Latest Post Office Interest Rates: April-June 2021

Latest Post Office Interest Rates: April-June 2021

What are the Latest Post Office Interest Rates from April – June 2021? What are the latest Post Office interest rates on FDs, MIS, SCSS, NSC, KVP, PPF, and SSY Schemes?

Earlier the interest rates used to be announced yearly once. However, from 2016-17, the rate of interest will be fixed on a quarterly basis.

Below is the timetable for change in interest rates for all Post Office Savings Schemes.

As per the schedule, Government announced the interest rate applicable to all Post Office Savings Schemes from 1st April 2021 to 30th June 2021.

On 31st March 2021, Government notified the interest rates which shocked many as the reduction was very high.

As of now, the latest post office interest rates April – June 2021 will remain the same and they are as below.

Let us see the trend of the pasty one year of Post Office Saving Schemes Interest Rates.

8 Easy Ways To Reduce Your Expenses

Spend less than you earn. That’s the mantra of personal finance success. Every week, month, and year that you spend less than you earn, the more you save and the better your financial situation will be.

A big part of that solution is cutting back on spending, and for many people, the thought of cutting back on spending seems unpleasant. Losing out on the things that bring you pleasure in life seems like a pretty steep price to pay for a little financial success.

The secret is to intentionally target spending on the things you don’t care about and rarely use while holding steady on the things you do care about.

Scale back on entertainment costs
1. Cut cable: These days, streaming services and free over-the-air television provide more content than any one person could ever watch. Take advantage of the variety by eliminating cable service.
2. Focus your interests on finishing rather than collecting: Rather than collecting physical or digital items in a media collection, focus on actually finishing those things or enjoying them to completion. For example, instead of buying yet more books that go unread, aim instead to build a long list of books you have read. Make doing the center of your hobby, not buying. After all, isn’t that what you really love?
3. Don’t treat shopping as entertainment: It’s fine to go out in the town to be entertained but keep to a simple rule: don’t go into a store unless it’s for the purpose of buying something you’ve already decided you need before going in. Don’t go to stores just to browse for entertainment, as they’re designed to convince you to buy things you don’t need or even really want, but just react on impulse. Find other places to be entertained.

Reduce your food costs
4. Use a meal plan and make a grocery list: Instead of going to the grocery store whenever you feel like you need food, get into a routine of making a meal plan once a week, then constructing a grocery list from that plan. The time invested in making that plan is more than saved by spending less time in the store and having a list to stick to saves a ton of money on grocery store impulse buys that just sit in your pantry.
5. Learn how to cook: Cooking for yourself doesn’t have to involve three-course meals or Gordon Ramsey-level skills. Start by identifying things you enjoy eating, then look for how to easily prepare it from scratch and with basic ingredients.
6. Buy in bulk: The big bulk packages might seem like they have a high price, but they’re usually quite a bit cheaper per use, meaning you get more value for your dollar. If you frequently buy something at the store, look at the big bulk versions and save up for them. You’ll save over the long run. It's basically what our parents or grandparents did - buy - store and use efficiently.
Cut your monthly bills
7. Go through your bills: Sit down with every regular bill you have and go through it line by line, making sure you understand everything you’re being charged for. If something isn’t clear, Google it. If it doesn’t seem like something you should be charged for or is a service you don’t want, call the bill issuer and get it removed from future bills.
8. Cut your subscriptions down to just the things you actually use: If you have a subscription or membership that you haven’t used in the last month, cancel it. Turn off any auto-renew you have with that service and allow it to expire. You can always renew it in the future if you decide you have a need for it again.

What you should do with the money saved from trimming your budget?
The key to making frugal living tips really work for you is to not simply spend that money on something else fun. Keep your “fun” spending at the same level and use the money you save when you cut down your monthly budget on something smarter. Cut un-fun things like your energy bill for something financially useful that can build a bright future for you.

One great option is to open an account and use your savings to create your emergency fund or you could save it up for your next trip. Whatever excites to reduce your unnecessary spending. These are just some of our suggestions. Do let us know what you had like to read and learn more about and we shall share more content on that.

Disclaimer: - The articles are for information purposes only. Information presented is general information that does not take into account your individual circumstances, financial situation, or needs, nor does it present a personalized recommendation to you. You must consult a financial advisor who understands your specific circumstances and situation before taking an investment decision.

