Printing photos at home is expensive
Let’s cut right to the chase. What does it cost to print your own photos? Everybody likes the convenience of printing their own photos at home, but nobody is satisfied with the quality. I will show you that the cost is actually much higher and the quality is much lower when you print your own photos at home as opposed to having them printed by a professional developer. I will also let you know what a good alternative is. First, let’s look at the costs of doing your photos at home.
Cost of printing at home
Supplies and cost w/tax
Med. Quality Photo paper $19.66/100 sheets.
Color and B&W Ink $61.61.
Photo Printer $382.49.
Photo Editing Software $53.11.
Total cost $516.87.
Total cost per Photo $1.64.
WOW! That is expensive
Before you say I am crazy I will prove that these are conservative costs. The medium quality photo paper was priced on clearance at Office Max. The monotone and color cartridges were priced as a combo deal. The photo printer was the PSC 950 which is in most regards a cheap printer. Last but not least the editing software was not Adobe Photoshop which can cost over $500. It was a cheap Microsoft version that will do simple editing on images and video.
This is also assuming that you only print 10 photos per week, and that you only use your printer and software for two years. If we used a more realistic number for instance 10 photos per month then the cost per photo would go up to $3.04. For the ink I used 60 full color sheets per set of cartridges. I have never been able to print over 20. With other printing on that same printer I only got about 8 full pages out of the cartridges. The pictures were so bad that they ended up in the garbage. So the prices of photos can range from $1.64 per photo to over $3. Pretty costly for prints that you cannot display or hang on your walls.
Printing them online and having them mailed or picked up costs much less?
How about uploading your pictures to a professional and having them ready to pick up in one hour? Or uploading them to a professional and having quality prints mailed to you for prices as low as 12 cents per print?
Digital Photo Printing
Utah Wedding Photographer
Online Photo Mugs
Are you looking for a great down payment source for your next real estate purchase? Are you otherwise qualified for a mortgage loan, but unable to pull together a down payment? Consider tapping the accumulated cash value in your whole life policy. By doing so, you are merely shifting your investment between two investment vehicles.
In today’s relatively easy mortgage market, getting an 85% -95% mortgage advance rate is not that difficult if you have excellent credit. If your credit standing is less than stellar or if you can not muster a down payment, you may need substantial cash at the closing. An excellent place to look for cash is your whole life policies (or perhaps those of a parent).
The advantages of tapping your accumulated cash value are:
• The loan probably will not affect your credit rating since insurance companies rarely report loans to the credit agencies.
• Policy loan repayment can be very flexible as long as you pay the interest on the loan.
• Unless you borrow the majority of the accumulated cash value, you can even service interest payments for a short while by borrowing more cash against the policy.
• Interest on cash value loans is reasonable, usually between 6%-8% per year.
• If you can service the interest for several years, you might be able to repay the loan by refinancing your real estate (assuming the real estate appreciates).
• In general, because of the financial leverage involved in real estate, the cash borrowed from your insurance policy used to acquire real estate will grow much faster than keeping it in your insurance policy.
There are certainly some drawbacks to borrowing against your policies. Here are a few:
• Whole life policies from stable insurance companies are usually lower risk investments than real estate. Real estate is an illiquid investment that does not always appreciate. In fact, real estate can sometimes drop in value, wiping out your equity position.
• The interest on a policy loan is not tax deductible, while the interest on a second mortgage/home equity loan usually is (if you have either of these choices).
• If you allow the life insurance policy to lapse or default in making loan payments, it can result in a significant tax liability. Any termination in your policy will trigger such an event. If you have borrowed against the policy, you may not have sufficient cash to pay the taxes.
• Loans against a policy reduce the policy’s death benefit. There would be less money available for the policy’s beneficiary.
Notwithstanding the disadvantages of borrowing against cash value to help finance real estate, I think this source represents an excellent opportunity for young would-be homeowners and real estate investors. If you are first time home buyer, this source could be just the one to help you complete your first purchase.
George Parker is a co-founder, Director and Executive Vice President of Leasing Technologies International, Inc. (”LTI”). A twenty-five year industry leader, George is a frequent panelist and author of several articles and e-books, including “Using Venture Leasing As A Competitive Weapon” and “101 Equipment Leasing Tips”.
Headquartered in Wilton, CT, LTI is a leasing firm specializing nationally in direct equipment financing and vendor leasing programs for emerging growth and later-stage, venture capital-backed companies. More information about LTI is available at: http://www.ltileasing.com
