Does all of the advertising and hoopla over the ROTH IRA make sense to you?

Download the free ROTH report from Entrust and learn how to take advantage of one of the last tax enhanced programs the government allows. Visit www.entrustcalifornia.com for details.

Did you know there are over 10 million individual and family owned forest owners in the U.S? 72% of these are located in the Eastern part of the country where productive timberland is produced.

According to The American Wind Energy Association, 20% of the nation’s electricity may come from wind by 2030. States with the most wind power include: Texas, Iowa, California, Minnesota and Oregon.

And what about water? The business of water rights is alive and well in states such as Colorado.

These alternative investments are allowable in a self-directed IRA. If this is of interest to you, log onto www.theentrustgroup.com to learn how you can self-direct your IRA to acquire investments that are important to you!

The internet and social networking has allowed the professional business owner the ability to market their business with little financial costs to them. The reality of social media such as Twitter, Facebook and MySpace has changed the frontier from the wired world to the main world.

Do you use the web, blogs and social media to help build your brand?

Here are a seven must-haves that are worth the investment should you decide to expand your horizons in technology.

1. Have a CRM (contact relationship management program) for managing your customers.

2. Use a good email marketing program. I like Constant Contact but there are others out in the market.

3. Consider launching an e-commerce web site if you are in a business that sells product.
4. Review your search positions. Research from Cornell University showed that searchers spend the bulk of their time looking at the initial 10 results on the first page, with a sharp drop occurring after the 10th result.

5. Test banner ads and headlines, graphics against each other to see which performs best.

6. Continually refresh or update your blog, Twitter and any social media that touches a prospect. My personal goal is three entries a week on each of my technology related media and I know that is probably not enough.

7. Finally if you are using email marketing, make sure your message is well thought out and offers an appealing incentive and a call to action or next step.

By using today’s technology tools you add more to your little bag of tricks at little cost to your bottom line. What do you have to lose?

With the forecast of foreclosures still on the rise, one would assume that the rental markets and long-term strategy of real estate investing make sense. In my opinion, long term real estate can be a great strategy. In certain markets, however, flips or buy/sell strategies are making a comeback

From investors attending auctions in markets such as Phoenix, to investors acquiring delinquent tax liens in Florida to brokers or wholesalers representing out of state investors in Texas, to California markets that have gone through economic perils, who now have investors buying multiple properties with private funds, short term real estate investing can be profitable to those who know how to navigate the market and buy right.

While there is plenty of inventory out there, you as the investor must know the local marketplace, where to buy, actively participate in and be involved in the actual transaction, and of course, have the money or financing in place before you buy.

If you are serious about making money in real estate, you must educate yourself and be responsible for due diligence and the steps needed to follow through with the transaction along with an exit strategy for your investment. Never allow others to control the transaction or your money. Know what you are getting into and be prepared to present multiple offers. Most importantly, know when to walk away and when a deal makes no sense.

In other words there is to be no emotional decision making! This is the key to a successful real estate investor. It is about the numbers and only the numbers!

Good luck!

These 40 tips coms comes courtesy of Kathleen Snodgrass.

Enjoy!

For Health:
1. Drink plenty of water.
2. Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a beggar.
3. Eat more foods that grow on trees and plants and eat less food that is manufactured in plants..
4. Live with the 3 E’s — Energy, Enthusiasm and Empathy
5. Make time to pray.
6. Play more games
7. Read more books than you did in 2009 .
8. Sit in silence for at least 10 minutes each day
9. Sleep for 7 hours.
10. Take a 10-30 minutes walk daily. And while you walk, smile.

For Your Personality:
11. Don’t compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
12. Don’t have negative thoughts or things you cannot control. Instead invest your energy in the positive present moment.
13. Don’t over do. Keep your limits.
14. Don’t take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
15. Don’t waste your precious energy on gossip.
16. Dream more while you are awake
17. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need..
18. Forget issues of the past. Don’t remind your partner with His/her mistakes of the past. That will ruin your present happiness.
19. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone. Don’t hate others.
20. Make peace with your past so it won’t spoil the present.
21. No one is in charge of your happiness except you.
22. Realize that life is a school and you are here to learn. Problems are simply part of the curriculum that appear and fade away like algebra class but the lessons you learn will last a lifetime.
23. Smile and laugh more.
24. You don’t have to win every argument. Agree to disagree…

For Society:
25. Call your family often.
26. Each day give something good to others.
27. Forgive everyone for everything..
28. Spend time w/ people over the age of 70 & under the age of 6.
29. Try to make at least three people smile each day.
30. What other people think of you is none of your business.
31. Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends will. Stay in touch.

For Life:
32. Do the right thing!
33. Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or joyful.
34. GOD heals everything.
35. However good or bad a situation is, it will change..
36. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.
37. The best is yet to come..
38. When you awake alive in the morning, thank GOD for it.
39. Your Inner most is always happy. So, be happy.

Last but not the least:

40. Please Forward this to everyone you care about, I just did.

With all of the known scams as well as the new ones to come, where do you go to protect yourself when entering into a new financial arrangement or having your identity protected?

Identity Theft
Identity Theft Resource Center. No cost victim assistance. Contact them at 888-400-5530 or on the web at http://www.idtheftcenter.org.

