I have some very important questions regarding my son who is going to be attending a private university next year. He is going to be a student athlete (he golfs), which does not help very much financially. We’re shocked at the cost and do not have enough saved. We were counting on selling our home and downsizing to pay for his education, but got caught up in the real estate downturn. We need some help and advice on how we can get access to the free money that I know is out there. We also have two other boys, 13 and 6. We will start immediately saving for their college.

Answer: The “free money” you know is out there may not be the answer to your problems.

Yes, there are scholarships your boy might get to help pay for his education. But if he receives any financial aid from the university, those scholarships may reduce the amount he gets in grants — another form of financial aid that doesn’t have to be paid back.

If, on the other hand, he doesn’t get any grants, the scholarships could reduce the amount of loans he’d otherwise need to take out.

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The ways in which your corporate blog can be a play a crucial role in your marketing communications strategy are manifold. It helps you improve search engine presence, projects your organization as a business concern with a customer-driven culture, and gives you a viable platform for enhanced target audience engagement by regularly giving them useful information and having the thought leaders speak to them directly. This element of accessibility  brings you closer to your audience and enables you to share brand stories with them in a decisively direct manner. Basically, while your article marketing and submission efforts merely act to direct traffic to your website, your corporate blog can be so much more by being the online voice of your organization.

Heres how you can get more out of your corporate blog and get closer to realizing its full potential.

Brands are built on the bedrock of trust, and there’s no trust without authenticity.

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Moodys warned that the banks ratings may come under downward pressure although the negative outlook contrasts with the stable outlook given to the bank financial strength ratings of 14 of the 15 banks.

Moody’s Investors Service downgraded on Wednesday the outlook for India’s banking system to negative.

The rating agency explained the cut to concerns that the global economic crisis and domestic slowdown could lead to more defaults and curb the profitability of the financial institutions.

Moody’s senior analyst in Singapore Vineet Gupta explained that India’s economic momentum is slowing due to high inflation, monetary tightening and fast rising interest rates.

Gupta added that concerns over the sustainability of U.S. and European recovery and higher cost of borrowing for the Indian government could drain the country’s funds away from private credit market. Because of those factors, banking stocks in India declined 5 percent this year.

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Roth IRA is an individual retirement account that unlike a Traditional IRA includes contributions that are not tax deductible and allows qualified withdrawals without penalty. Previously, Roth IRA was available only to those whose annual income was limited to $100,000. Recently in the year 2010, the US government reformed the rules applying to a Roth IRA, relaxing the income limit and made it available to higher income investors. This in turn led to an increase in demand for Roth IRA. To know more about the rules, limitations and conditions applied to Roth IRA, turn to page roth-ira.org.

Roth IRA not only promises a tax free growth but is also more adaptable and flexible.
Roth IRA conversion is a voluntary rollover from a regular IRA to Roth IRA. Full Article…