According to stats from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the I-95 corridor between the southeast and New England includes five of the 10 U.S. states carrying the highest fines for speeding--Virginia, Georgia, North Carolina, Maryland and New Hampshire. All hit up speeders for a maximum of $500 or more for a first offense. Judges in Carolina and Georgia, not to mention 16 other states, have the discretion to add jail time.

In grade school I learned that "borrowing" entails the obligation to pay back. How quaint. this is from today's Wall Street Journal. What a "surprise": many people have theft in their hearts.


December 21, 2007

Fraud Seen as a Driver
In Wave of Foreclosures
Atlanta Ring Scams
Bear Stearns, Getting
$6.8 Million in Loans
By MICHAEL CORKERY
December 21, 2007; Page A1

ATLANTA -- Skyrocketing foreclosures are a testament to how easy it was to borrow from mortgage lenders in recent years.

It may also have been easy to steal from them, to judge from a multimillion-dollar fraud scheme that federal prosecutors unraveled here in Atlanta. The criminals obtained $6.8 million in mortgages from Bear Stearns Cos., including a $1.8 million mortgage to Calvin Wright, a New Yorker who told the investment bank that he and his wife earned more than $50,000 a month as the top officers of a marketing firm. Mr. Wright submitted statements showing assets of $3 million, a federal indictment alleged.

In fact, Mr. Wright was a phone technician earning only $105,000 a year, with assets of only $35,000, and his wife was a homemaker. The palm-tree-lined mansion they purchased with Bear Stearns's $1.8 million recently sold out of foreclosure for just $1.1 million. Bear Stearns, meanwhile, posted the first quarterly loss in its 84-year history as it wrote down $1.9 billion of mortgage assets yesterday. (See related article1.)

Fraud goes a long way toward explaining why mortgage defaults and foreclosures are rocking financial institutions, Wall Street and the economy. The Federal Bureau of Investigation says the share of its white-collar agents and analysts devoted to prosecuting mortgage fraud has risen to 28%, up from 7% in 2003. Suspicious Activity Reports, which many lenders are required to file with the Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network when they suspect fraud, shot up nearly 700% between 2000 and 2006.

In 2006, losses from fraud could total a record $4.5 billion, a 100% increase from the previous year, says Arthur Prieston, chairman of the Prieston Group, which provides lenders with mortgage-fraud insurance and training. The surge ranges from one-off cases of fudging and fibbing to organized criminal rings. The FBI says its active mortgage-fraud cases have increased to 1,210 this year from 436 in 2003. In some regions, fraud may account for half of all foreclosures. "We've created a culture where a great many people know how to take advantage of the system," says Mr. Prieston.
ALSO TODAY

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• Pricing Probes on Wall Street Gather Steam2
• SEC Probes Washington Mutual on Appraisals3
• Econ Blog: Has Home-Price Bubble Been Exaggerated?4

Yet the system itself bears blame. The evolution of mortgages into a securities instrument turned loan origination into a competition. Caution gave way to a push for speed and volume. Embroiled in an all-out war for market share, issuers reduced barriers to credit, for example, by offering so-called "stated-income" loans, which require no proof of income. "The stated-income loan deserves the nickname used by many in the industry, the 'liar's loan,' " says the Mortgage Asset Research Institute, which works with lenders to prevent fraud. A recent review of a sampling of about 100 stated-income loans revealed that almost 60% of the stated amounts were exaggerated by more than 50%, MARI says.

It didn't take a rocket scientist to steal a fortune from mortgage lenders in recent years. That much is clear from the Atlanta scheme. It was perpetrated in large part by a 23-year-old college dropout named Gregory Jerome Wings Jr., aka G-Money. His accomplices included a young nightclub owner, along with the director of an underground documentary called "Crackheads Gone Wild," a cautionary tale about drug addiction.

Their scam was garden variety: recruit borrowers with good credit to apply for gigantic loans, often of the stated-income variety, using false income and asset statements. Find a mortgage broker willing to submit false information, and find appraisers who will approve inflated values. The perpetrators line their pockets with the proceeds, using some as down payments or for future renovations. Some buyers diverted proceeds to themselves through shell companies.

The brazenness of the scheme is illustrated by the case of Mr. Wright, the New York telephone worker who posed as a highly paid executive to obtain a $1.8 million mortgage from Bear Stearns. Recruited into the scheme by an acquaintance in Atlanta, Mr. Wright, with the help of ring leaders, diverted hundreds of thousands of dollars from that Bear Stearns mortgage to himself, to Mr. Wings and to others in the scheme, according to a federal indictment.

