Life in Bangalore

If you want to test a person’s patience & perseverance, put him/her in a queue in India. Even if the person is a personification of patience, fellow by-standers will turn them to be a Patient. My first tryst with queues were in Cinema Theatres (this was long back ..when dinosaurs used to roam the earth with no internet connectivity) . I and my class friends,in wanting to gain the “First Day First Show” tag,  used to stand in queue right from early morning only to be bypassed by the ladies arriving at the right place at the right time. Ladies used the non-existent “Ladies Queue ” to grab the bulk of tickets (that included the men folks in their family) only for us to be left so near yet so far from the counter. My second encounter with queues were in the Railway reservation center. The group that come here is of a more serious personality than the Cinema crowd and a bit more orderly. Tension will be palpable in the air as self-proclaimed queue marshals will shoo away even an in

In the current era, there is so much din that we lose out doing mundane tasks such a paying the electric bill, renewing the insurance or buying the milk simply because We Simply Forget. If you think its a problem, I would recommend One of the web tools that I follow : www.rememberthemilk.com It’s a free web application that helps you to keep track of the things. Sign-up for this application is through your email account. It’s a simple tool that allows you to define a task, set up due date & time ,recurrence ,priority, location ,Tags & Notes. Key Features : Web application would start sending reminders to your email account every day. If you think that its too many, you could reduce the frequency of email. Another advantage is that you can share tasks with others. I like this feature which I use for delegating tasks to fellow family members !!! Also, you could tag the tasks based on the task location such as Home, Work, Web, Downtown etc., It helps me to focus on the tasks . For

It started as a trickle, but soon started to flood and now I find myself neck deep in it. I am referring to the deluge of passwords that I am supposed to store in my brain and nowhere else. Internet Banking, Personal email, Home Computer, ATM Pins….list goes on. The software programmers are not helping me either. When I started out using email, the passwords can be chosen to simpler. But nowadays, the Geeks who are the guardians of the web page security have made Password creation an exercise by itself. So, When you create a new password it shows the strength of your password as you type each character. So According to the Geeks,the rules of a strong password are as following: Rule 1: No two characters of your Name or your family member’s name is allowed. They track the lineage of your family till your Great grandfather. Rule 2: Password should be vague so that nobody can login to your account. Even yourself Rule 3: Passwords should be changed every month. Actually I ch

These are some one-liners which I found pretty excellent either because they are or because I wrote them 1. “They said you should Pay Taxes with a Smile. I did ; but they wanted Cash” 2. Frequently Asked Questions Seldom have Answers 3. I write about Money & Humor and came to realize that they are mutually exclusive 4. "I buy expensive suits. They just look cheap on me." – Warren Buffett 5. Be patient. Otherwise you will become a patient 6. In Life Its all a matter of perception. I consider myself frugal. My wife thinks I am a miser. 7. In vibrations class, we used to calculate frequency of oscillation of our prof. Between the two ends of the stage 8. There was a professor with a verbal mannerism “You Know”.And then there was a Professor who made all of us Utter “Oh No” 9. I am diligent. Even If I go to Arsikere, I set the Out-of-Office setting on 10. I am a pretty decent money-minded personality

In Modern Life, People want to be Bigger, Higher , Faster, Stronger, Richer in everything they do. In this quest for being better in everything, Most people end-up with many things on the plate resulting in loss of Focus & Dissatisfaction. We can do anything ,but not everything. The solution then lies in Simplifying down to the Most Important Things in Life by paring down to the absolute essentials. We need amplify the richness of every day by Simplification. Simplifying is not easy as it sounds. It means to identify the two or three main aspects that we want to focus among the hundreds of Things that lay in front of us. Try doing this exercise : You need to tell your life story in a time of 5 minutes. Through this exercise, you will come to know that, To tell the essence of your life in 5 minutes you need to subtract ,subtract,subtract…..all the incidents of your life until it comes to barely one or two that matters most to you. And when you tell this story containing one or two i

“The Professional” – by Subrato Bagchi (Co-founder, MindTree) is a profound book that lays out the checklist for aspiring Professionals at all levels –Entry,Middle or Senior Management .Mr.Bagchi clarifies very early in the book that “Anyone who is professionally qualified is not a professional” ,and goes on to layout the qualities that a Professional should exhibit. In the subsequent chapters ,the author breaks down the Professional Qualities into actionable behaviors that any professional need to cultivate. Bagchi explains these through several real life examples that he has seen throughout his distinguished Corporate Career. From my personal experience in Corporate , Bagchi’s principles resonate with the behaviors of high performance individuals that I have come across. This book is a must read for any aspiring professional who wants to make a mark in the Corporate Career. I would conclude with my take away from the book as stated by Bagchi : “ A Professional is one who is able

