Ways To Save Money On Your House Insurance Monthly

Are you tired of receiving a hefty home owner's insurance bill in the mail each month? If so, then you might be wondering what you can do to cut down on your home insurance premium and enjoy immediate monthly savings. Aside from shopping around for deals and discounts from other insurance companies, the good news is that there are some simple tips you can try out as a way of reducing your monthly home insurance costs. Not to mention, some of these tips can even increase the overall value of your home in the process.

Switch to Paperless Billing

Many home insurance companies these days offer a discount for policyholders who switch to paperless billing. After all, not only does this save the company money in printing costs, but it also saves trees and eliminates paper waste in the process! By switching to a paperless bill statement from your insurance company, you can simply receive this paperwork via e-mail, which you can then print out if needed.

Work on Your Credit

Believe it or not, insurance companies these days use one's credit score and credit history as a determining factor when it comes to the cost of one's insurance premium. Therefore, if you have less than perfect credit, consider taking steps to gradually increase your credit score over time. Doing so can lead your insurance premium to drop by a few dollars per month, which can add up to significant annual savings.

Update Your Home

If you live in an older home, then you are inherently at a higher risk to ultimately have to file a home owner's insurance claim. For this reason, owners of older homes cost more to insure. Fortunately, by making small updates, such as having new electrical wiring installed or better ventilation systems, you can drastically reduce the cost of your home insurance. Just be sure to report these updates and renovations to your insurance agent right away so that you can begin enjoying the savings.

Make Your Home Safer

If you do not already have some kind of security system in place, you may want to consider having garage alarms for home installed as a way of increasing security and reducing the chances of becoming a victim of a home invasion or burglary. Not to mention, most insurance companies offer substantial discounts for those who have security systems in place, so you can save money on your policy this way.

Bundle Your Insurance Policies

If you have other forms of insurance, such as vehicle or boat insurance, then you may be able to save a significant amount of money by bundling those packages through the same company. Check with your home owner's insurance company to see if they offer the other type or types of insurance that you need, and then take advantage of any bundling discount they may have.


Paying for home insurance can be a pain, but there are plenty of ways to reduce your monthly costs without sacrificing coverage in the process.

How to Choose The Right Car Insurance

When it comes to selecting a car insurance provider, it is important to compare and assess the many factors that are in play. It can be daunting to sort out all of the factors as each company claims to give the most discounts, the best rates, and the best customer care or perks. Selecting which company to go with can involve abundant amounts of research, but not many people know what to look for. 

FindTheBest, an unbiased, data-driven comparison search engine, has developed some tools that may help you with your car insurance search. This post will breakdown some of the most important factors used to compare car insurance companies and will educate you on how to select the best fit for you. Please feel free to test out the interactive tools included below, as they can help you narrow down your search results and create side-by-side comparisons for insurance companies that fit your needs best.

Car Insurance

Comparison Factors 

1. What You’re Currently Paying 

Although it may seem obvious, it is easy to overlook what you’re paying now and exactly why you are paying that amount. This should be your first step in selecting a new auto insurance provider. Understanding your rate is essential to buying car insurance. Every year your car insurance company sends out a comprehensive policy breakdown that shows what you’re paying and what you’re getting for your money. If you do not know where this document is, you can request a copy from your insurance agent. This step is essential in your hunt for a new car insurance provider and will help lead you in the right direction to what you are ultimately looking for. 

2. Amount of Coverage You Actually Need 

You now understand what you are currently paying for, but what coverage do you really need? You must answer question like, how much is your car actually worth? How much do you drive? Do you have long commutes or can you walk to work? Car insurance covers more than the cost of the car, it covers liability such as medical fees and legal fees. It is also important to understand the deductible. A higher deductible can be a headache if you actually get in an accident, but can eventually save you money long-term. If you rarely get into accidents, it would be wise to lower your premium and set aside funds for emergencies to cover the deductible. 

3. Hidden Fees 

Insurance agents will tell you all about the great discounts you can receive, but rarely do they divulge the hidden fees. These fees require a little more research than usual. Car insurance providers tend to charge you more if your marital status is either single or divorced. The easiest way to identify these fees is to run a free quote, and then running a second free quote with a changed marital status. If the quote is different, you know there is a hidden fee. Other examples of hidden fees include, the type of car you drive, where you live, where you work, and your credit rating. 

4. Best Deals Offered 

FindTheCoupons, a FindTheBest site, was created to make your life easier. Finding a coupon for car insurance should take no longer than a few seconds of your time. FindTheCoupon can help you find great deals on car insurance companies and will further assist you in finding the best fit for your next provider. This resource will allow you find affordable car insurance and provides user reviews for the coupons offered. 

