This is an article about real estate bubble and what is the relationship between it with your journey to financial freedom.

What is Real Estate Bubble?

Real estate bubble is an economic condition where the value of property is increasing at a very high speed until a high level that not match with the growth of local average income and other economic elements. Real estate bubble is also called property bubble or housing bubble for residential market and is one of the hot discussions around the world.

Many people believe that historically low interest rate, poor lending standards and mania for purchasing property are the main reasons that caused this real estate bubble.

Real Estate Bubble or Boom?

I always hear a theory about real estate that the value of property is always up and never go down. But there is heated argument between experts that we are currently in real estate bubble and the price of the property is too high and will burst in future. At that time, the price of real estate property will go down tremendously and parties such as investors, property owners have to endure the losses.

There are no 100% facts and evidences to prove that we are either in real estate bubble or booming market. However, as an investor or property owner, we must learn and protect ourselves from the every possible risk. At least we must do something to reduce the risk.

Steps to protect you from the risks

No matter what kind of market we are in, bubble or boom, it is good for us to learn the skills to help and protect us from any possible risks that we will have in real estate investment. Without further ado, here are the tips:

1. Learn how to determine if there is a housing bubble in an area.
   
2. Buy or invest within your means. Stick to the property costing that not more than 3 times of your gross household income.
   
3. Research the market and do not pay more than 200 times what a comparable property is renting for.
   
4. Look for rental instead of flipping. Buying a new property in a hot market and flip it for a quick profit can be risky. So concentrate on rental income and build up your equity.
   
5. Equity is more important. Concentrate on building equity instead of buying luxury items for your property.
   
6. Always spend time to look for good deal. Spend time to research and look for property that below market value and have the investment potential.
   
7. Study properly and not hurry. You are not racing with anyone. So take time and study properly to search for a good deal.
   
8. Keep your overall debt load as low as possible. This will help you manage an unplanned move.

Do you have any ideas about real estate bubble? Why not share it over here? We are glad and happy to read your ideas.

With so many trading strategy available these days, it is hard to choose the right one for you. This will be harder as there are so many trading markets available in the business world and different market needs different strategy to trade. This is why many people claims that make money from trading is hard and risky. This is because they don’t have any clear cut and successful strategy that really can help them to make money from trading. 

However this fact is going to be broken because of the new Netpick’s Universal Market trader.

What is Netpick’s Universal Market Trader?

According to what I read, The NetPick’s Universal Market Trader was released in June and immediately sold out in 4 days! This is a pretty cool result that I ever heard. In general, it claims that this system is a successful trading strategy that you can actually learn once and then use it to trade multiple markets such as Forex, Futures, Stocks and other markets. Maybe this is the main reasons why it sold out so fast because it simply provide an all in one trading system for both active and new traders.

Now I think they are trying to expose their trading strategy to traders and this is why they order a reviewme review from Journey to Financial Freedom.

Don’t worry if this strategy sold out in June because this hot trading strategy is coming back on the market with a limited time released—the end of August. So you still have a chance to grab this system.

But the question is

Does Netpick’s Universal Market Trader works?

I think this is a question that many traders will ask. Every one of us wants to know what benefit of certain products is before we spend money on it. This is a natural reaction in the process of making decision, isn’t it?

So in order to prove how this system works, a blog is created and ready for those interested traders to come and visit. This blog is updated in daily with information on actual trades, strategy demos, Q&A and of course some videos and charts that show you how they make money. I watched their videos and I pretty impressed by how they trade and make money. They manage to make some positive results at the end of the day in different kind of market using the same trading strategy. Of course, some time they still loss money, but what important is they still make some profit and the end of the day.

What you can do right now?

If you have any interest in making money from trading, then I will suggest you to visit their blog and see the Netpick’s Universal Market trader in action. The blog is open and ready for you to learn more about this exclusive Universal Market Trader release. Besides that you also can read some feedbacks, interviews and results from actual traders who were fortunate to become owners a couple months ago.

You may also download their free book, 30 minutes to an Optimized Trading Life that truly change the course from failure to success.

I involved in Forex trading last 2 years. At that time I was told by my friend that Forex is another kind trading investment just like stock where I can make some easy money. Easy money? Really that easy? I doubt. I was not 100% believe what my friend said but I still want to give it a try and test it on my own. 

So I looked around for some free trading simulators over the internet. Like what I said in my article, 3 steps to train yourself become great stock investor, I emphasize that a trading simulator is really important to train up your skill in stock or Forex market. Well, I know that I will definitely loss a lot of money in starting because I’m lack of skill and experience. I need something that can let me trade in the real market without using my money. 

