James L. Paris's Blog, page 224

Hackers Post Stallone's Social Security Number Online

Hackers recently infiltrated the computer network of Sony Pictures and posted online the Social Security numbers of Sylester Stallone, Conan O'Brien, and tens of thousands of current and former employees. We don't know if Rocky cried out, 'Adrian, Adrian, my identity has been stolen,' but it is likely that he uttered a few choice words.

While some speculated that North Korea was behind the security breach, they have denied it (but can we believe them?). The working theory on the involvment of North Korea was that the breach was in retaliation for an upcoming comedy about Kim Jon Un. An interesting side note is that in addition to the disclosure of Social Security numbers, celebrities aliases were also revealed. These are the names that an actor might use when checking in at a hotel or traveling. By the way, my alias is 'Jimmy Cash.'  

When Can You Do If Your Social Security Number Is Stolen?

1. Get a new Social Security Number

While it is a little known option, if you are the victim of identity theft you can apply for a new Social Security number from the Social Security Administration. In one sense, you are starting all over again with a fresh new credit identity. Although I don't know anyone that has ever received a new Social Security number, the research I have done on this suggests that your 'old credit file' may still be associated with your name. This would, of course, require some explaining each and every time you apply for credit.

2. Freeze Your Credit

The three major credit bureaus provide a way for a consumer to put in place a security freeze. Once frozen, no one can apply for credit with your Social Security number without your authorization (and your secret pin code). Depending on what state you live in, you may have to pay a few dollars to freeze your file. If you are a bonafide victim of identity theft you will not have to pay for your credit freeze.

3. Stay On Top Of Your Credit File With A Monitoring Service

Credit monitoring is available for a monthly fee of around $15 from a number of national companies. Many consumers have been given free credit monitoring as a result of a corporate security breach (e.g. Target). Even if this does not apply to you,  there is a way to monitor your credit file for free (two of the three bureaus). Credit Sesame and Credit Karma both offer free monitoring, but each service only monitors one of the bureaus. Presently there is no means to monitor an Equifax credit file for free.

4. Review Your Full Three Bureau Credit Report At Least Once Per Year

You can obtain your full three bureau credit report one time per year through Annual Credit Report.com. Additionally, if you are turned down when applying for credit, you can make additional requests at no cost. The details on this will be included in the credit denial letter you receive from the lender.

Other Issues To Be Concerned About

Most people think only about the risk to their credit file when their Social Security number has been compromised. There is another consideration that may be much more problematic than your credit file - your IRS file. One of the fastest growing areas of fraud is the theft of tax refunds. Sorry to report that there is no method in place that allows for the monitoring of your IRS file. The only way to learn that your Social Security number is being used by a tax fraudster is when you file your own return. 

Helping you make the most of God's money!

  James L. Paris 
Editor-In-Chief ChristianMoney.com
Follow Me on Twitter Twitter.com/jameslparis
Christian Financial Advice 
Jim Paris 24 Hour Radio  

JFK Assassination Solved - Lamar Waldron Joins Jim Paris Live

Could the mystery of the JFK assassination finally be solved? Author Lamar Waldron provides a convincing theory with a mountain of evidence. Why did the mafia want to kill JFK? What role did Carlos Marcello and Santo Traficante play? Was Lee Harvey Oswald a patsy? Why it was never reported that there were assassination plans in both Chicago and Tampa prior to Dallas? The shocking story of how the first black Secret Service agent was framed and sent to prison after exposing assassination plots (Abraham Bolden).

Is Burt Reynolds Broke?

On this episode Jim discusses Burt Reynolds financial problems. Reynolds is selling off more than 600 items through one of the largest auctions of its kind. Burt Reynolds is losing his home to foreclosure and is being sued by ex-wife Loni Anderson for unpaid support payments from their divorce settlement. Rush Limbaugh pays $500,000 per in in property taxes on his Palm Beach estate. New York Taxi medallion values plummeting as Internet based ride sharing services take hold. Why 2015 should be a very good year for Bitcoin. Jim's own Pearl Harbor story.

