, but you can oftentimes get not only 0% interest but also no payments for anywhere from a few months to up to a year.

This is why it's so very important to monitor your credit score, dispute any errors you see on your credit report, and keep your credit score as high as possible.

If your a regular reader of my blog or watcher of my Youtube videos you already know how important I feel it is to have multiple income streams. Whether those streams are full fledged businesses, or just little side hustles like some affiliate accounts, a few books on Amazon's Kindle KDP Marketplace, and a few blogs. It's important to have multiple hustles and multiple revenue streams.

Recently myself and my business partner decided to start another venture. A landscaping company. Now granted it's not a glamorous business and it's tough to scale, you can only make so much money. I greatly prefer ecommerce where I make money in my sleep and work from a desk in the comfort of my office to outside in hot weather doing manual labor and busting my butt. That said I felt the need for another revenue stream, I had an employee lined up so this would be a pretty passive business and we decided to give it a go.

At the outset we debated on saving money and buying used equipment which would mean paying outright from the start. The other option we looked into was financing. We found out we could finance all our equipment with no only 0% interest for 48 months, but also no payments til September. We started this in late April so the idea of no payments til after the summer when we made the bulk of our money was appealing, and after that we could use proceeds from the business to pay down the loan at 0% so no harm in taking our time paying it back.

Now granted, this didn't allow us to start a business for free, we eventually will have to pay back the $13,000 and change we spent on equipment. The key however is that we did not have to lay out that cash at the outset. We were able to get all our equipment and have almost 6 months to earn that money to pay it off. Now granted we probably won't make a ton of profit the first year, but hopefully by the end of lawn season we can pay off the loan in full, hopefully with a little bit of profits in the bank. At that point we will probably invest a couple thousand in a snow plow for the winter and have another revenue source, snow removal.

The Importance Of Maintaining A Good Credit Score

This story highlightes the importance of monitoring your credit, paying your bills on time, and maintaining a good credit score. Not only will it help you when you want to buy a home, a car, a boat, do some home remodeling. It will also allow you to pay less for pretty much all credit that you get.

Recently I had a few dings to my credit due to a mistake by a credit card company and was denied a mortgage on a rental property I've been eying for months. This was hugely disapointing, and though I know this will be remedied, it's most likely going to prevent me from buying this particular home. I imagine it will sell before I'm able to get this corrected and adjusted on my credit file. I'll do a follow up post and video in more detail about this but just wanted to write this post as a quick reminder how important maintaining a good credit file is.

Samsung Galaxy S6 Review - I'm Not Impressed

I just picked up a new Samsung Galaxy S6 3 days ago. After a few days of using the phone I'm not all that impressed. The new Samsung S6 has changed some features. Now everytime I get a new phone I always seem to hate the new layouts, and functions, we get used to something and like to stick with it.

A few changes Samsung has made is back to the tiles they used to have on the early Galaxy models. Some people like this as it acts as a task manager and allows you to close apps and web pages. This feature may actually wind up growing on me, however initially I'm not a fan.

Other things just as far as how to delete apps, how to layout your pages, etc are things I don't like. I'm also not a fan of them adding a tab for Flipboard which I hate and do not use. You can not delete it without rooting your phone, however you can turn off that page so it's not one you flip through.

Samsung S6 Review

Samsung has also limited the number of screens or pages you have to organize and layout your apps. On prevoius models there were almost too many pages. On the new S6 however you have a home page, a Flipboard page and two other blank pages loaded with bloatware, most of which you can delete but I was surprised by how little number of pages they have. For someone who has lots of apps and doesn't want to have to flip through all apps to find one, you will probably not like this feature.

I havn't really had time to dig into all the features, more casual use, listening to some music, playing some games. I do use my phone for business but havn't had much need to use it for extensive e-mailing or anything lately.

Thus far I'm relatively unimpressed and will most likely be returning this phone and swapping it out for a Samsung Note 4. I was initially very interested in the LG Flex 2, however have heard nothing but terrible things, which is disapointing as the phone was supposed to be a great improvement over the previous LG Flex. Just incase your wondering which phone I was comming from prior to getting my S6, I had the Samsung S4 and prior to that the HTC Evo.

The Best Thing About Leaving My Day Job - Perks Of Being An Entrepreneur - Flexibility & Freedom

It seems almost everyone has a dream of someday working for themself and not working for somebody else. Almost everyone at some point or another has dreamed of being an entrepreneur.

Being an entrepreneur can be very rewarding and there are many benefits to working for yourself. It seems a lot of people think if they didn't work for someone else they wouldn't have stress or they wouldn't have to work as many hours.

Image result for entrepreneur flexibility

I can tell you nothing could be further from the truth. Most entrepreneurs probably work many more hours than someone working a 9-5 for someone else. I can also attest to the fact that being an entrepreneur doesn't eliminate stress from your life. In some ways it can be even more stressful. Where as most people know how much effort they have to put in to stake by and keep their job, when you're an entrepreneur, your livelihood and your income lies on your shoulders and you alone. If you don't make sales, if you don't have success, you don't get a paycheck.

So though entrepreneurship does isn't the Holiday many people envision it being, it does have it's perks.

I quite my job a little over a month ago and my favorite part of being an entrepreneur has to be the freedom and flexibility. It's not that I'm not working as many hours, I am probably working more hours than I was at my day job and in some ways it's even more stressful. What I do have however, is flexibility.

