Situated far back from the canopied lane called Peacock near the Siesta Key south bridge, the house is large — 10,207 square feet, not counting outdoor living areas — and it has extraordinary curb appeal because of the landscaping and because it’s nothing like the Mediterranean revival homes sprouting up all over the key.
But Hampton does not signal something monumental — even with its three-car garage, guest portico parking, varying roof lines, widow’s walk, many upper and lower terraces and white-shingle exterior. (The shingles are actually made of Hardieboard fiber-cement siding, so appropriate for the Florida climate). Hampton’s proportions are right for the one-acre property, and the lot next door is empty. Tennis courts, anyone?
Hampton and the vacant acre are for sale as a package or separately. The house itself is on the market for $8,595,000, offered by Linda Sloan and Cheryl Loeffler of Sotheby’s International Realty. It ha
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Within the past few weeks major banks across the USA hikes their fees for using debit cards, while they also discontinued debit card rewards programs. The big banks claim that they had no choice in the matter because they are being overregulated and are losing vital profits, but most consumers consider that a pretty lame excuse.
The fact is that banks are losing profits thanks to the fact that they are finally being forced to stop charging outrageous credit card fees and using sneaky devices to add miscellaneous fees and charges to checking accounts. They can no longer enroll you in an overdraft program without your explicit permission, for example, a strategy that was helping banks make extra money every month on tens of millions of customers. Neither can they raise your credit card rates without warning or for no reason.
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The credit reporting firm Experian is the target of a California lawsuit that claims the company duped customers by selling them bogus credit scores.
The suit claims the company, through its Consumerinfo.com subsidiary, misled customers by selling them credit scores that are not the same ones used by lenders to evaluate customers for loans. The suit was filed in federal court on behalf of one borrower but is seeking class-action status. “Consumers pay for these scores so they will know what lenders are evaluating before they apply for a car loan, a credit card, a mortgage, or other credit. It’s a shock when they learn the score they got from Experian was worthless, and not seen by any lender,” said Jason Hartley, an attorney representing the plaintiffs. Consumerinfo.com operates the FreeCreditReport.com web site, which is widely known for a series of high-visibility advertisements encouraging consumers to keep tabs on their credit scores. The sit Read more…
The governments proposal for a massive pensions shake-up is good in many ways, but it wont help anyone over the age of 61.
Earlier this month, the government published proposals for a massive pensions shake-up. The heart of the plan is that most pensioners will receive a flat State Pension of £140 a week. This will replace the current basic State Pension which pays £102.15 a week. This is a good idea in many ways. The trouble is, not everyone will benefit.
Now I should stress that these are just proposals at the moment and the government is now asking for feedback. In fact, the government has asked for feedback on two different proposals. The first proposal – known as ‘Option 1′ – is a fairly limited tweak of the current system whereas the second proposal – ‘Option 2′ – is much more radical.
Option 2 is the one that boosts the state pension to £140 a week and is the most likely to be implemented. So in this
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–This can’t be good. The Associated Press reports that, “Scores of Iranian students have attacked the Saudi Arabian embassy with firebombs to protest the Gulf country’s role in cracking down on anti-government protesters in Bahrain.”
–But first, one way of looking at the emerging events in the Middle East—and this is the way we looked at it last month’s issue of Australian Wealth Gameplan—is that everything is quickly becoming a proxy war between the Iranians and the Saudis. That is a gross simplification, of course, given the local complexities in each country.
–But the main idea is that the modern national borders in the whole region are fairly recent (historically speaking) and fairly artificial. If there was ever a time to re-draw them, now would be it. Surely all
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