5 Smart End Of Year Financial Moves

The hardest thing about getting things done this time of the year, is that it is THIS TIME OF THE YEAR. With Christmas and New Year's (and all of the related social events), it is the worst season to find the time to sit down and deal with your finances. The problem is, however, that this is prime time for making end of year moves that can have an enormous impact in your financial picture for next year.

5 Smart End Of Year Financial Moves

1. Make a financial contribution to your favorite charity or ministry

The great thing about making charitable contributions this time of year is that the tax benefit is merely weeks away and not months. This is a great time to take a look at your bank balance and decide if you have any surplus funds to donate. This is the season that many charities and ministries need extra funds as well, and being able to add that as a deduction to your 2014 taxes makes it a win-win for both parties (not to mention the good cause to which the organization will use it toward). 

2. Make an in-kind donation to a charity or ministry

Many times when we think about charitable contributions we think only in terms of cash. This is a great time, however, to make in-kind donations (property). This can be anything from a used car you no longer need, to clothing, appliances, household items, sports equipment, and more. Now, even going a step further here, you might consider gifting stock. Giving the gift of stock to a charity can create a highly valuable tax benefit. If you own shares of stock that have gone up substantially in value, you will be hit with capital gains taxes on your profits when you sell (unless it is inside a retirement account). By gifting your shares to a non-profit, you avoid the capital gains and get a deduction for the current market value. 

If you have a losing stock position, the strategy is reversed. Sell your losing stock,  take your tax loss, and then gift the cash.

Some Interesting End Of Year IRA Strategies For Year End

 

3. Defer income into the new year

We all need some extra money around Christmas, but it may make sense to push some of your income into 2015. For example, if this is the time of year that your employer pays out bonuses, you may have the option to request that the bonus come after January 1 rather than around Christmas. By waiting just one additional week, you can push that income into next year and keep it off your next tax return. It is not enough to simply delay picking up your check, you need to ask your payroll department to officially make your bonus a 2015 payment.

4. Sell losing investments

Investment experts say that this is a good time of the year to do a review of your investment holdings. There are a lot of reasons to do an end of year review, but one of the most significant is to consider selling your losing stock positions. By selling your losers prior to the end of the year, you will have capital losses to offset gains you may have realized on other stock market profits. Conversely, if are considering the sale of any stocks in your portfolio that are big winners, consider waiting to do so until after January 1. Get it? We are trying to push profits and income into the next year and capture losses and write offs for this year.

5. Reconsider your health insurance options

Although it is not a tax issue (except for the penalty for not having coverage), I felt that health insurance should be on this top five list. Obamacare enrollment has opened up again and will close on February 15. This is your chance to reconsider your health insurance options for the next year. I would suggest using your state exchange to see what rates are being offered. Depending on your health situation and age, you may find the state exchange the most affordable option. Another possibility is Christian Medical Expense Sharing (this is what I have opted to do). 

There are quite a lot of other end of year financial moves that could be added to this list

Make repairs to rental properties
Pay business expenses early
Make large equipment purchases in your business
Fund 401K and other company retirement plans

My most important advice is to discuss your end of year tax planning with your accountant. Each person's situation is unique. Some of these ideas may not apply at all to you based on a large number of factors (income, whether you itemize or not, any losses you are already carrying foward from prior years, etc...).

Helping you make the most of God's money!

James L. Paris 
Editor-In-Chief ChristianMoney.com 
Follow Me on Twitter Twitter.com/jameslparis
Christian Financial Advice 
Jim Paris 24 Hour Radio 

Grabbing Another Chromecast For $23

Many of you know that I dropped cable TV over a year ago now. We use a ROKU box to access our programming via the Internet. Several months ago I bought the Google Chromecast device, which allows me to stream content directly from my smartphone, tablet, desktop or laptop computer, directly to my TV. Honestly, I bought it not really knowing how much I would use it or how it might complement my ROKU. It is very easy to set up - just plug it into the wall and then into an available HDMI slot in the back of your TV, add the Chromecast app to any device you want to stream from and you are ready to go.