Debt / Equity / Investments / Money tips / Mutual Funds / Uncategorized - 03/20/2021

Things To Remember Before Taking A Loan Against Property

Hello all!

We’ve all thought about purchasing property. If not now, then maybe sometime in the future. And we’re here to tell you that it’s not as easy a process as you might think. Many people consider that where they have a property, they can easily take a loan against it. Read this article to know some points you can keep in mind, before you approach your bank for the same.

A loan against property (LAP) is a secured loan that banks, housing finance companies and NBFCs provide against residential or commercial property. These loans are usually offered at a lower interest rate as compared to a personal loan or business loan and are disbursed at a reasonable time. Anyone with a pre-owned property can avail such loans, whether they are salaried or self-employed in a business or professional setup. The quantum of loan sanctioned is also higher than what may be offered in other available options.

The demand for LAP is increasing among individuals because of three primary reasons:

It is cheaper than a personal loan.
The applicant can continue to occupy his or her property even after the loan is availed.
The loan can be used for a variety of purposes such as unforeseen medical expenses, children’s higher education and marriage, or setting up a business.
Besides, existing customers of a bank or housing finance company need not go through the document verification process again.

A loan against property is a boon for both business owners and salaried employees. Self-employed who are seeking funds for expansion of their business can make use of this facility. Salaried professionals facing a sudden medical crisis that may require long-term treatment, including expensive surgery, or sending children to a foreign university for higher studies can avail the facility for raising funds. A LAP not only leaves one’s savings intact, but it also comes at low-cost EMIs with repayment tenures of as long as 15 to 20 years. The low-interest rates on such loans dilute the repayment burden.

All these and other benefits help in the growth of the business or safeguard the financial future of both the loan applicant as well as his or her family. The only criterion for availing of a loan against property is that the loan should be for a legitimate purpose.

While it is relatively easy for existing customers to receive a loan against their property, new customers will have to furnish the necessary documents as well as credit history, repayment capacity and marketability of the property to be mortgaged.

An existing customer can also apply for a ‘top-up’ loan, but this would depend on factors such as repayment history of a preexisting home loan and outstanding balance on that loan, monthly income and loan to property value ratio. However, a fresh property appraisal is not required as the property is already mortgaged with the lender.

While these are the basics of a loan against property, there are other aspects to the loan that applicants must know. These are:

Loan repayment:

Since the loan amount that can be availed of against property is high, it is important that the borrower fulfils the required income criteria to repay the entire loan. It can be repaid over a period of 12 months up to 20 years, though the tenure varies from one lender to another.

Property valuation:

loan against property is provided against collateral; i.e., an immovable property such as a constructed residential/commercial property. Before deciding the eligibility and amount of loan, your lender will appraise your property. The amount will depend on the prevailing fair market value, not the past or potential future value. Housing finance companies usually provide up to 50-60 per cent of the market value of a property. Therefore, you should analyse the loan-to-value (LTV) ratio provided by your lender.

Ownership of property:

The lender will approve the loan only after it is convinced that your property has a clear and marketable title. Further, the co-owners need to be part of the loan and meet the criteria.

Any loan against property comes with a longer repayment tenure compared to a personal loan. The EMIs are spread over many years and the rate of interest is much lower. A longer tenure means lower EMIs, which reduces the monthly repayment burden.

Repayment Capacity:

The lender will evaluate your repaying capacity with the help of your income statements, repayment history, ongoing loans etc.

To sum up, a loan against property offers greater flexibility, lower interest rates, higher loan amount, and a longer repayment tenure and feasibility of end use. While the long-term advantages of this type of loan make it a much better option than personal loans, it is important to remember that if the borrower defaults on repayments, his or her rights over the property are transferred to the lender.

Disclaimer: - The emails are for information purposes only. Information presented is general information that does not take into account your individual circumstances, financial situation, or needs, nor does it present a personalized recommendation to you. You must consult a financial advisor who understands your specific circumstances and situation before taking an investment decision.

Money tips / Real Estate / Uncategorized - 03/13/2021

Mistakes To Avoid Before Making Tax Saving Investments

We have entered March 2021 and soon we will be celebrating our 1 year lockdown anniversary. It Maybe not so much of a celebration but still, we have survived 1 year of COVID with some gains and some losses, and lots of learnings. Another reason to look forward to March 2021, is the last month to make all your tax-saving investments!