My predication really came true and I lost almost 10 demo accounts before I start making some profit. If I really using my money to trade, I think I have lost several bungalows. At the same time, my friend, who introduced Forex to me, end up losing a lot of money as he plays with his true money.

So now you know how important a trading simulator is for you to profit from trading. So below are some of the Free Trading Simulators that I collected from the internet which you may consider to play around and gain the skills.

Stocks Simulator

 
Investopedia Simulator Game

Our stock market game is like a fantasy sports pool for investing - it simulates the experience of trading in the stock market. Our system connects to a real-life datafeed, allowing you to invest just like you would with an online trading account at any discount broker, but with $100,000 of virtual cash, you can trade without fear of losing real money!

Sign up for the Zacks $100,000 Challenge and you could WIN a $100,000 contract with Zacks. We're conducting a nationwide talent search to find the very best traders. If you can find winning stocks and write about them, you could win a stock-picker's dream job.

Einvesting

Compete in the eInvesting.com Stock Market Simulator competition!  Buy Stocks, track your progress, view your trade history and see how you stack up compared to other members. Register once and access both the forum and the stock sim, it just takes a minute. Plus, it's free!

StocksQuest

The MyStocks page is the one-stop place where you can trade stocks with virtual money. The Global Stock Game (GSG) is the world's most realistic stock market simulation, where you can have fun and learn the stock market at no cost. Yes, it is 100% FREE. In addition, it's is easy enough to use even if you know little or nothing about the stock market. Even seasoned investors use this Web site to test their investing strategies before placing real orders in the stock market.

Forex Simulator

MoneyForex

MoneyForex Financial Ltd. is one of the world leading online currency trading broker offering low pips and commission-free online forex trading. Founded by Wall Street veterans, MoneyForex's vision is to service individual and corporate investors such as money managers, banks, and financial institutions in easing the complexity in dealing with forex trading. Our dealing software which specialized in forex dealing is rated second to none for it user friendly environment. Lightning speed and efficient execution is one of its many benefits.

FXCM

Because the Forex market is an over the counter market with no centralized exchange, not everyone receives access to the same prices or quality of execution. The worlds largest banks tend to provide better prices and execution to institutions with the largest trade volume and the most solid financials. $200,000,000,000 ($200 billion) in notional volume per month is traded via FXCM's trading platform, and FXCM is one of the most well-capitalized Forex Dealer Members. According to the financial data posted on the CFTC website, as one of the oldest and largest high-volume retail online Forex brokers, FXCM has built strong execution relationships with many of the world's largest international banks. FXCM receives and is able to pass on the benefits of size, better prices, and better execution to our clients.

GCI Trading

GCI Financial Ltd ("GCI") is one of the world's largest online foreign exchange and Share CFD brokers, executing billions of dollars per month in foreign exchange transactions alone. In addition to Forex, GCI is a primary market maker in Contracts for Difference ("CFDs") on shares, indices and futures, and offers one of the fastest growing online CFD trading services. GCI has over 10,000 clients worldwide, including individual traders, institutions, and money managers. GCI provides an advanced, secure, and comprehensive online trading system. Client funds are insured and held in a separate customer account. In addition, GCI Financial Ltd maintains Net Capital in excess of minimum regulatory requirements for securities brokers and futures dealers.

Conclusion

Trading Simulator is really important for a newbie to get started in stock and forex market. Besides that, it is also important for us to test our trading strategy using trading simulator before dumping any money inside the market. Anyway most of them are free of charge. So why not play the game and learn the skills of trading?

PS: Are you using any stimulator? You may share it here too.   

Did you hear any news about an investor goes bankrupt because of real estate? I didn’t hear any, how about you? 

I frequently hear people made their fortune from stock market, but I also hear about investor lost their shirt playing in the same game. However, I don’t hear about any real estate investors go bankrupt. This is because it doesn’t happen often. But on the other hand, I always hear investors are building assets empire that worth millions of dollar from real estate.

So today, I want to share with you some of the “how to” that I learnt from successful real estate investors.

How to Build Wealth from Real estate in any market Trends

1. When properties prices appreciate fast, you can “fix and flip” for a quick profits.

2. Doing cash-out refinance when your properties prices appreciate which will let your having another capital to get more properties. The good news is this money is tax-free.

3. When interest rate falls, you can refinance your rental property and get a lower monthly payment and increase your cash return.

4. There are a lot of foreclosures, motivated sellers and bargain-priced properties on the depressed markets. You will have a lot of chances to get below market value properties at this time. You have plenty of good deal to look for!

5. High rates of inflation will drive up market interest rates and cut down the short-term demand. This will be the perfect time to look for seller financing lease options, and low interest rate mortgages that you can take over from the sellers.