I have to tell you that my family just loves it. For starters, we all use it to put our favorite YouTube videos up on the 60 inch TV. That alone is worth it, but we have found more and more ways of utilizing Google Chromecast to access online content. For example, last week when the riots broke out in Ferguson Missouri I was able to find several online streams covering the events. With the click of a button, the streaming video was up on my big screen TV. We also did the same thing to watch the Macy's Parade using a site called Earthcam.com. 

One feature that we all especially love are the screensaver pictures that come up when you are not streaming content to your TV. These are some of the most amazing and beautiful pictures that you will ever see. It is almost like turning your TV into an ever changing canvas of paintings.

Example Of A Screensaver Picture

We like it so much that when they went on sale last week on Cyber Monday I was able to grab a second one for our bedroom TV for just $23. The word is that Chromecast deals will bubble up again some time before Christmas. Whether you are planning to drop cable TV or not, I think you will find this little gem well worth the money.

 Helping you make the most of God's money!

James L. Paris 
Editor-In-Chief ChristianMoney.com 
Follow Me on Twitter Twitter.com/jameslparis
Christian Financial Advice 
Jim Paris 24 Hour Radio

Planning To Pocket $500 On My First Amazon FBA Shipment

If you are a regular reader, you know that I recently completed four hours of training on a concept that I call Amazon Flipping. The more generic term for the strategy is retail arbitrage. The idea is based on the strategy of buying items offline that you can turn around and sell for more online. I cover this in a lot more detail on the videos, but the rule of thumb is you need to find items you can resell for about three times your cost. This allows you to cover Amazon's fees and still pocket a net profit of 30 to 35% on each sale. 

Amazon Handles Your Shipping And Customer Service

What makes this whole concept especially interesting is being able to sell items and make available Amazon's free shipping. Using my approach to this, not only are you able to offer free shipping through Amazon, but you are also able to leverage Amazon's branding to boost your credibility as well (since buyers perceive Amazon shipped items as the same as buying from Amazon's own inventory). Probably what I like most about the whole arrangement is that I don't have to deal with the issue of shipping individual items (Amazon handles this all for me through their Fullfilled By Amazon program - also known as FBA). In fact, the reason for this article today is to share with you an update on my own Amazon FBA business. I felt that if I was going to be teaching on this I should jump in the deep end of the pool and sell some stuff myself. Well, I have now decided that even though my 'research' is over, that I am going to continue this as an additional income source.

My Story So Far

I have about $150 invested up to this point. This includes the cost of the items I bought to resell, shipping of my first load of items to Amazon's warehouse, and my shipping supplies (remember that I only ship to Amazon in large boxes and they handle the individual item shipping to the customers directly). I started out by sending 30 items to Amazon. After these items sell, I will pocket about $500 -$600 in net profit.  About half of the items in this shipment were books that were gathering dust on my bookshelf. The other half were products I bought at retail stores and thrift shops (all included in my $150 start-up figure above). Pictured below is one of my boxes. I used plastic wrap on a roll to add a little layer of protection to each book before putting in the box. I also used bubble wrap as padding before taping it shut. This shipment included two boxes and a bubble envelope. Amazon directed me to send my items to three different warehouse locations on the basis of the category of the item (book, video, electronics, etc...) and inventory levels.   

My Shipments Arrived At Amazon!

I received e mails over the last couple of days alerting me that each of my shipments arrived at their respective warehouse locations. In fact, I received an additional e mail yesterday informing me of my first sale! I can't tell you how much I absolutely love the Amazon Seller Central dashboard. It provides a real time view of all of my inventory and my earnings. 

Tripping Across Stuff To Sell Almost Everywhere

After a couple of weeks of visiting thrift shops and our local flea market, I have reached a point where I can quickly pick out profitable items to resell. For example, two nights ago I had about 20 minutes to kill, so I stopped in at a local Goodwill Store. In less than 10 minutes I found an Arturo Sandoval CD for $2 and a medical textbook for 99 cents. The book shows a resale value of more than $40 and the CD is going for about $16. This will easily end up putting about $30 in my pocket in net profit.

