Asha Anujeeva

My brother and sister-in-law have started the process of starting a new small business.  They have taken extensive college courses in business, and think that they have found the perfect market niche, and the perfect location to open their business.  They say that they are lining up their “ducks in a row” and are starting to look around for ways to increase their working capital.

One of the business courses that they took explained to them how to create a business plan to take to the bank when they apply for their business loans. The class explained to them the different types of small business loans, including the sba loans and the line of credit loans. They think that they want to just get a regular business loan, the line of credit loans sound too expensive for their tastes!

They found a company called the Merchant Advisors Company that has a website that helps them to line up their loans, and set up inexpensive merchant accounts for processing credit cards, too! They even have a link to a company that will help them incorporate if that is what they decide to do! I think that they should become a “S” Corporation, or an LLC, but they haven’t decided which is best for them yet. They told me that they are going to seek some advice from the Merchant Advisors Company people on which type of corporation will be best for them.

I’ve taken a lot of college classes in Business, too, and I told them that I think that “C” Corporations are a rip-off because they get hit with double-taxation, and that a smaller structure would benefit them financially the most.  But you know how brothers are; they can’t ever take the advice of their sisters!  So they will contact that Merchant Advisors Company associate and see what they have to say about it.  I’ll be interested to hear for myself what they say – it would be a feather in my cap if they agree with me!

I was quite annoyed to receive a bill in the mail last week for a doctor’s appointment that I was told was going to be “no charge.”  I have called the doctor’s office THREE TIMES during normal business hours and keep getting put through to someone’s answering machine, where I leave a message asking them to call me back to clear this up.  Of course, they have NOT returned my call, and my frustration is mounting.  Good customer service has apparently become a victim of the “Information age!”

Later on today my folks are planning to come over to talk to me about their estate planning.  They are getting on in years and have become quite concerned about protecting their assets from disappearing, not only while they are alive, but also when they pass on.  They have been talking to other relatives about finding some kind of tax haven to minimize the taxes they have to pay, and about wealth preservation techniques.  They are even going to be looking into offshore asset protection.

I’ve been doing a little bit of research on the subject over the Internet on the subject and plan to suggest to them that they look at the assetlawyer.com website.  This website was created by the law firm of Rubinstein & Rubinstein which specializes in legal preservation and protection of wealth and assets.

The law firm is located in New York, but their practice is an international practice – they have clients from around the world.  A lot of their clients are well-known athletes, business leaders, doctors, real estate owners, and entertainment personalities.  So it seems that this business is highly qualified to help my family with their estate planning and wealth management needs too! 

Today I learned to water ski! It was a lot of work, but it was so much fun! A couple of friends invited me to come to their cottage on the lake and we went out on the boat for a couple of hours. They went water skiing and offered to teach me how to do it. It took a couple of attempts for me to get up out of the water and stay up on the skis, but I did it! I was a little bit scared at first; I was surprised how much stress it put on my shoulders, getting pulled up out of the water; but once I got up on my feet it wasn’t too bad. It was a little bit scary going up over the waves of the wake – once I got out of the wake I was afraid to go back in for a while. I’m looking forward to doing it again soon!

With the price of gasoline continuing to skyrocket, we will be spending more time at home and less time on the road.  That means we will be spending more of our money on fixing up our place to enjoy it on our vacations instead of traveling.  I’ve heard the phrase “Staycations” tossed around a lot lately – it means people who are staying home on their vacations instead of going someplace “special.”  So, we are going to be investing some money making our home someplace “special.” 

We have a large room in our basement that we are going to convert into a home theater system.  We’ve been looking at the Precision Electronics Systems website to do some pricing and planning of the system that we want to get.  My honey wants to get some JBL cinema speakers for the system, and I’ve told him that I’ll leave that kind of planning up to him.  I’d like to get more involved in picking out the cool seating arrangements to make sure that everyone that is in the room has a great view and a comfortable seat.  And I want to make sure that we have a mini-kitchen area nearby so we can pop some popcorn and serve cold refreshments without having to go upstairs to get food or drinks.  I’m really looking forward to having this done – it is going to be so cool!