Cable vs. DSL

I had a Verizon DSL since they first offered the service in my area, back5 years ago. I was one of those guys who had to have the fastest and the latest. So when I got my DSL, I was truly thrilled. I was paying $39.95 a month with small mystery fee of $1.22. Total cost was $41.17. After many years of service, I decided to give Time Warner Cable a try. Main reason of course was because I just had to have the meanest and fastest internet access.

Next 3 weeks I had both DSL and Cable installed on my home office. I wanted to make sure I was getting what I wanted so I did many tests. I wanted to make sure one I kept was faster and more reliable. During 5 years of service of DSL, many times I had to reboot my DSL modem. Sometimes load time was getting slower and slower as day progress, and it was getting frustrating. During these 3 weeks, I found Time Warner Cable to be noticeably faster.

I have been warned by many people, and read many articles, that if many people around you have cable, internet access will be slower. DSL however does not matter. Fortunately for me, this was not the case.

I also wanted to point out that my transition period was very smooth. Installation service man came out and I was up and running within ½ an hour. He were friendly and professional. After working with both DSL and Cable for 3 weeks, my choice was clear. Time Warner cable.

When I called to cancel Verizon DSL, I was told by service representative that they were willing to give me faster access if I stayed with them. When I told them I have already installed Cable, they told me that I should be able to switch back to DSL without penalty fee. Now here is something that made me pissed. I have been their loyal customer for 5 years. Not once did they offer me this until I decided to go with Time Warner. I told them I am sticking with Cable for NOW.
I guess I just did not want to haggle with the Verizon customer representative.

Which online Broker is best?

I have been using Charles Schwab since 1996. I have been happy with their service to some degrees. I also have Ameritrade for more than 6 years. I have been fairly active trader since I began trading online and I noticed some difference in these two online brokers. First let’s talk about commission. Unless you are power trader at Charles Schwab you will be paying $12.95 per trade for first 1000 shares. If you were trading 2000 shares you would be paying them $25.90 per trade. What makes a power trade? You need to trade at least 30 trades per quarter. Most people really do not trade that much so if you are thinking about trading once a while Ameritrade is way to go. Ameritrade charge $10.99 per transaction. You could trade unlimited amount of shares and it would be $10.99.

So why would someone trade with Charles Schwab? If you trade more than 30 per quarter you are entitled to get a discount. That is $9.99 per transaction with unlimited amount of shares. Difference in price is really not great so if you already have an account with either of them, it would make no sense to switch unless you consistently trade more than 1000 shares on each transaction.

What really matters to me is execution time. I have consistently traded same stock with both Schwab account and Ameritrade account at the same time. I have found that Ameritrade to be faster almost every time. It could be their software, I do not know.
When I spoke to Schwab representative about this they introduce me to StreetSmart Pro software. Unfortunately, results were same. Ameritrade execution time was still faster.

I found that software in both Ameritrade and Schwab to be very good. They are easy to understand and they are very user friendly. One thing however I like to point out to people in Schwab is that on StreetSmart Pro, on My positions section, instead of Position in Dollar value, I would have prefer to have position in amount of shares. It would make my trading simpler since I would know how much shares I have in hand to trade.

Here are some of the things I like about Schwab. First, Schwab seemed to have better customer service. When I call them with problem, I usually get through to them within 5 min. Ameritrade is slightly slower in my experience. Second, I like Schwab end of year statement to be better. I usually do not have to order consolidated statement from them. Ameritrade, I usually pay $20 for year end consolidated statement to do my taxes.

This year I am going to open Etrade account so I could have the benefit of their software. From What I saw from my friends account and from their website I found their software to be very good. Anyone interested I would post the result.

Saving for college

One of the life’s biggest financial challenges is saving for college, yet many of us have different way of preparing for children’s education. Some ignore it or postpone it. We procrastinate losing valuable time that can be used to build our children’s future.
Some of us rely on rich relatives, thinking they will help them in our children’s need. Some of us put money aside each month on our savings account hoping it would be enough for their children. Some of us just hope that their children will be smart enough to get scholarship. Some of us understand the need for good education, plan a strategy and start the program as soon as possible.

Each year cost of college is glowing. Consider this. For a baby that is born today, the average cost for four years of college will be over 150,000 for a public university and more than 300,000 for a private university for just one child. Putting some money aside on saving account will be like drop on a very big bucket. What one should do is maximize the savings by using savings option below.

Here are some Education Savings options.
Traditional IRA and or Roth IRA
529 College savings plans
Supplement your college savings with Upromise.

Briefly, I like to point out characteristics of Traditional IRA:
Tax deductible
Tax deferred
You have control over assets
It can be used for higher education as well as for one’s retirement.
Maximum contribution in “tax year 2004” is $4000 for tax payer under 50years old and $4500 for tax payer over 50 years old.

Roth IRA is basically same as traditional IRA except fund is after tax which means you are funding with money you already paid taxes on. Money however grows tax free which can saves you significant over the period of your life.

Characteristics of 529 college plans are:
Significant Tax Advantages
Control over assets
No age or income limit
Favorable gift and estate tax treatment
Accelerated gift tax treatment
Flexible beneficiary Designation
Money can be withdrawn for 529 plan account at any time. However, if it is not used for qualified education expenses, investment earnings are subject to ordinary income taxes plus 10% federal tax as well as state income tax.

Characteristics of Upromise:
It’s free so there are no excuses not to have this in place.
Every time you purchase from participating companies, including grocery products, restaurants, gas stations and online retailers you get back small portion to your Upromise account.
Upromise can be link to your 529 College plan account so it can be used to invest.
Did I mention it’s free! Join free at www.upromise.com

This information is provided to help however one should really use this as a guide and do more research on materials that was supplied here.