Mortgage Scams
Freddie Mac – This site has links for report suspected mortgage fraud and examples of what to look out for. Visit http://www.freddiemac.com/avoidfraud for more details.

Investment Brokers or Advisors
You can do your due diligence on your investment broker or advisor through the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority http://www.finra.org/investors

Do your homework before you do your deal!

Many of us have become lazy in our day to day communications, with etiquette in social and professional settings, and for feeling good about ourselves.

Here are Lisa’s 3 simple suggestions to help you gain confidence and develop a positive attitude in the year ahead.

1. Never put something in writing that you would not want read in court. This simple mantra has helped me through the years in my written communications.
2. Develop an attitude of gratitude. Before I get out of bed each morning I tell myself 3 things I am grateful for today. It is a great way to start the day, no matter how bad things are.
3. Deal with any situation in straightforward way. Confront your problems head on, come up with a solution and then let go. Look at mistakes as an opportunity to learn. I know first hand this step is hard but in the long run it helps me let go of things I have no control over!

Remember we are what we think we are!

Welcome to 2010! It is the year of the ROTH conversion and the time to examine your retirement plans to make sure you feel comfortable with your asset allocation, your time horizon, financial assets that are a part of your retirement plan and your level of risk.

Experts have called the five years before you quit the workforce the most dangerous to your retirement plan. The only way to guarantee growth whether you have five or twenty years until retirement is to utilize your IRA by making the maximum contributions, and to invest in assets you believe will grow over the long term. In my opinion this means making the leap and becoming responsible for the investments you control in your IRA.

Compounding wealth with investments where you are comfortable, that can go the course and allow you the ability to invest in assets that the traditional advisers may not be in a position of offer, gives your IRA diversification and allows the opportunity to be in control of what specific alternative investments are a part of your IRA. Many of us depend on third party advisers to tell them what to do because we think we cannot invest on our own. This is not the case with a self-directed IRA.

For more information on how you can learn how to invest with your IRA, visit www.theentrustgroup.com. Entrust, the nation’s largest administrator of self-directed plans (with close to 30 years of experience), has a wealth of information on their web site to answer any question you may have.

If you want a more personalized experience, you can find the local offices closest to you and work with experienced professionals who know and understand your marketplace and are able to provide you with outstanding customer service.

You owe it to yourself to take advantage of the tax-deferred/tax-free possibilities that the IRA can offer.

Teamwork is necessary for a small business to succeed. We as business owners wear multiple hats but cannot do everything necessary to grow our businesses. We need a team (whether outsourced or in-house) of people to help us get to the level we aspire and meet our objectives.

Think sports. It takes the entire team to win the game. How is the best way to encourage teamwork from your employees? Think TEAM:

T – Together
E – Everyone
A – Achieves
M – More

1. Be selective as to who is brought onto your team.

2. Communicate the goals of the team. Make these realistic, measurable and achievable.

3. Establish rules so everyone plays fair.

4. Identify potential questions and issues. Seek to understand and share knowledge that everyone can use to build a stronger team.

5. Have fun. I recently read where one company used water pistols in their team meetings when someone suggested a solution. I prefer gold stars, easier clean up.

Use these 5 steps to help you grow and your business and develop happier employees and vendors along the way!

For 2010, investors who earn over $100,000 per year in income will, for the first time, be able to convert their IRA or inactive 401(k) from a tax-deferred plan to a Roth IRA, which is a tax-free account, when you make future withdrawals. For now, this opportunity is for one year only—2010.

Many investors do not understand the rules of conversion, what this means for them, and why they would be willing to pay tax today for tax-free wealth in the future. It’s important to understand how the conversion works to determine whether it makes sense for your financial situation.

As of January 1, all investors—not just those with an adjusted gross income under $100,000—can convert retirement assets to a Roth IRA. When you convert the funds, you pay taxes now, but you are not taxed on gains and withdrawals as long as you are over 59 years old or if the assets have been in the Roth for at least five years. With traditional IRAs, earnings and any pre-tax contributions are taxed as ordinary income when withdrawals are made. In addition, with a traditional IRA, you must start taking distributions from the accounts after age 70. With a Roth IRA, you aren’t required to take any distributions.

The concern for many investors is that converting to a Roth IRA means paying taxes now on the assets converted. However, you do have two years—2011 and 2012—to pay the tax owed on this conversion.

There are three benefits in my mind for doing the conversion:

1. If you are betting on higher tax rates in the future, converting to a Roth makes sense today.
2. If you know how to compound wealth in your IRA, tax free earning are better than tax deferred.
3. If you believe that the government will change the IRA rules to help pay down the debt that is owed, now might be the last chance that you have to take advantage of this tax-free opportunity.

None of us have a crystal ball to see into the future. Who knows if this Roth conversion will be extended beyond the year 2010? One thing that is certain is whether you convert to a Roth or leave your funds in a tax-deferred plan, you can no longer afford to sit on the sidelines.

Entrust is committed to helping investors learn more about self-directing your IRA so that you can invest in alternative investments such as real estate and precious metals, to name just two possibilities. A self-directed IRA should be a part of everyone’s portfolio.

For more information on the new rules for 2010 and other information on Roth IRAs, visit The Entrust Group and download the free special Roth report.