I should also add that while I happened to be at the thrift shop I found a bicycle trailer for $14. My wife used to have one of these for our kids when they were toddlers and they loved being able to go along with her on neighborhood bike rides. In this case, I bought it to pull my two little dogs behind my bike. I have seen people use the bike trailers for small dogs, but could not bring myself to pay nearly $200 to buy a new one for this purpose. So, spending a few minutes in thrift stores here and there is also a great way to find fantastic deals on stuff you will buy and keep for your own use. 

The Key To Much Of This Is Using A Smartphone App

While I am certainly developing an 'eye' for the items I can quickly flip for easy money, the smartphone apps are used as a confirmation. I discuss the different apps I use on on the videos. All you do is open the app and point your phone at the barcode and you will get a quick report on the going price for that item, what the demand is, and how many other people are selling it (competition). Some of the apps even take the guesswork out of it completely and make a recommendation to you to buy the item or not (based on all of these factors).

Getting Another Wave Of Items Ready To Ship

I am in the process of putting together my next shipment to Amazon. This one will be at least 50 items. I am really focusing on cleaning out my bookshelves here at the end of the year. I also have a bunch of CDs to sell as well. I wanted to hold off on spending any more cash on this project until I at least got my first items to Amazon successfully and started to hear the cash register ringing. Now that we are past that point, it is time to 'rinse and repeat.' 

The Four Hours Of Video Training Is Now Available

The video of my four hours of training on Amazon Flipping is now available. After you make your purchase you will be able watch the videos online or download to your own computer. Also, I am going to throw in some additional bonuses. 

Bonus #1 

I read about two dozen books on Amazon FBA and one book really stood out as the best overall - The Home Based Bookstore - Start Your Own Business Selling Used Books on Amazon, eBay or Your Own Web Site. Although there are a ton of different items you can buy and resell on Amazon, books are one of the absolute best categories. In this book, the author shares the story of how he got started with just $80 and turned that into a hugely profitable used book business that now earns his full time income from. (Note: this is a physical book that I will ship to you directly).

 

Bonus #2

Pick two of my new videos as additional bonuses (simply mention the name of the two additional videos you want in the comments section of your order form). These are all digital downloads that you can watch right away (click on each one below for a more detailed description). 

Budget Mastery

Credit Scoring Secrets

The Shortcut Publishing Method

How To Start An Internet Talk Show

Profit Surfing

How To Develop And Market Information Products

If you have any questions, please let me know ( send me an e mail). To sign up now, Click Here. This special offer with bonuses, etc.. will only be available until Sunday night December 7 at midnight Eastern.

Helping you make the most of God's money!

  James L. Paris 
Editor-In-Chief ChristianMoney.com
Follow Me on Twitter Twitter.com/jameslparis
Christian Financial Advice 
Jim Paris 24 Hour Radio  

Burt Reynolds To Hold Massive Sale To Pay Debts

Famed actor Burt Reynolds says he is not broke, but some people are wondering after the announcement of the auction one of the largest personal collections of a living celebrity. The Burt Reynolds Auction will take place in Las Vegas on December 11 and 12. Bidders may also register to participate online and by telephone. Reynolds, age 78, is selling everything, including the kitchen sink (more than 600 personal items). Many of the items are the sort of thing you would expect, such as movie memorabilia, etc... but others are more of a personal nature, such as art and conversation pieces from his home. One item of note is a 1977 Pontiac Trans Am (just like the one he drove in the movie Smokey And The Bandit). Even the football helmet he wore in the Longest Yard will be going on the auction block.

ChristianMoney.com has learned from public records in Martin County, Florida that Reynolds divorce case (v. Loni Anderson) was reopened in July of 2013 for 'contempt.' Recent filings even include a motion for a writ of execution against Reynolds (a legal order allowing the sheriff to physically take possession of a debtor's assets to satisfy a judgment).  

"Marriage is about the most expensive way for the average man to get laundry done."

