Money and Finances Advisor

You and your loan don’t have to be ideal

admin — Fri, 14 May 2010 17:38:04 +0000

Complete a project together. Sort of like a first date, planning initial activities with a partner enables you to work together without the pressure of eternal commitment. You and your partner don’t have to prove you are ideal mates. You also avoid jumping into a relationship that presumes you will do more than you want to do. The planning reduces the risk of unrealistic expectations.

The purpose of this exercise is to help document the task and relationship agreements you have with your partner. Check off each item as you fulfill the assignment. Document your agreements in a joint meeting.

Define the area of interest where you and your partner are going to create an initial activity (marketing, sales, product development, and so forth). Brainstorm a list of potential activities you can do together. Can you agree on one specific activity to work on together?

Document the start and stop point of the activity. Develop a timeline of the activity. Set the boundaries of the activity (what you won’t try to accomplish).

List the various roles and responsibilities of each partner.

Agree on the decision-making style to be used. Gain consensus on the strategy for resolving conflict. Allocate resource contributions and commitments in writing.

Create a set of criteria to evaluate the success or failure of the task objectives. Create a set of criteria to evaluate the success of the relationship development.

Identify your needs before you take a loan

admin — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 14:21:33 +0000

To accomplish a task successfully, the first thing the partners should do is sit down and plan what it is they are going to do. The Initial Activity Team Checklist and the Agreement Between Partners Checklist will help them remember key items. I like checklists. Pilots, regardless of the number of hours they have logged on a certain type of aircraft, always complete a preflight checklist before taking off. It’s wise to do the same with any important activity—and the initial activity in a partnership falls into the category of “important activity” for me. After all, you’ve spent time, energy, and money to identify your needs and find a partner. When you use these checklists, you and your partner must work together and talk through the issues to gain consensus.

I recommend that you write down your agreements—not to use them as a club should things go wrong, but to clarify issues as the planning proceeds. Sometime during the initial activity or immediately after, set a meeting to discuss with everyone involved how well the partnership is working. The key document you’ll want to review is the Agreement Between Partners Checklist.You’ll also want to address the relationship issues.Use the Partners’ Trust Assessment and/or the Partnership Stressors Checklist to assess the Stages of Relationship Development. Be sure the agenda you send out in advance has been written down or approved by the partners.

Payday loans for better efficiency and quality

admin — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 22:05:46 +0000

You think you have found the ideal partner. You want to know if this is the right partner before you invest too much time, money, and other resources in the alliance. You have assembled the partnering team. You are ready to try the initial activity. Review the steps and tools in previous articles for starting the initial activity. You can build quality into the process by using the Plan–Do–Check–Act cycle. This can be accomplished by listing the tasks that need to occur in the Initiate stage below each step of the cycle. On the following pages are examples of what to do in each step. You may want to use these examples as is or modify them to meet your particular objectives. Either way, the process will help you accomplish the task in less time and with greater efficiency and higher quality.

Credit may be a hige portion of business

admin — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 11:09:30 +0000

Once the team is assembled, begin with the “Stages of Relationship Development” section. Ask each partner or team of partners from the same organization to fill out its column separately. Then, after each team has had this opportunity, discuss each partner’s response until you reach an agreement. This takes time. It may move slowly at first, but this is time well invested in the development of what may be a huge portion of your business. Please note: Although this example lists only two partners, if there are more than two you will want to make sure each group involved is provided with input and feedback. Continue until all the items have been resolved. You then have the foundation for developing your project plan.

The best credit trademarks on the market

admin — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 08:12:34 +0000

Trademarks do not have to be registered to obtain rights to prevent others from using the same or a similar trademark, but federal registration significantly enhances these rights in a trademark. You can claim exclusive rights to use your trademark, after you have searched the USPTO’s database to be certain that it is available, simply by putting the symbol ™ after your product name each and every time you use it. It costs nothing to do this and it provides notice to others of your claim to this trademark. It is not a federally registered trademark, however. A trademark registration can be obtained from both the state and federal governments. If a product/service is going to be sold across state lines . . . think Internet sales . . . then a federal trademark registration should be obtained. The cost for having a law firm prepare and prosecute a trademark registration application varies according to the number of classes in which the goods and services are to be registered. We were quoted prices averaging from $1,000 to $3,000 to obtain a federal trademark registration. But the cost can be higher depending upon the existence of similar trademarks. There are no maintenance fees for federal trademarks but federal trademark registrations must be renewed every ten years. Renewal cost at this time is around $500.