As emphasized in these post, The essential of building wealth is to Invest Systematically while controlling your expenses. On top of this foundation comes Your financial goal. Its necessary to have a Goal of where would like to be in say 5 or 10 Years. Too often Financial Goals are in the form of specific amount that one wants as Bank Balance. The problem with this Goal the person is just keen on Earning without looking at the expenses.And many a time , it will lead to frustration and loss of focus. Personally, I think a better Goal would be to be come “Financially Independent” in a period of say 5,10 or whatever period. “Financial Independence” means that your returns on Investment take care of your Food, Shelter ,Clothing & Other monthly expenses giving leeway to pursue your passionate things in life. When you have this goal, you would not -Opt for an apartment with extra-room when two will suffice -buy the latest mobile, while the one in your pocket is serving your purpose well

Continuing on the topic of Investing, the biggest investment that anyone will make in their life is on Real Estate. I had always that I was too late to buy a home. It is never so. However one has to decide if he is going to buy a home or not , and if so, Identify the City/Town that you want to buy. There are two reasons why Investing in Real estate may be lucrative : 1)Rent Avoidance : In urban areas, As the home rent is always bound upward its wiser to buy a house. However, the flip side is the Cost. People with a limit on their budget have to compromise on the locality or size of the home. In my opinion,its still a worthwhile option to buy an home, if you are able to afford 2)Investment : The next best alternative is to buy a property in your hometown or a Tier II city. You may get a better sized home at a better locality at an affordable price. The flip side is you may not earn high enough on rent. This is again a good option given the fact that you can leverage this Pr

One of the common fallacy of Investing is that people lose out on the actual act of investing in their quest for “where to invest?” . As I write this Gold is at its peak and Everyone is behind the Gold Mutual Funds & Gold Exchange Traded Funds. The key in Investing is not to Time the Market , but to be Systematic As has been emphasized in these posts, Wealth Building is more about discipline than about money. So, Research enough to find out an Investment mode that you are comfortable with and start investing Systematically for a peroid of atleast 3-5 years. If its Mutual Fund register for a Systematic Investment Plan. If its Stocks set aside an amount every month and invest If its Bank Fixed Deposits use the Recurring Deposits or use Fixed Deposit Laddering Your Goal should be use the “Snow Ball effect” to build wealth through systematic investing.

Have focused on Expenses, its now time to focus on the Spending again but wisely on the Investments. Thumb rule of investing is “Save at-least 10% of your income ”. Start investing as early as possible however little it may be. This is to due to the “Power of Compounding” When you save Rs 100 and get an annual interest of 10%, you will have Rs 110 at the end of one year. Due to compounding the next year you will get a 10% interest on Rs 110, which will then leave you with Rs 121. The next year, interest will be calculated on Rs 121 at 10% and so on. In time, these savings will grow exponentially. If you set aside a sum of say Rs 5,000 every month from the age of 25, at a return interest rate of 10%, in 60 years you will have with you funds worth about a crore and more. However, if you start at 40 with the same amount and return rate of interest, the retirement fund will amount to only around 33 L. That is a huge difference, the 40 year old individual would need to invest several multi

In the last post we discussed about how to deal with the “Vital Few” expenses that are unavoidable. In this post we will discuss the “Trivial Many” expenses that are avoidable. Expenses due to Eating out too often, buying latest Electronic gadgets often, purchasing items that were not on the shopping list fall into this category. The best antidote is to follow the principle of being Frugal. Being resistant to Impulsive buying is the key to this.Resist the urge to splurge. Count to ten before making a buying decision. Think Twice if you want to do a Card Swipe. Start cutting down on the expenses on the trivial many and divert the money instead into Investment or Debt Servicing

In the last post we had discussed about how to segregate your expenses based on 80/20 principle. In this post we will discuss on how to handle the expenses that account for 80% of your expense Credit Card Debt :Check out for any outstanding credit card debt that you are serving. If so, the Credit Card debt should be cleared as soon as possible. This is because of the high rate of interest that you will be levied in case of default. Also this would lead to a poor credit rating for yourself which can become an issue if you want to get loans (Housing Loan/Education Loan). Home Loan/Education Loan : If you are servicing any loan ,You should have a plan of when to close it out. HAVE A PLAN TO SEE YOUR DEBT MELT.One rupee paid today on the loan would at a minimum the reduce the Total Loan by at least two rupees at the end of your tenure. So, Divert the additional cash that you may get, however little it may be into the payment for loan. House Rent: If you live in a rented home, H