Choosing tax regime without comparing liability The finance ministry in the previous financial year 2020 had introduced a new tax regime that gives individual taxpayers the option to pay income tax at a concessional rate.
Read more about old regime vs new regime

Notably, if you opt for the new tax regime with lower tax rates, you will have to forego the deductions and exemptions including the standard deduction, deduction under Section 80C, interest paid on housing loan, etc. This can be helpful if you do not want to lock-in your funds for a longer period in tax-saving instruments such as Tax Saving Bank FD, Provident Fund, etc.

Comparing liability under the existing and the new tax regime while helping you to decide on the most suitable option depending on your income and expenses and customize your investment preferences accordingly.

1. Failing to ascertain actual taxable income

When computing the taxable income, it is important to take into account all sources of income. Besides the income from salary, you may have income from a business, rental income from property, interest from bank/post office deposits, capital gains from assets, or any other source.

Determining the taxable income is an important step in streamlining your tax planning exercise which will help you to correctly estimate the amount of tax-saving investment to be made for reducing your tax liability.

2. Taking the wrong approach to insurance

The primary purpose of a life insurance policy is to provide financial protection to dependents in case of the untimely demise of the insured person. Simply opting for a policy because it offers a tax deduction under Section 80C of the Income Tax Act, 1961 is an imprudent approach.

There is a possibility that you may end up investing in investment cum insurance policies such as endowment policies, money back plans, or ULIPs that provide tax-saving components along with life cover in a bid to meet tax-saving requirements. However, you must know that these products will neither provide adequate cover nor generate optimal returns. A simple-term plan is enough to take care of your life insurance requirement at a very reasonable premium. Read this article to compute how much cover should you have

3. Not aligning your Investments as per your goals and investment objective

Ensure that you are not investing in 80C investment options only for tax savings purposes. Check how it fits into your debt - equity allocation which is determined based on your risk profile. Further, these investments should be made to achieve your goals not just for the purpose of tax savings. Align them to your requirements. Do not just invest in 80C investment options, if you have already exhausted this limit, you can explore options beyond Section 80C. Besides, certain payments that are eligible for deductions such as payment of house rent, expenses towards children's school tuition fee, interest payment on the home loan.

Read these articles to know more about your tax planning before March 2021
1. How to save taxes before you invest your money.
2. Ways to save taxes under various sections of the Income-tax Act.
3. Mutual Fund taxation
4. How to save taxes on health insurance

Income Tax / Investments / Money tips / Uncategorized - 03/04/2021

Leave Travel Concession Cash Voucher - new ways to claim your LTA

Hello fellow investors,

It is that time of the year where we all start planning to submit your tax proofs to claim tax deductions. One such claim is the Leave travel allowance. Given that, none of us are really venturing into travel, a new component of leave travel concession - a cash voucher was introduced for salaried individuals.

This leave travel allowance (cash voucher) scheme initially announced for central government employees has now been extended to all other employees with riders to boost consumption during the festive season and also help you get tax deduction. The government has announced that all non-central government employees will be eligible for income tax exemption for the entire leave travel concession amount up to Rs 36,000 per person without producing travel bills. However, such employees will have to spend three times the amount for purchasing goods or services on which GST of 12% or higher is levied, said a press release from the Central Board of Direct Taxes.

Employees will have to make purchases through digital payment mode and submit the invoices to avail of the benefit.

What’s LTC For Private Sector?

Unlike government employees, their private-sector peers have a part of their salary or cost to the company, structured as leave travel concession. This is done to save tax on the total income of the employee. By showing travel expenses, the employee can avail of the income tax exemption on the travel amount. Those who haven’t availed of this benefit during 2018-21 would be eligible for the tax exemption.

Points to Note:

The employee exercises an option for the deemed LTC fare in lieu of the applicable LTC in the current block (the year 2018-21);
The employee spends a sum equal to three times the value of the deemed LTC fare on purchase of goods/services which carry a Goods and Services Tax (GST) rate of at least 12% from GST registered vendors/service providers through digital mode;
The expense is made between 12 October 2020 and 31 March 2021; and
The employee obtains the voucher indicating the GST number and the amount of GST paid.

What Government Is Offering An employee?