Yes you can really make money from real estate if you do the right things. However, there are no shortcuts or quick ways to invest in real estate and start making money. Everything in this world needs your hard works, time and efforts to make it success. You have to deal with a lot of people such as your tenants, real estate brokers, bankers and others. Just like a business, you also need to handle all the operation expenses such as maintenance fees, fixing expenses and also renovation costs. Besides that you also need to train your brain to accept and read about the market trend, information and figures which will help you plan your strategy accordingly.

Don’t worry, if you pay the enough hard works, you will be success. It only time matter. But if you don’t take any actions today, it is just a dream for you to make money from real estate.

Good luck,

Harrison

Are you one of them, Group of irregular income? I understand that most freelancers and also small business owners will be the “members” of this group. To be honest, I’m also one of them. Being a small business owner, my income is mostly depending on my business and I can tell you that a business is different with a steady income job, the income is different each month. This is one of the challenges that you might encounter if you want to start your business.

In this article, I would like to share with you the investing guide for the group of irregular income. Although the main target of this article is on the group of irregular income, but I think this guide is also work for any one especially those with tight budget over their steady income.

Preparation before investing Your Money – Budget Your Money

Yes I agree that budget your money is quite boring and annoying. However, from the group of irregular income, we have no choice but have to make a plan to use our money. Planning is important to an investor and budget can help you build a system to control your expenses. There are a few points that you must pay attention on budgeting your money, especially you are from the group of irregular income.

For the first 3 months, set a budget and get the average figure for your income and expenses and also categorize your expenses. The main purpose is to know your habit on spending money.

Use the information you collected for the first 3 months and predict your expenses ahead and then set a budget that included an investing account. This account will be the place where you save a certain amount of money for investing.

Then building up an emergency fund at least 4-6 months. The main purpose is to secure your life just in case anything happens in future.

If needed, try to re-allocate your money in the budget again every 1-2 weeks. This is one of the important steps for budgeting over irregular income. This will ensure your money is enough for the next pay day by reviewing your budget from time to time.

Before this, I wrote a few articles that are about budgeting which might help you:

Saving Tips that make your budget works

What Make Your Budget Fail

Learn and Start Investing : Start Small with simple baby steps

I prefer to get started small in everything. This will be much easier for my mind and get motivated to take action. I usually become procrastinate and stress if I want to start something very big and complicated. Eventually nothing is done by me. So I prefer baby steps especially invest using my irregular income.

Learn “how to invest” frugally – Investing is a skill that we must learn. We cannot just jump into the market and invest our money. This sound like gambling and not investing, isn’t it? So I always try to learn and gain information before taking any actions. Since I have a budget, the money for me to take any investing courses, buying any reports or books are quite tight. So I usually read books and reports for free from local library and also local book stores. If you can take good care on their books, you are welcome to spend time reading in book stores.

Always invest with small capital – Yes, sometime I come across some of the investment that can bring more profits in a shorter time. However, those investments usually need a lot of money to invest. For me, I usually let them go and look for those small capital investments. I think stocks, forex and also mutual funds are a good start for. This is because with a small amount of money, you can start investing and gain experience.

Dare to loss “small” – So far I never heard or see any investors that do not loss any money along their life in investment. Everybody will lose money in investment. The key here is how you learn from the losses and then make more profit next time to cover it. So “Exit strategy” is playing an important role here. To minimize my losses, I always have an exit strategy. Since my income is limit and so is my investment capital, I must learn how to control the losses from investment and protect my capital.

Diversify your investment – There are always some argument between putting all your eggs in one nest or diversify them. To me both of them have their pros and cons. However, for irregular income group, I will recommend diversify. The reasons to do that are:

1.   Diversify means diversify the investment risks

2.   Diversify means diversify your investment capital and hence reduce the impact of losses into your capital.

Because our capital is limited, we must learn how to manage the risks of investment and also protect our capital from being burnt out by the market.

Conclusion

No matter what kind of job, income or business you have, you must learn how to manage your money, how to invest them and plan your future financially. Yes I agree that, sometime, there are a lot of negative voices coming out from my head telling me that “I can’t invest because of my irregular income” or “There is nothing you can do with this kind of irregular income”. This kind of negative voices and mindset don’t block me at all because I have a goal, a goal to achieve financial freedom by age of 30. I know I must do something to achieve my goal and have better future. So I still continue to learn how to prepare my irregular income, get myself ready and invest. You might also have the same condition that I have. But don’t give up! There is something you can do on your personal finance and future, even your retirement. This only depend whether you believe it or not. IF you believe, nothing can block you!

Good Luck!

Harrison Loke