5. The Car You Drive

Cars Ratings and Reviews

One of the biggest factors that car insurance companies consider when determining your rate is the type of car you drive. It is often assumed that your rate is correlated to the value of your car, but it is also related to how likely your car will inflict damage on another vehicle, or how likely your car is to get stolen. 

Other factors include how safe your car is and how much repair costs would amount to. It might be wise to keep this in mind when shopping for your next car. Some car insurance sites provide lists of cars and how much they cost to insure them. As long as you do your research on safety ratings you should be in the clear. 

It is always smart to consult with your agent if you need any questions answered. Searching for your car insurance provider can be a tricky topic and with the tools and tips provided in this post, you will be able to find and compare the best insurance options available.

Are You Missing Out by Not Knowing About Wealth Management?

Finance (Photo credit: Tax Credits)

In this day and age, it’s never been so important to know who to make the most of your money. Maximising your cash flow and taking care of your finances is advisable when the economy is good, but in these hard times it’s become an absolute necessity. Yet, large numbers of people still remain in the dark when it comes to assessing and managing their wealth.

Why Should We Look After Our Finances?

Looking after your finances has numerous benefits, including giving your wealth the opportunity to grow. On the other hand, not taking care of your finances can have devastating consequences. For this reason alone, it’s advisable that you get clued up about the best way to take care of your money, and the best way to start is by learning about wealth management.

How Does Wealth Management Work?

In its simplest form, wealth management is the process by which financial planning, advice, management and investment are all corralled together under the same heading, with one purpose in mind – to maximise the assets of the client in question. However wealth management is much more complicated than this, and requires significant time, knowledge and effort to be applied correctly. If wealth management is carried out properly by an experienced financial advisor, this can result in a significant return for their client. If you’d like to find out more about how wealth management can benefit you directly, you should visit www.spi.sanlam.co.uk for more detailed information.

Which Areas Does Wealth Management Cover?

Wealth management is a large and complex practice which can be effectively utilised across multiple financial products. These may include:

• Pensions and Annuities 
• Savings and Investments 
• Stocks, Bonds and Shares 
• Portfolio Management

The specific type of wealth management you may need will be entirely dependent upon which financial products you already own, and your proposals for future investments and savings. If, for example, you are coming up to retirement age, you may need advice on how to maximise the value of your pension. Alternatively, if you are a young professional who has just received a promotion, you may be interested in investing your newly increased salary across various different trading options.

Wealth management services also differ between locations. Wealth management companies in London, for example, will be more likely to offer a broader range of international investment services than a smaller, regional company. Clients with small portfolios and limited resources often prefer the personal service of a smaller company. However clients with large portfolios and a significant amount of capital would be wiser to choose a larger, international company, which is more likely to be able to diversify their investments across a wider range of options. 

Advice and Information on Wealth Management

If you’re interested in the idea of investing in wealth management, or simply want more information but don’t know where to begin, it’s always advisable that you get in direct contact with a professional wealth management services provider, such as Sanlam. Their financial experts are always on hand to help you make a decision about whether or not wealth management is right for you.

Direct Debits You'll Need to Update When You Change Bank

I recently opened a new current account when I realised that a different bank could offer me a better interest rate as well as other benefits such as travel insurance. I think a lot of people avoid changing their bank account due to the admin that often comes with it though, such as filling in forms, attending appointments and then considering the actual money side of it too. This includes getting an employer to pay your salary to your new current account, as well as figuring out which direct debits are set up to your old account. Some banks will now help you change all of your direct debits, but if you are required to do this yourself, these are the types of services you might need to update...

Charity donations

Many of us have recurring payments for charities scheduled by direct debit each month. Changing bank account is an ideal opportunity to look at the donations you currently have set up, before analysing whether you want to continue giving the same amount. If you are happy with what you’ve previously set up, you should be able to set up a new direct debit schedule from your new account; remember to cancel the existing agreement.

Mobile phone

If you have a mobile phone contract, this is more than likely set up as a direct debit. It’s important you don’t miss this payment as you may incur charges for having a failed payment attempt. Therefore you should call your mobile phone provider if you will not have a new payment schedule in place on time and they should let you make a manual payment instead. Of course, if you’ve timed the expiration of your contact with the opening of your new bank account, you could look at new mobile phone deals online and simply set up a new agreement with the provider.

Satellite TV

Another service you may have is that of satellite TV such as Sky or Virgin Media. If you depend on these services so you can watch sports channels and more, you’ll want to make sure that you remember to update your payment with your provider. Again, make sure that the original agreement has been cancelled so you do not incur any charges with your old bank. You might even want to consider finding a service that doesn’t charge you monthly, such as a freeview box which just requires a one-off cost.

Energy bills

Many of us pay our energy bills through direct debit agreements, so make sure you check how your own bills are currently paid. Think about electricity, gas, water and even your council tax. If there are going to be any problems with making a payment quickly, it is a good idea to call each of your energy and utility suppliers as you can make alternative arrangements for payment. If you are going to call, you could also give them your latest meter readings to make sure that your payments aren’t too low or too high.