An Employee who has not availed LTC during 2018-21 would be eligible to avail of the tax exemption subject to the condition that the person spends three times that amount on goods or services with GST of 12% and above.

Those who spend less than three times the fare amount will get proportionate income tax exemption. For example, if the LTC fare is Rs 20,000, and is claimed for a family of four, then the employee would get Rs 80,000 (20,000 x 4). The amount that the employee will have to spend would be Rs 2,40,000 (Rs 80,000 x 3). However, if the employee ends up spending only Rs 1,80,000, the person would get tax exemption of Rs 60,000 (75% of 80,000 or 1/3 of 1,80,000).

Thus, this income tax benefit may actually be considered as a discount on expenditure, which the employee has already planned to incur, instead of a reason to incur expenditure. On the other hand, income tax foregone by the Government may be offset by the additional GST revenue on expenditure incurred by the employees.

It is advisable to check with your HR department and your employer to see if the policy is modified to include the leave travel concession component and how you can claim this benefit for yourself. It was initiated to encourage people to shop more and take tax benefits on the same, so don't rush to buy new items but if you are buying anything, ensure you have GST documents of the same to claim tax benefits under LTC.

Debt / Equity / Investments / Money tips - 11/27/2020

Income-Tax Relief For Home Buyers

Hello fellow investors

As a part of various relief measures taken by the Government in response to the economic slowdown post-COVID-19, the Finance Minister (FM) has announced a very attractive income tax relief for home buyers (new residential properties of value up to Rs 2 crore). Here is what you need to know.

Income Tax relief for home buyers

In case the declared purchase consideration of the land/building is less than the stamp value (circle rate) by up to 20%, there will be no additional tax outgo for both the seller and the purchaser for the period 12th November 2020 to 30th June 2021. Earlier, the acceptable difference was 5% which was to be enhanced to 10% with effect from 01 st April 2021.

This move will also help developers in selling off their unsold inventory at up to 20% below the circle rate and the buyers in getting cheaper homes without any additional tax burden on either party. Let’s look at the relevant provisions of the Income Tax Act to understand the applicable tax relief.

Section 43CA of the Income-tax Act - for the seller

This section provided for deeming of the stamp duty value (circle rate) as sale consideration for the transfer of real estate inventory in the case the circle rate exceeded the declared consideration. The circle rate is the minimum rate per unit area fixed by the state governments for the sale of land or property and is
aimed at reducing stamp duty evasion by declaring lower sale values in the sale-purchase deeds.

Thus, even if the real estate was sold at a price below the circle rate, the circle rate was considered as the sale value for the calculation of the business profits of the seller. For example, if a house is sold by a developer for Rs 80 lakh but its value as per the circle rate is Rs 96 lakh, the developer is supposed to take Rs 96 lakh as the sale value for
calculating his profit.

Through Finance Act 2018, a difference of 5% between the two rates was declared to be acceptable. This was increased to 10% through Finance Act 2020. Now, the FM has raised this acceptable difference to 20%. Thus, in the above case, the difference is exactly 20% as seen below and the developer can consider Rs 80 lakh for calculating his profits from the sale.

Section 56(2)(x) of the Income-tax Act for the buyer

This section is applicable to the buyer and provides for stamp duty value to be deemed as purchase consideration even if the purchase was made at a lower price. As per the above example, the buyer is deemed to have received Rs 16 lakh (the difference between the stamp value and the sale consideration) and was supposed to declare this amount as ‘Income from other sources and pay tax on the same. Now, he will not have to pay any tax if the difference is up to 20% as is the case in the above example.

In summary, this announcement by the FM comes as a major relief to real estate developers who were struggling to offload their inventory due to lower demand in the market. The benefit is applicable, however, only for the primary sale of residential properties and not for commercial and secondary sales.

Income Tax / Insurance / Investments / Making Money / Money tips / Real Estate / Tax - 09/20/2020

Health Insurance: Single Plan or a Family Floater Plan?

Hello fellow investors

With COVID-19, the one thing that everyone has realized is Health insurance is a must! We all need adequate Health Insurance cover and at a good price. Because whether to have Health Insurance or not is no longer a point of discussion. In fact, now we want to ensure that everyone in the family also has Health Insurance.

We have been asked many questions about whether you should opt for a stand-alone health plan or a family health plan; and whether to opt for a top-up plan afterwards. We are going to break down these concepts for you.