Burt Reynolds

Reynolds appears to be making a very astute move here. He will get top dollar for his assets and will likely be able to resolve his financial troubles. This is much smarter than allowing things to reach the point that the county sheriff is hauling things away in a box truck. Separately, there are reports that Reynolds is facing foreclosure as well. A Notice Of Lis Pendens (notice of litigation associated with foreclosure) was made in 2011 (below).  The foreclosure lawsuit was filed over three years ago.

Based on a review of both court cases, it simply appears that Reynolds has run out out of time and has few options here. Whatever you think of Burt Reynolds, he has earned his place as a uniquely American icon. As someone that has been through bankruptcy myself, I know what it is like to have to lose all of my possessions. I never had the wealth of Burt Reynolds, but I can't help but feel bad for him nonetheless. I am sure that the sentimental value of the items being sold is many times the amount they will bring at auction. Something tells me that much of this may end up in a museum somewhere, and that will probably bring more satisfaction to Burt than he realizes right now.

Helping you make the most of God's money!

James L. Paris 
Editor-In-Chief ChristianMoney.com 
Follow Me on Twitter Twitter.com/jameslparis
Christian Financial Advice 
Jim Paris 24 Hour Radio

The End Of Radio?

I read a thought provoking article today about the future of radio. Let's face it, AM/FM radio probably represents one of the oldest technologies in our society that has not yet been replaced or substantially improved. The death knell for radio appears to be free city wide WiFi. Although it is already possible to connect your smartphone to the auxiliary jack on your car stereo, most people don't stream the Internet while driving. This is due largely to the high cost of data (accessing the Internet through your cell phone provider's wireless network). Even if you have a generous data plan, it doesn't take long to rack up data charges if you frequently stream live Internet radio in your car. Depending on your location, your wireless connection may also be hit or miss. This is why just flipping on the radio is the easiest option for most people (and probably the only reason that traditional radio is still holding on to its last few listeners). Smart radio broadcasters are already making the transition by building an online following with their own online streams. Some radio shows (that got in the game early) have as many listeners that pick up their programming online as do over traditional radio. Glenn Beck would be one example of someone that really understands this trend and is exploiting it full force. In my own case, I host a radio show that is carried on satellite and is available to traditional radio stations. I have thousands more online listeners and downloads than I have listeners over the radio.

Why Free City Wide WiFi Is A Game Changer

Free municipal WiFi is now available in dozens of U.S. cities and it is expected to become ubiquitous in less than 3 years. The United States is actually on the slow track with regards to municipal WiFi. Municipal WiFi is  spreading internationally at a much faster pace than it is here in the U.S.  Once Internet streams become as easy to access as regular radio, the thinking is that traditional radio will simply not be able to compete. Think of it in the same context of what happened to over the air TV when cable become available. 

How You Can Profit From This Coming Change

I recently wrote an article sharing how easy it is today to launch an online radio or TV show.  Now is the time to stake out your piece of virtual real estate and begin to build a following for your own talk show. Just like we have seen with cable TV, you can start a show or 'channel' on virtually any topic and you will garner an audience. It takes virtually no money to launch your own show today. To offer you a bit of inspiration, I have decided to cut the cost of my 2 hour video by 50%. I can only do this for a very limited time, so grab it at this price while you can. Coupon code InternetShow brings your cost down to just $7.50.  Order Here

 Helping you make the most of God's money!

James L. Paris 
Editor-In-Chief ChristianMoney.com 
Follow Me on Twitter Twitter.com/jameslparis
Christian Financial Advice 
Jim Paris 24 Hour Radio

 

Jim Paris Records On Christmas Album For Veteran's Charities

I was excited last night to appear on Coast To Coast AM with George Noory to discuss my contribution to their Christmas album. The album is to raise money for Veteran's charities nationwide.  You can grab your own copy from Amazon.

 

JFK Assassination Special - David Ferrie Author Judyth Vary Baker

On this episode Judyth Vary Baker discusses her new book 'David Ferrie.' Baker shares details of her love affair with Lee Harvey Oswald in the summer of 1963. She also shares details on the life of David Ferrie and connections to mafia boss Carlos Marcello, Baker believes that Oswald was a patsy and that there was a wide ranging conspiracy in the assassination of John F. Kennedy.