An Overview about Tax Efficient Life Insurance

If you have started up a business recently with a few number of employees, you must be planning of providing life insurance cover to each of the. Well, at most of the times, the employers of the small companies opt for a contract, in which the premiums are paid by the employer, on behalf of the employee, either from his own earnings or from the company's account. As a result of this, the employer spends a lot on the premiums. Moreover, these premiums of conventional life insurance policies are also subject to National Insurance payable. As an alternative to the traditional method of life cover policies, tax efficient life insurance has turned out to be a popular insurance policy among the employers, these days. According to the features of this policy, the employer don't need to enter any specific contract with your employees. You can just set up a death in service benefit for all your employees in which the payments are done by the company, and that too, in a tax efficient manner.

Who should opt for this cover?

This type of life insurance policy is especially designed for employers who have started up new businesses, with a few number of employees. This type of policy is absolutely not meant for companies that have the required number of workers to be eligible for a registered group life scheme.

Moreover, employees with high earning are especially benefited by this type of policy. This is so because the employees are allowed to keep the payouts separately from their pension or other annual allowances. Since the pension funds are high enough in themselves, it is important to keep these benefits separate from them. Since the premiums are not paid in kind, they are not subject to severe tax obligations. The employer, too, will get to enjoy certain substantial tax benefits like corporation tax relief as the monthly premiums are considered as trade expenses. 

Some positive aspects about Tax Efficient life insurance -

The recent changes made to relevant life legislation have proven to be extremely beneficial for the directors of the small companies. Initially, there was no individual scheme to be offered to the individual employees, whereas one could not apply for the registered group life scheme unless there were enough employees, to be eligible for that.

Due to such restrictions, mentioned in the legislation, there were some problems in providing life insurance policies to the employees and considering these problems, certain changes were made in the legislation, following which a client will be entitled to 15 times of his annual salary.

One should remember that the policy does not include any sort of surrender value and it expires when the beneficiary reaches the age of 75. Moreover, if the local tax inspector is convinced of the fact that the premiums can be considered as trade expenses and they qualify under the exclusive rules, they will be considered for certain tax exemptions. One can use a relevant life calculator to understand the effectiveness of tax efficient life insurance.

Why Would Anyone Insure Their Art?

Most of us are accustomed to seeking insurance cover for things such as our homes, our car, travel, and even for our health, but when it comes to insuring fine art work we may well think why bother. There was a time when the so called ordinary person would have perceived the idea of insuring artworks to be something that only the gentry did, but nowadays with people often putting any spare money into a work of art which is likely to appreciate in value, then insuring against loss, theft, or damage should be a reality. 

Insuring Against the Unexpected

Whether you own a small exquisite piece of fine art or are an art dealer with numerous priceless pieces adorning your gallery, insurance is paramount for peace of mind. Aside of the tragic loss of human life which happens when natural disasters like hurricanes or floods wreak havoc around the world, art galleries and swanky offices can sometimes be left assessing the level of damage to irreplaceable pieces of art which were damaged when the area flooded. Naturally they’re also worried about the cost of their insurance premiums rising, but the point here is that at least they did have insurance for when the unexpected happened.

Collections Borne out of Love

Under insurance is another big problem because plenty of people over the years amass large collections of antiques, jewellery, and art but many of them don’t have a real grasp on the true value of their collection. Because collections are invariably built out of love or passion for particular items, insurance isn’t approached in quite the same way as it would be if they were looking to insure their car for example. Often they just insure these valuable collections for the price which they paid for them some years ago.


To counter this problem people should be insuring items in their collections for the retail replacement value, which means getting someone to appraise them on that very basis, every few years or so. This means that they have appraisal reports which they can pass to insurance companies to ensure adequate coverage and it also means they have evidence to back up any future claims.


More insurance companies are starting to employ art consultants and can make their more wealthy clients aware of the importance of valuation and insurance. However, if you’ve got collectibles or art worth a couple of thousand pounds or more, then you may need a specific policy clause to cover your valuables, since most general home policies rarely cover items above that level.


There are plenty of specialist insurance companies such as Catlin Insurance UK who offer coverage for a variety of fine art. The range of inclusions under a fine art insurance policy is wide and includes such things as

• Furniture, lighting and mirrors 
• Historical artefacts 
• Arms and armour 
• Fine wine, bottles and glasses 
• Musical instruments 
• Ceramics, silver and glass 
• Fossils and mineral specimens 
• Textiles 
• Memorabilia 

• Toys and games 

It’s worth shopping around for the best deal but take care to find out just what risks are covered. Check that the policy offers protection against theft, accidental damage, and as in the case of a natural disaster, losses from fire and water damage.