How much does a credit attoreny charge?

admin — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 21:39:32 +0000

No matter what the initial fee is, you will not be required to come up with additional money until the first Office Action comes from the USPTO. This is not likely to occur for a year or longer, so you will have time to accumulate the money to pay for the response to that Office Action.

Your attorney’s or agent’s responses to the Office Actions will typically cost $2,500 for a response to the first Office Action and about $1,500 for a response to the second Office Action (if a second one is necessary). At this writing, the utility patent issue fee is $700 and your attorney or agent may add in his own fee for handling. Utility patents will have maintenance fees payable in six month windows which open at of 3 , 7 , and 11 years after the date the patent is granted, ranging from $450-$1,900 at this writing (based on which maintenance fee is being paid). Again, these are the USPTO fees and your attorney may charge a bit more for handling the payment of maintenance fees for you.

Costs of professional credit services

admin — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 09:22:24 +0000

How do you determine what it will cost if you wish to hire a professional for your utility patent? We have obtained some ballpark ranges from several patent professionals to give you a feel for what your patent might cost. The cost of obtaining a good, strong utility patent can have a wide range, based on such variables as the complexity of the invention itself, the amount of prior art involved, and the number and complexity of the Office Action responses required. Each time you receive a letter from the patent office, taking some official action on your application, this is referred to as an Office Action. Obviously, if your invention is highly technical, it will require more of the patent professional’s time to write the application. If there are a large number of similar products or patents, it will likewise require more work to prepare the patent application. And, when the patent examiner returns the application for changes in the claims, there is a charge each time for handling the response.

Independent inventors, small businesses and non-profit organizations are entitled to what is known as small entity status. This qualifies you for reduced filing and maintenance fees, usually half of the cost for large entities.

Credit option of last resort

admin — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 20:35:10 +0000

If none of these resources will work for you there is one final option. If you have valuables such as jewelry, antiques or stocks that are not a part of your retirement portfolio, and you are willing to part with them in order to fund your invention, you can sell them. We would only recommend this course of action if you have no other. Exhaust all other possibilities before selling off your valuables.

You can see that while there is funding available for Shoestring Budget™ inventors, there is no magic panacea. It is, instead, a common sense approach to creative ways to fund your invention. You can help to make up for limited funds by careful planning and cautious use of your limited resources.

Can’t get a credit? Look for a private grant!

admin — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 16:52:47 +0000

In addition to grants offered by inventor clubs or the Small Business Development Centers, there may be other grants for which you would qualify. The main libraries in each community have large books of grants. While grants are commonly offered for college and vocational schooling, some are simply offered to qualified applicants and attending school is not a requirement. Most of these grants are offered by private foundations and some of the grants are quite obscure. For example, there may be a grant offered for a female of Italian descent who is between the ages of 18 and 45. If you meet those requirements, however, it is often quite easy to get that particular grant. Not all of the grants are so specific. Some of them are for categories of people. An example of this would be a grant for offspring of military personnel, offspring of civil service workers, offspring of graduates of a particular college, offspring of people who work for specific companies, people of a specific religious faith or people who have parents who belong to a service club or religious club. The list goes on and on. There are literally thousands of grants that go unclaimed each year. The only way to find out if there might be a grant for which you would qualify is to actually go to the library and pore over the grant books.

Grants may be a good alternative to loans

admin — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 11:21:46 +0000

Business communities across the country are beginning to recognize the value of independent inventors and offering research and development (R & D) money to inventors in a variety of ways. The Amarillo, Texas, inventor club has partnered with the Small Business Development Center and community leaders to establish a fund from which they award grants to deserving independent inventors. The State of Oregon also recently offered grants to deserving independent product developers. There are similar programs in other parts of the country. The availability and requirements for each of these programs varies from community to community. Contact your local inventor club or Small Business Development Center to see if such a program exists for inventors in your area.