How much Insurance should you have?

Before getting into the discussion of what type of plan, it is important that you know how much insurance is enough for you. Ideally, if you live in a tier 2/3 city you must have a cover of at least 5 lakhs and if you are in a metro/tier 1 city you must have a cover of at least 10 lakhs. These are indicative numbers based on the cost of health incurred in different places and you can always take a higher cover.

What is an Individual Health Insurance policy?

In the case of individual cover, the policy provides specific health cover for each member covered in the policy. You can decide to have a higher cover for the working member and a smaller cover for the children. Each family member will have a dedicated sum assured under the policy.

For example, you can buy an Individual Health policy that gives a cover of INR 10 lakhs each to yourself and your spouse and INR 6 lakh for your elder kid aged 15 and INR 3 lakhs for your younger kid aged 10. The cover amount is specific to each person and not shared among the different members.

What is a family floater plan?

In the case of a family floater policy, all family members are covered in a single policy. Unlike individual policies where there is a dedicated sum assured, here there is a single “floater” sum assured which is shared between all members of the family.

For example, if the family in the above example takes a family floater policy with a sum assured of INR 10 lakhs, all the four members of the family share the INR 10 lakhs sum assured. That means the insurer’s maximum liability towards the entire family for a particular year (irrespective of which individual gets hospitalized) stands at INR 10 lakhs.

Under the family floater policy, medical reimbursements can be availed by any or all of the members subject to the total sum Insured.

Let us compare the prices of family floater and individual policies to understand better:

Case 1 - A couple

Family floater plan premiums are determined based on the age of the older person. Given that this is a relatively younger couple, their premiums are not very different.

Case 2 - Parents with 2 children

In case 2, for older parents, there is a significantly higher premium being paid for a family floater plan. In case there is a predetermined illness that would further push the premium for the entire family. However, the 20 lakhs cover under the floater plan would be available to each family member thus increasing the cover amount at a higher premium.

However, where you have a cash crunch, you can go for a floater plan of 5 lakhs wherein the cover of 5 lakhs is available for all members with a reset clause for a cheaper price. You save around 10 K per annum in the premium costs where you go for a floater plan of 5 lakhs for the family.

The reset clause: Family floater plans come with a reset clause that allows for a 100% reset of the sum insured once in a policy year. This option automatically comes into operation when the sum insured (including the accrued additional sum insured, if any) is already used by one insured person and hence is insufficient for the other. The reset of the policy happens only for an unrelated illness.

For example: In the case above if the husband is sick for malaria and makes a claim of 3 lakhs in a year and later wife gets admitted for a different health issue like blood pressure and has a hospital bill of 4 lakhs. The floater plan will cover it as it would have reset the sum assured. But if the wife is admitted for malaria itself and the bill is of 4 lakhs, only 2 lakhs (to the tune of the original sum assured of 5 lakhs less 3 lakhs claimed by husband) will be payable by the insurance company.

A Family floater policy is value for money and comes a bit cheaper compared to individual policies and that’s a plus, especially for young families who are tight on budget for their insurance spending.

No claim bonus: If you do not make any claims under the policy any year, a percentage of your sum insured, say 10%, is added each year to your sum assured. So if in 2019, I do not make any claims under my policy which has a sum assured of INR 5 lakhs, in 2020 when I renew it, my sum assured is increased to INR 5.5 lakhs without any increase in my premium amount. The negative of a family floater plan is that in case of a claim by even one member under a family floater, the entire No Claim Bonus (NCB) is nullified for the year under the policy whereas the same is not true for individual policies.

Top-Up Plan

A top-up plan is a regular health insurance policy that covers hospitalization costs but only after a threshold limit, known as a deductible, is crossed. A deductible is that portion of the claim amount that is not covered by the insurer and has to be paid by the policyholder before the benefits of the top-up policy can kick in.

A top-up plan, therefore, is a cost-effective way to increase your health insurance. You can take a base policy and a top-up over above that policy. This way you can use your base health insurance policy to make a claim up till the deductible amount and use your top-up plan for any payments over that.

Where you want to increase the sum assured of your policy, you can do that only when the policy is due. Top up gives you the option to increase the sum assured at a minimal cost during the year. Hence, Top-up helps you to increase the base sum assured amount for your insurance needs.

