Gina G asked:


Have a small business and have a customer that has run up a debt and their company is now filing bankruptcy. How does a business go about collecting from the business. We are a small business also there has to be laws to help protect us also. Need some advice on how to legally go about being paid as a creditor. Also if a business says they are filing bankruptcy is it public record and what sites show this record.

business

Trying!! asked:


Discuss the ethical climate at a business that you are familiar with or one that you have researched. How have ethics affected this business? What does this business do to enforce ethical principles? What things could they do better?

How can we as individual employees influence the application of ethics are our businesses? Give your thoughts and ideas on this subject.

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Chev asked:


i want to open a business in jamaica what are some of the thing that i would need to start this business?

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Ken asked:


I am opening an online business for website design. (set up as a LLC, I’m the sole owner) Should I start keeping receipts of all business related expenses? Or would my business qualify as a hobby if I don’t make a certain amount of money in the year that I’m filing.

What types of things can I write off onto my business? (dinners, gasoline, etc.) Do I need a seperate business credit card/bank account for the expenses?

Do I have to accept payments towards the business’s services through a corporate account, or can they make the check/payment directly to me?

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Art Activist asked:




There is a lot of talk about corporate responsibility and the environment. Individuals are tiring of the onus being placed on them to change the world. Have shorter showers, water your garden less, switch to green power, change your light globes, car pool, take reusable bags to the supermarket, and recycle. All of these are necessary but pale in comparison to the damage being done by big business and industry.

But what about small business?

Somewhere in between large corporations and the individual, lies small business. Australia, a country of about 21 million people, incredibly has over 2 million small businesses. In the US approximately 99.9% of all business is small. The ecological impact of these cannot be ignored.

It is easy to assume that large corporations are, by the nature of their large profits, less ethical but is this actually the case? Large corporations have large reputations to protect. Often it is more cost effective for big business to invest in environmental impact minimisation than to clean up the mess afterwards. They also have the capital to invest in changing technologies to not only utilise the green machine but to actually profit from it, directly through carbon trading and indirectly through marketing with a social conscience.

So where does small business fit in and what can be done? The answer is very little or a lot. It depends on your business model, your business goals and your values. The advantage that small business has over a large multinational is fewer layers of bureaucracy and more transparency. Big business generally has a board of directors that need to be convinced, then a feasibility study conducted before changes can be implemented. As a small business owner you can conceive it and implement it virtually simultaneously.

Here are some of the things you can do:

- Recycle. Seems simple enough but you may have to find different depots for your various waste such as paper, plastic, printer cartridges, batteries, computers and other electronic parts.

- Switch to paperless billing. It is resource intensive to print and deliver paper. It is also time consuming and unreliable.

- Switch to a Green Power company that derives its energy from renewable sources that do not pollute.

- Reduce water consumption by ensuring your business has dual flush toilets and water efficient taps.

- Choose energy efficient vehicles for your business.

- Choose sustainable suppliers. Research suppliers whose ethos includes environmental sustainability. The potential for eco-conscious small businesses to support each other is large and underestimated.

- Donate to charities. Really any charity is a positive step but a charity that is aligned with your business practice or goals serves to reinforce those values.

- Become Carbon Neutral. This does not simply mean paying for an offset for bad business practice or paying for the right to pollute, this means establishing the carbon footprint of your business, then reducing emissions as far as possible. Once a minimal emissions target has been met the residual emissions can be neutralised by the acquisition of offsets.

The changes that you make may depend on your local economic landscape but have the potential to impact locally and globally. Small business is more important than ever and has a responsibility to future generations.



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James Kobzeff asked:


Net present value is the present value of all future cash flows produced by a rental property less the amount of initial cash investment required to purchase the investment property.

Net present value (NPV) considers the time value of money and therefore is a popular real estate investing rate of return. Say, for instance, that you require a 10% rate of return on your investment. Net present value (with consideration for the timing) reveals whether the cash flow produced by that property would give you a 10% rate of return.

How it Works

Let’s say that you require a 10% rate of return. This percentage then becomes the rate at which future cash flows are “discounted”. Moreover, you plan to invest $100,000. This is also known as initial investment and represents the down payment plus closing costs. Next, you estimate what the annual cash flows will be over the next (let’s say five) years. Finally, estimate the proceeds you would receive from a sale of the investment property in the (let’s say fifth) year. Since the money you collect upon a sale is considered income, it’s added to the cash flow derived in that same year.

Here’s how it looks:

Discount Rate: 10.0%

Initial Investment: $100,000

Cash Flow # 1 [estimated first year cash flow]

Cash Flow # 2 [estimated second year cash flow]

Cash Flow # 3 [estimated third year cash flow]

Cash Flow # 4 [estimated fourth year cash flow]

Cash Flow # 5 [estimated fifth year cash flow] + [sale proceeds]

How to Calculate

Okay, now to arrive at a net present value we must do the following.

1. Discount all forecasted future cash flows at 10% to arrive at their present value (PV), remembering to add the forecasted sales proceeds to the cash flow in the final year. Let’s say the present value for all five cash flows plus sale proceeds is $100,000.

2. Deduct the initial investment of $100,000 from the $100,000 present value of future cash flows to determine the NPV. In this case, NPV would equal zero.

What it Means

Net present value is a dollar amount (not a percentage rate) and will always result in one of the following amounts.

1. Greater than zero – this means that the discounted value of the future cash flows is greater than the initial investment and thus you’re getting a higher rate of return than you desired

2. Equal to zero – this means that the discounted value of the future cash flows is exactly equal to your initial investment and thus you’re getting the return you desired exactly

3. Less than zero – this means that the discounted value of the future cash flows is less than the initial investment and thus you’re getting a lower rate of return than you desired

As stated earlier, net present value is commonly used in real estate investing by investors and analysts to evaluate investment real estate opportunities. It should not be used as the only factor to decide whether a rental property provides a good buying opportunity, but NPV does offer the investor a quick and easy way to determine whether a property might yield the investor’s desired rate of return.

You can make your own computations for net present value on Excel, with some real estate investment software programs, or with the help of a real estate professional who understands real estate investing.



finance

debra l asked:


I plan to work as a business person who finds different vendors for this business. Is this profitable? Is this a good plan?Do I meet first with the business with my idea, or do I start with the vendors first , or do I start my own webpage and have the vendors as part of that first?

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Peter Kenny asked:




Having some knowledge of how to calculate finance charges is always a good thing. Most lenders, as you know, will do this for you, but it can helpful to be able to check the math yourself. It is important, however, to understand that what is presented here is a basic procedure for calculating finance charges and your lender may be using a more complicated method. There may also be other issues attached with your loan which may affect the charges.

The first thing to understand is that there are two basic parts to a loan. The first issue is called the principal. This is the amount of money that is borrowed. The lender wants to make a profit for his services (lending you the money) and this is called interest. There are many types of interest from simple to variable. This article will examine simple interest calculations.

In simple interest deals, the amount of the interest (expressed as a percentage) does not change over the life of the loan. This is often called flat rate or fixed interest.

The simple interest formula is as follows:

Interest = Principal

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