When I worked at my day job I was pretty much tied down there from 9:00 to 5:30, I really didn't even have much flexibility to leave for lunch. If I had to pickup my nephew from school, or get an oil change, or have a workman come to the house, it meant I had to take a day off work if I could even arrange one which typically I could not.

That is one of the things I enjoy most about being an entrepreneur, is that I make my own schedule. Granted my cusotmers are my boss and I have to be available to them. That said due to the nature of my business if I want to stay up a bit later, sleep in a bit longer, enjoy my coffee and read the paper leisurely before heading into work I can do that. I'm not worried about getting fired if I'm not in by 9AM, I can stroll in at 10 or 10:30 and it's not a big deal. If I want to make a lunch date and take a long lunch I can do that as well.

What I enjoy the most is the flexibility and though I still have things to do, flexibility in many ways equals freedom.

Land Banking Something Worth Looking Into - Passive Real Estate Investing

land·bank·ing

ˈlandˌbaNGkiNG/

noun

noun: land banking

the practice of buying land as an investment, holding it for future use, and making no specific plans for its development.

Land Banking A Passive Real Estate Strategy

Land banking is pretty simple. Like many things it boils down to buy low sell high. Buy cheap land in an area currently uninhabited, undesirable, or just plain cheap. If you think an area could grow and develope and get nicer over time there may be an opportunity to make some money as the property appreciates.

In some cases to further add value, someone who land banks, as a real estate strategy may bring in power, water, sewers, and develope and subdivide the land for larger profits. This however is over my head and over the heads of probably most new or small-time real estate investors like myself so personally I would prefer a buy and hold strategy, selling off at some point down the road for a profit.

Lnad banking as an investment is nothing new. Several self made billionaires began by purchasing large tracts of land in California where the development opportunities hadn't happenned yet. Two of these individuals are Bob Hope and Donald Trump who have both been rewarded greatly from buying large areasa and holding the property until the market commanded a substantial return and that is when they sold.

That said tread carefully as scams are a plenty in the sale of land and you run the risk of paying way over value for land if you're not a saavy investor.

Currently I'm just beginning the process of looking at buying raw land in Tulum, Mexico as it's a popular destination already, however as Playa Del Carmen and the Rivera Maya continue to develop further south, at some point probably all the way to Belize, I think it could be a good buy. I am hesitant buying property outside the country and from what I've heard to actually get good deals and quite honestly the way things are done down there, your not going to find much on sites like Realtor.com or online and the little you do find typically isn't deals.

You really need to have some feet on the ground scouting out land for you, or even better you need to be in the area developing contacts. I'm also somewhat turned off that I will not be able to hold the property in my own name. This is typical and has been safely done for years, however it just seems odd as it's not the way it's done here at home. In Mexico you have to be 32 miles out from the coast or border to own land as a non-Mexican citizen. Obviously everything that appeals to me for the most part is beach towns and not the interior of Mexico

I'm still at the very beginning states of investigating land banking. I will do a follow up post and share what further info and strategies I find and will report back if I wind up buying anything.

In the meantime, if you have experience having done this or have info to share or even questions to ask just leave a comment in the comments section below.

Buying A Home Near A Starbucks Can Increase Your Homes Value - Who Knew?

I occasionally use the website Zillow to look for properties, look at potential rental properties I may want to buy as well as check the "Zestimate" of my homes, even though I know a Zestimate really doesn't serve much practical purpose and is more for entertainment.

Anyhow, Zillow occasionally will send me articles and e-mails on various topics. Recently they sent out an e-mail giving tips to home buyers such as how the lowest interest rate isn't always the best loan if there's pre-payment penalties or high loan initiation fees.

Can Buying A Home Near Starbucks Increase Your Home's Value?

Anyhow, one interesting thing they mentioned in the article is that homes near the Coffee giant Starbucks see an increase in home value just due to being near a Starbucks coffee shop. Who knew?

Now on the surface this may seem stupid, really someone is going to pay more for a home because it's near a Starbucks? Now personally I'm not a huge fan of Starbucks, I'm more of a Dunkin Donuts kind of guy, however I can attest to wanting to live near a coffee shop.

It may seem trivial but if you're a coffee drinker like me you have to have a cup of coffee before your day starts. I prefer getting my coffee out as opposed to brewing it at home. I realize it's not the frugal thing to do and is a waste of money, however it gets my day started and it's one of my few splurges. Also, I'm just getting a plain cup of Joe and not some fru fru milkshake coffee drink that costs $7, so not a huge loss.

I have never really lived close to a coffee shop. I often go get a coffee as soon as I wake up to enjoy at home while doing my morning routine before actually getting in the car and going to work. It may sound silly that one would choose to buy a home based on a location of a coffee shop however I have said before "man I wish I had a coffee shop down the street I could walk to" or even one a short drive away as opposed to having to drive clear across town wasting probably a half hour round trip just so I can have my coffee before leaving the house and starting my day.

Now as we all should know stats and figures can be twisted to say anything so we do have to examine, is it strictly having a coffee shop near the house which increases home value or is the main factor that Starbucks typically is going to open stores in affluent or improving areas and therefore home values are following good areas which would grow in price whether a Starbucks is there or not. Basically this could be that Starbucks is not driving home prices, but Starbucks is simply moving into and opening up stores in areas where home values or already rising.

I woulnd't make the distance of a Starbucks a prime decision point in my home buying decision, however that said it can't hurt to have a Starbucks or coffee shop nearby.

If you're interested in reading Zillow's article you can read it at the link below...

Starbucks caffeinates home values, too, and some cities see a bigger jolt than others.