What should you do?

The health insurance that you would take would depend upon the age of the oldest member in your family, the number of members, and the premium you are comfortable paying for the same. It would be interesting to check various options and choose which one best suits your needs and pockets.

It is advisable to have separate health insurance for older people or those who are susceptible to illness/hospitalization. By doing that, you are protecting the no-claim bonus clause of the policy and also not paying a higher premium for other insurance.

Hope this helps you understand your insurance needs better.

Happy Investing!

To learn more - you can check our course - NM 102: Build a Safety Net. Use code SAVE20 for 20% off.

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Insurance / Money tips - 08/12/2020

Ways to Invest in Gold

Hello fellow investors,

We Indians love our gold.

And it also works as a good financial backing. In fact, it is the fallback asset in India to tide over financial emergencies. In the calendar year 2020, gold has given an exceptional return of over 41%, the highest returns generated in the last decade. While that is attractive, gold has given an average return of 9% per annum for the last 30 years.

Gold is on everyone's mind so we thought let us highlight the ways in which you can invest in gold. Though in no way are we recommending you go and buy it without checking if it fits in your portfolio.

Gold can be owned as physical gold and as paper gold.

You can buy it physically in the form of jewelry, coins, and gold bars. Gold can be owned digitally through Gold ETF, Gold Mutual Funds, Sovereign Gold Bonds (SGBs), and as Digital Gold through wallets. We have discussed each of them in detail here.

Physical Gold

1. Buying Jewelry: For buying jewelry you reach out to your neighborhood jeweler or your family jeweler uncle or can buy it online today. Such jewelry generally forms a part of your personal assets against your investment assets.

As an investment, there are some concerns with gold jewelry like safety, purity, and its high cost (such as making charges). Jewelry making charges range from 6% to 10% of the cost of the gold and are a cost for you the day you purchase jewelry and hence not a preferred mode of investment.

To ensure its authenticity, you must check The Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) hallmark, the Jewelers' identification mark, and the purity of gold stamp on the jewelry that you are buying to ensure its authenticity.

2. Gold Savings Scheme - Given the high prices of gold, (₹ 55,000 per 10 grams for 24kt purity gold as of 5 August 2020), many jewelers run gold savings schemes to make it easy for buyers to buy gold by paying in installments.

A typical gold scheme allows you to deposit a fixed amount every month for the chosen tenure. When the term ends, you can buy gold (from the same jeweler) at a value that is equivalent to the total money deposited, including a bonus amount added by the jeweler to incentivize the depositor. In most cases, the jeweler adds a month's installment for every 11 installments deposited or may offer a gift item.

Please note that this scheme is useful only when you want to buy gold jewelry from the jeweler (say Tanishq or Kalya Jewelers or your local jeweler) whom you are depositing the installment each month. Don't forget that jewelry making charges would still be payable by you when you buy the jewelry.

3. Gold Coins: If still want to own physical gold and do not want to lose out on the making charges, then Gold Coins is a good option. You can buy them from jewelers, banks, non-banking finance companies, and even some e-commerce websites.

The government has launched ingeniously minted coins that will have the National Emblem of Ashok Chakra engraved on one side and Mahatma Gandhi on the other. The coins are available in denominations of 5 and 10 grams while the bars are for 20 grams.

Paper Gold or Gold Securities

Physical gold has its advantages and most of us own gold like that. However, PAPER GOLD is the new seamless way of investing in gold. It is effortless to buy and does not carry the security risk and purity risk of physical gold. Let's look at options to invest in Paper Gold.

1. Gold Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) - Gold ETF is the most cost-effective way of owning gold. The Gold ETF can be purchased via the stock exchange (NSE or BSE) which has gold as the underlying asset. Transparency in pricing is another advantage.

To Invest in ETFs you need to have a Trading and a Demat account which is the same one used for owning stocks.

When choosing an ETF, compare the Fund Management charges and the Tracking Error of the ETF with other ETFs and choose the one with the lowest Fund Management charges (expenses for managing the ETF for you) and lowest Tracking error (deviation from gold prices). This ensures you get the return on your gold investment with the least deviation from the actual gold prices.

2. Gold Mutual Funds: If you don't have a Trading and Demat account, you can invest in Gold Mutual Funds which in turn invest the Gold ETFs discussed above. Just like Gold ETFs, choose the Gold Mutual Fund with the lowest Fund Management Expenses and Tracking Error.

