Category: Reviews & Howtos

5 (free) ways to keep in touch during a lockdown

5 (free) ways to keep in touch during a lockdown

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Hello dear readers and followers of the Total Balance household!

While we all try to practice safe “Social distancing” these days (to break the chain of infection from the dreaded Corona virus dubbed Covid-19), there are ways to remain social, without being close to one another!

Thanks to the great invention of The Internet (and Video chat software/Apps!).

Todays post is thus NOT going to be about investments (lets all try to avert our eyes from the market for a little while anyway, am I right?!)…

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Crowdestor gets a facelift and adds 2FA – yay!

Crowdestor gets a facelift and adds 2FA – yay!

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Quick update from your friendly neighborhood Total Balance guy!

Crowdestor announced last month that they were gonna give their website an overhaul, and it has now arrived.

Why should you care, you ask?

Well, I think it’s noteworthy when a young company decides to completely re-vamp their website and add extra security features at the same time. Kudos to Crowdestor, for taking security serious, unlike some other folks out there! It tells me that they are serious about their business 😉

Lets have a quick look at some of the new features!

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Crowdlending platform (in)security check

Crowdlending platform (in)security check

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On Oct 14, I received a disturbing E-mail from one of the Crowdlending platforms that I currently have investments with. This was the exact message:

Kuetzal website was attacked this Sunday, it was successfully reflected by Kuetzal, but for security reasons, some passwords may be deleted. If you can’t sign in your account, please use “reset password”, or contact Kuetzal support team.

Ahem, WTF?

I obviously immediately attempted to logon to my account, but couldn’t. – So I had to use the “Reset Password” feature. I then received a new randomly generated password, in clear text via E-mail. Forgive me if I’m being too technical here, but this is a huge no-go! It was not a temporary one-time password that I was forced to reset after using it, so that only made it worse.

When someone sends you a password in clear text to your E-mail, you should be worried about your (or your data’s) safety! (You should receive a unique link to reset it via a web-form!)

This experience prompted me to run a few common security-related “tests” (no systems were harmed during this test 😉 ) on all the platforms that I’m currently using (14), to uncover whether this poor security hygiene was a widespread issue.

What I uncovered was fairly shocking!

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A lazy mans guide to budgeting

A lazy mans guide to budgeting

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I know.

It was bound to happen eventually, right? – “How to do x-y-z” is the most boring blog posts of them all. I do believe we even refer to them as “filler posts”. Something we use to fill the void between the good stuff, right? – But not this guy! I’m here to tell you that this IS the good stuff! Why? Because, it involves the use of technology to help me (and you) to facilitate my favorite activity: being lazy.

Thanks to the somewhat monopolized payment industry, I no longer have to lift a finger to control my spending. How is that, Nick? You might ask. Well, to be fair, the monopoly doesn’t exactly help me control my spending – but it helps me categorize my spending, which is pretty much the most important part, of budgeting…

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To Stooze or not to Stooze

To Stooze or not to Stooze

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I know what you’re thinking; WTF is a Stooze!?

I’d never heard the term before either, until I started researching a nifty little trick (that I’ve been using for a while), in order to deploy “free leverage” that I used to purchase Property #1.

It turned out that the little trick had a name: Stoozing.

So, what is Stoozing then, Nick?

Stoozing: The act of taking out credit at 0% (or a low rate) and putting the money into a high interest savings account to profit from the difference in rates.

Hm. That sounds simple enough…

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How to diversify your crowdlending portfolio

How to diversify your crowdlending portfolio

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We all know the famous quote from Warren Buffet: Diversification is protection against ignorance.

Well, admitting ignorance can also be a strength…So there! – I admit it: I’ve invested in 10 different crowdlending platforms, in hundreds of different loans to hundreds of different people/businesses of whom/which I know very little about. All I know is what the platforms (and the community) tell me. How much of this information can truly be trusted? I’m hoping the majority, but I’d be a fool to blindly trust “strangers on the Internet” 😉 – And so would you!

So don’t take my word for it! When investing in crowdlending, you need to protect yourself against (your own) ignorance. How can we best go about that, then? Well, I’ve got a few ideas that I will share with you today, dear readers 😉

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The secret to becoming (or staying) wealthy

The secret to becoming (or staying) wealthy

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Today, I’m going to let you guys in on a little (big) secret (it’s really not that secret…).

Here goes: The secret to becoming (or staying) wealthy, is to stop paying your taxes…

But Nick, If you don’t pay your taxes, you’ll go to jail!

Precisely! And what do you get in prison? Free accommodation, free meals 3 times per day, free education – and even a free membership to the gym! Granted, you might have to share the dumb bells with a real badass mofo, but beggars can’t really be choosers, can they?…

All kidding a side, I don’t mean you should stop paying your taxes altogether. – I just mean you shouldn’t pay more than the law requires…

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A night out – with Rich Dad (Property investing)

A night out – with Rich Dad (Property investing)

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This week I attended a 2-hour (free) seminar on property investing, from the Rich Dad Education company.

I didn’t really know what I was going into (the agenda was very sparse), so I tried to keep an open mind (I already read Rich Dad, Poor Dad, so I was pretty sure I already knew the gist of it).

What I did know however, is that nothing is free 😉 I was sure that they would try to convince me to purchase something after/during the seminar.

I was right.

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How to hack your charity donations

How to hack your charity donations

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If you’ve ever walked down a busy shopping street, odds are that you at one point or another, have been solicited by one of those annoying street “sales-people”, who will try to convince you to support <insert worthy cause here>.

When I was living in the city (in my 20’s) this happened to me quite often. I distinctly remember one guy, who managed to catch my attention AND sell me on one of those monthly plans, to support <insert worthy cause here>. He was young and enthusiastic, and with the argument “it’s only 1 pizza per month”, I couldn’t turn him down. His teeth was so crooked that I could not take my eyes away from his mouth, the entire time he was talking to me. I don’t remember which charity it was, but I remember him! I figured that if I supported this <insert worthy cause here> I could honestly – and in good conscience turn down any other solicitor for the next many years! “No thanks, bro – I’m already donating to this cause”. Of course it never actually pan out like that. …

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My 3 Biggest Crowdlending Mistakes

My 3 Biggest Crowdlending Mistakes

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I realize that the topic of my past mistakes has been a little over-represented on the blog lately, but this time I’m going to keep it a bit more relevant to the theme (of investing) 😉 I promise I’ll be done talking about my mistakes after this one (yeah, right).

A couple of my friends and family members have asked my advice on crowdlending, since they learned of my involvement in it. I’ve thus been talking a lot about my crowdlending adventure lately, and figured I’d make a post out of some of that chatter – in the hopes that others might benefit from it.

So if you’re new to crowdlending, and are considering boarding the train (or just curious about my past escapades), here’s some examples of what NOT to do when entering the crowdlending scene 😛

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