Cash only accounts for 20% of all transactions and the average person only keeps $67 on them at any given time. When asked, 32% of respondents to a Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco survey said they prefer to use a credit card as their primary form of payment. You may be considering accepting credit cards as a form of payment for your business. No matter the type of business you are involved in, accepting credit cards can increase sales and generally produce positive results for the business....

Online With Direct Pay The IRS doesn’t charge a processing fee for this option. You can schedule payments up to 30 days in advance. You can also cancel or change them up to two business days before you’ve scheduled them. The only downside is that you must re-enter your personal, identifying information each time you use Direct Pay, which can be a bit of a nuisance. The system doesn’t save it for you....

Pros: The principal is safe. Cons: This strategy will generate little current income. Income varies with interest rates as CDs mature and are renewed, and income may not keep pace with inflation. Depending on interest rates, it may require a large amount of capital to generate the amount of retirement income you need. Interest from CDs is 100% taxable unless you own the CD inside of an IRA or Roth IRA....

How about Roberto, who works as a salesperson, traveling from his home office to client offices? He has a small office at his employer’s site, but he rarely uses it. The employer requires him to maintain a home office in his territory to get to client sites more quickly. What is the principal place of business for Julia and Roberto? Understanding the concept of “principal place of business” is an important issue, because you can only deduct expenses for business use of your home if your home is your principal place of business....

The key phrase is in these ads is, “as little as.” The $19 Auto Insurance Websites If you’re curious about that $19 deal, just type “$19 car insurance” into a search engine and see what pops up. You’ll get a site or sites offering a comparison of insurance company quotes. Some offer an online comparison, which requires you to enter answers to a number of questions about yourself as well as your vehicle and how you use it....

Timely notice of a loss is a condition of many business insurance policies. The standard commercial property form requires you to notify the insurer promptly of any loss or damage. Likewise, the ISO general liability form requires you to notify the insurer as soon as practicable in the event of an occurrence, offense, claim, or suit. If you fail to report a loss or claim within a reasonable amount of time, your insurer may deny coverage on the basis that you’ve breached the insurance contract....

The volume of homes on the market dropped to 1.29 million, 1.5% lower than in July, the National Association of Realtors said in its monthly home sales report Wednesday. Not coincidentally, the volume of sales dropped 2%, the first decline since May. A slight increase in the supply of homes on the market cooled the hot real estate market a bit this summer, but the new data for August signals a return to a familiar pandemic trend: high demand for homes, but little to buy....

Many of the index funds offer low expenses and long-term growth while adding a sense of security for investors. If you are considering investing in an index fund, you should consider the benefits and understand how to find and compare them to meet your investing goals. What Is an Index Fund? An index, with regard to investing, is a statistical sampling of securities that represents a defined segment of the market....

While there isn’t a hard-and-fast rule that determines whether a company is a small cap, mid cap, or large cap, these are the general guidelines for differentiating ETFs, using market value: Micro cap: Less than $250 millionSmall cap: $250 million to $2 billionMid cap: $2 billion to $10 billionLarge cap: $10 billion or more Market cap can be used as a relative indicator of a company’s stability and growth potential....

The president began the address by talking about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, winning cheers and multiple standing ovations from Democrats and Republicans alike for his message on uniting against Russia. “When dictators do not pay a price for their aggression, they cause more chaos,” he said. “We countered Russia’s lies with the truth. And now—now that he’s acted, the free world is holding him accountable.” The U.S. and its allies so far have imposed a series of economic sanctions on Russia, including cutting off some of its banks from the international money transfer system, SWIFT, and freezing Russian banks’ U....

Extending the deadline seemed less likely earlier this month when White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said the administration was considering the impact of omicron, but that borrowers should prepare to resume payments. It’s also a reversal from August, when Biden last extended the deadline and said it was “final”—a word that does not appear in the announcements the White House and the Department of Education issued Wednesday. Borrowers have been allowed to skip payments and interest on federal student loans since March 2020....

More of the nation’s real estate wealth is going to Black homeowners, according to the latest data from the Federal Reserve. As the chart below shows, 6% of the country’s real estate wealth was owned by Black people in the third quarter of 2021, the most for any quarter in records going back to 1989. While that’s still disproportionately small—since Black people make up 13.4% of the population—it’s a step in the right direction, economists say....

To protect their portfolios from low to negative bond market returns, investors should mitigate the risks of a downturn. Here are some investments to consider, and some not, if a bear takes a swipe at bonds. Actively Managed Funds Many investors prefer index funds for their low costs and relative predictability. A bond bear market is a reason to consider actively managed bond funds if you decide you need to stay in bonds....

Some business expense deductions have changed since the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, so check this list carefully for changes. First, to be clear, you can’t deduct an expense if you didn’t spend the money. Also, you shouldn’t deduct an expense if you don’t have the records to show the expense. How the IRS Determines Deductible Expenses The IRS considers a business expense to be deductible if it is both ordinary and necessary....

New single-family home sales fell 5.9% in April compared to their March level, down to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 863,000 units, according to the U.S Census Bureau’s monthly report. That’s well below the 970,000 that economists had predicted, according to Moody’s Analytics. Meanwhile, the median price of a new single-family home surged to $372,400, a $38,200 increase (11%) compared to the previous month. Inventories improved somewhat, rising to a level that would sell out in 4....

Find out more about C-level corporate jobs, the typical job titles that are out there, and tips for getting one of these positions. What Are C-Level Corporate Jobs? C-level titles are used to describe a highly ranked individual’s role within the company. Officers and managers who maintain C-level positions are some of the most influential members of an organization. They usually hire and fire authority, lead stock decisions, oversee a larger workload than most employees, and have some of the highest salaries....

What happens if you have other commitments or don’t want to work the extra hours? There are some exceptions, but you may not have the option to opt out. Review information on when employers can require employees to work mandatory overtime, exceptions to overtime requirements, and pay for overtime work. Can Your Employer Make You Work Overtime? There are no federal laws prohibiting employers from mandatory overtime except for workers under 16 years old and in a few safety-sensitive occupations....

What Is A Custodial Parent The IRS defines a custodial parent as the parent the child lives with for the greater number of nights during the year. The custodial parent is determined using the tiebreaker tests for qualifying children if the child lives with both parents for an equal amount of time. The IRS will award the dependent to the parent with the higher adjusted gross income (AGI) when that is the case....

A hard money loan can be used to finance your business, such as if your business has a bad credit rating and you need cash to buy or renovate a property. But before obtaining a hard money loan, you need to know how it works and the underlying risk it poses. What Are Hard Money Loans? Typically, hard money loans are associated with real estate investors who buy properties, quickly repair them, and put them back on the market, a practice known as “flipping....

While Google shifted its focus on apps to its Play Store, which is available for Android phones and newer models of Chromebooks, there still are useful ways to keep up with your finances using Chrome extensions. Top Chrome Extensions These extensions will add functionality to your Chrome browser, making it easier to keep track of what is important to you, or they will add functionality to websites you might use, such as Google Finance....