While Gold Mutual Funds allow you to own gold without having a trading and demat account, you land up paying Fund Management charges twice, to the Mutual Fund as well as to the Gold ETF.

3. Digital Gold: You can buy gold online via mobile wallets such as Paytm, PhonePe, Google Pay and under the Gold Rush Plan of Stock Holding Corporation of India. All these gold buying options are offered either in association with MMTC-PAMP or SafeGold or both.

This is a good option to invest in gold in smaller quantities of as little as INR 1 grams of gold. However, you can keep the gold with them for 5 years, after that you must either sell the gold or convert it into gold coins. To know more about digital gold, read here.

Be sure you understand the charges associated with liquidating the amount you accumulate when investing in gold via this option.

3. Sovereign Gold Bond - If you don't mind a lock-in of 8 years for your investment, the best way to invest in gold is via the Sovereign Gold Bonds (SGBs) issued by the Government of India.

The returns on gold via this mode are tax-free investments as no tax is levied on capital gains on the maturity of these Bonds. Further, you also earn a simple interest of 2.5% per annum on the gold bonds in addition to the increase in gold prices. If you are looking to invest your money in Gold for value appreciation and bringing a balance to your portfolio then SGB's are a good investment option. You can read more about it here.

SGBs are not available 'on-tap basis'. Instead, the government intermittently opens a window for the fresh sale of SGBs to investors. This could typically happen every 2-3 months and the window remains open for about a week. If you are looking to purchase SGBs anytime in between, you can buy them from the secondary market as the SGBs are listed on the Stock Exchange.

You have quite a few options to buy Gold. Now, which option should you opt for would depend upon the need of buying gold? If you want to buy gold to wear as a jewelry or gift for wedding functions then physical gold is the way to go for. However, if you are looking to invest in Gold then depending on the time period you have in hand - for short term needs (like 3 - 4 years), you can invest in Gold ETFs or Gold Mutual Funds, for long term needs (of 5 to 8 years), you can opt for SGBs.

Avoid going overboard with gold investments given the good returns of the recent past and stick to your Asset allocation.

Happy Investing!

gold / Money tips - 08/06/2020

Should You Prepay Your Loans?

Hello fellow investors

Every person who takes a loan faces the question of whether they should prepay the loan or invest the surplus.
You take a loan at an EMI you can afford. Eventually, your income increases and you find that can pay back more of the loan than you had originally planned. So what should you do? Prepay your loan or invest the surplus?

The answer to this question depends upon 2 things:

A. How much interest are you paying on your outstanding loan?

B. How many returns would you earn by investing that money?

If the trade-off is positive enough then you continue with your loan and invest and if not – you prepay your loan. Pretty simple right? I shall break this up for you based on the type of loan you have and what kind of investments you are comfortable to make.

Credit Cards & Personal Loans:
These are the most expensive loans ever! In fact, the cost of borrowing i.e. the interest you pay on your credit card varies from 2% - 4% per month i.e. 24% to 48% per annum. The interest on your personal loans is also usually 14% - 18% which is also pretty high.

The only way you can earn a return higher than these loans is by taking an extreme risk with your investments which include the risk of losing your capital. It makes no financial sense in not paying your card bills and using that money to make investment gains.

Given choice, prepay your credit card and personal loans with your extra savings.

Education Loans and Home Loans:
Education loans are attractive for their tax deductions. Home loans are the cheapest and the longest loan that you will ever own and hence, there is always a question of whether to prepay your home loan or not.

To help you decide, you should do the below three checks.

Check I

One way to check this is how comfortable you are with your home loan. If the home loan EMI is at 50% of your take-home income – you should consider pre-paying your Home loan and reducing the EMI to at least 20%-30% of your take-home income. If it is already a 20%-30% of your home loan EMI, you can consider continuing with the home loan.

Next, you need to consider the returns of your current investment opportunities i.e. what is the after-tax return of available investments opportunities versus the interest burden on your home loan.

Let us understand this with numbers:

Cost of home loan: Home loans EMI are at an interest cost of about 8.00% per annum. If you fall under the 20% tax bracket, the home loan cost is reduced to 6.40% after assuming you are able to claim the entire interest as a deduction in your Income Tax Return. If you come under the 30% tax bracket, the cost of your loan falls to 5.60% because of the tax-saving you get.

Check II
Return on Investments: It will make sense not to prepay the loan if the returns you will earn from investing today are higher than your cost of 6.40% or 5.60%,

How much you earn from your investments would depend upon in which asset class, you invest your savings:

1) Fixed deposits – The interest rate on Fixed Deposits today range from 5.00% to 6.00%. Some of the Corporate deposits are yielding returns in the range of 7%. The post-tax returns will be lower by 20%/30% depending on your tax bracket.

If you are risk-averse and generally park your money in fixed deposits and other safe and low-return instruments, then you are certainly better off using your surplus earnings to reduce the home loan.

2) Equities - The returns on equity investment average about 12-15% over 10-15 years. So investing your surplus into Equities is numerically more beneficial than prepaying the loan.

Check III

But before you make the decision to invest the surplus in Equity Mutual Funds/Equity Stocks, you must check if you have the risk tolerance for dealing with the ups and downs of the equity market. You should choose to if you are planning to stay invested for 7-10 years because equity investments give better risk-adjusted returns over the long term only.

Also, by investing the surplus into Equities, your target Debt Equity ratio determined by your Asset Allocation should not get skewed towards Equities.

In conclusion, the decision to prepay the loan or not depends on your existing financial situation, the extra earnings from investments, and your risk-taking capacity as an individual.

Do ensure that you have your emergency fund in place and some investments at your disposal before you go ahead and prepay the loan with all the money at hand.

See you next Thursday!

Disclaimer: - The articles are for information purposes only. Information presented is general information that does not take into account your individual circumstances, financial situation, or needs, nor does it present a personalized recommendation to you. You must consult a financial advisor who understands your specific circumstances and situation before taking an investment decision.

loan / Money tips - 07/30/2020

Should you spend or invest your bonus?

Hi fellow investors

The bonus season is here!
Given that we cannot use our bonuses immediately to travel anywhere as such, it is a good time to put our thoughts to what we can do with our bonuses.

Generally, what you do with your bonus is a very personal choice on how you want to use your lump sum money and make the most of it. I have made the following suggestions to help you make an informed decision.

1. Reward yourself
Bonus is the money that you get for doing exceptional hard work in the year that has passed by and it is only fair to use a part of it to reward yourself. You can use it to buy yourself that fancy gadget that you always wanted, go on that vacation, put it aside for your dream car, etc.

2. Create your emergency fund
Using your bonus amount to create your emergency fund of 4-6 times of your monthly expenses if you already don't have one. Given, the uncertainty of COVID 19 has not yet found a resort/calm it is best to have an emergency fund in place.

3. Pay your outstanding debt
Many people use their bonuses to prepay their loans and reduce the burden of a heavy loan. While how much loan you are comfortable with is a very personal choice, you can consider these 2 parameters to check if you should prepay or not.

If your loan EMI is 50% or more of your take-home income, you should use your bonus amount to prepay and reduce the same to a comfortable 30% - 40% of your take-home income.
If your loan EMI is 20% - 30% of your take-home income, you can continue the same and pay it from your monthly income and enjoy tax benefits. You can avoid using your bonus to prepay your loan.

Basically, if you are having sleepless nights because of outstanding loan amounts, then use the bonus to prepay and have a good night's sleep.

4. Cover up your tax-saving investments
My first advice is always to invest regularly even for tax deductions to avoid any last-minute cash crunch in February and March. However, if you have not done the same, then use your bonus to do so and plan your investments to claim the tax deductions.

5. Keep it aside for your dream goals
Take that photography/culinary course, put it aside for your trip to Norway, buy that bike, save up for your business idea you have - keep this money aside for any goal of yours that is important to you and can be used for your own dreams. Use the bonus money for something that would add value and make you happy.

Bonus is a good lump sum payment and it is good to use it for something that will have a lasting impact on you.

Have fun splurging and investing (at least some of it).

See you next Thursday!

Disclaimer: - The articles are for information purposes only. Information presented is general information that does not take into account your individual circumstances, financial situation, or needs, nor does it present a personalized recommendation to you. You must consult a financial advisor who understands your specific circumstances and situation before taking an investment decision.

Money tips / Salary / Uncategorized - 07/23/2020