In the very same week, Mr. Wright obtained a $1.9 million mortgage on a second value-inflated mansion near Atlanta, this time from BankFirst, a unit of Minneapolis-based Marshall BankFirst Corp. This deal also brought enormous spoils to Mr. Wright, Mr. Wings and other accomplices.

"It was so easy, it's incredible," says Akil Secret, attorney for Mr. Wright, who has pleaded guilty to bank fraud and is awaiting sentencing.

'Seemed Clean and OK'

As profits from the scheme fattened their wallets, these young men became the envy of their peers, especially since their actions involved none of the dangers of street crime. "You see a guy who is 23 and he's driving a fancy car. You go into clubs and everyone seems to know him, and you kind of want to be like him," says defense attorney Rickey Richardson, explaining how his client, Daryl Smith, got involved in the scheme. "This wasn't drugs. This wasn't guns. This seemed clean and OK."
[art]

Residents of some fancy Atlanta suburbs spotted the scheme. They became suspicious when new homes in their neighborhoods sold for sky-high prices, then remained vacant. After the same individual bought several such homes in one ritzy development, neighbors alerted authorities. One homeowner who helped expose the fraud and other schemes in his neighborhood now carries a loaded handgun in his truck. "This is serious stuff," he says. "We are putting people in prison for many, many years."

Since federal authorities issued an indictment in April 2006, Mr. Wings, Mr. Smith, Mr. Wright and about 10 others have pleaded guilty to various counts, including bank fraud, and are awaiting sentencing. Another ringleader was convicted in federal court last month. Their sentences could be lengthy: In an unrelated case, an Atlanta attorney with no prior criminal record was sentenced in August 2005 to 30 years in federal prison on a mortgage-fraud conviction. Mr. Wings declined to comment for this story, as did Messrs. Wright and Smith.

In the wake of their downfall, debate has been intense about how such an unaccomplished group could defraud top-tier financial institutions out of millions.

Prosecutors call the scheme sophisticated, noting its reliance upon forged and falsified documentation.

Lenders agree. Bear Stearns says the scheme evaded its antifraud efforts by supplying false information at every step of the application process. "We as an industry cannot eliminate fraud entirely," Tom Marano, head of mortgages and asset-backed securities for Bear Sterns, said in a statement about the Atlanta ring. "We can and do continue to develop systems and detection techniques that evolve with the complexity of criminal schemes.'"

But others contend that the Atlanta case illustrates the recklessness with which lenders were issuing mortgages in recent years. "This case should have been an indictment of the mortgage industry," says Patrick Deering, an Atlanta defense attorney involved in the case.

In an eye-opening setback for prosecutors, Mr. Deering and other defense attorneys successfully defended three home builders against charges that they had participated in the scheme. Prosecutors had attacked the home builders for failing to raise red flags when they witnessed mortgages being issued far in excess of what the builders were being paid.

On the Offensive

But some defense attorneys went on the offensive and attacked lenders for failing to guard against fraud. Particularly illuminating was the testimony of Lucy Lynch, a former vice president of mortgage operations at BankFirst.

"Fraud was not really a consideration in our world," Ms. Lynch testified, according to a trial transcript.

Ms. Lynch said the bank relied on an outside "loan officer" at a reputable mortgage broker to serve as its "eyes and ears" in the real-estate transactions. As it turned out, that person was indicted as part of the fraud ring. Ms. Lynch stressed that the bank took measures such as running all loan applications through a software program designed to detect fraud. "And things that didn't seem quite right, an underwriter could quickly pick those things out," Ms. Lynch said, according to a trial transcript. "So as far as having an actual policy or procedure around fraud, we didn't think it was necessary, quite frankly."

A total of $4.9 million in loans from BankFirst were used by the Atlanta fraud ring. In some cases, the bank gave its blessing to closing documents that showed unexplained payments of hundreds of thousands of dollars to obscure companies that turned out to be owned by the fraudsters. On three different Atlanta-area homes over a three-month period starting in late 2005, closing documents approved by BankFirst showed large payouts to the same companies.

Ms. Lynch said the bank assumed that the cash was going to subcontractors for construction work. But the bank never asked for invoices. In an interview, Ms. Lynch says the bank was primarily checking to make sure the borrower wasn't being charged any additional fees or debt. "We didn't do anything different from the rest of the industry,'' she said, adding that she believes her testimony helped convict three perpetrators of the fraud -- two borrowers and a real-estate agent who helped lead the ring.

Asked in court why the pattern of payouts didn't raise any red flags, Ms. Lynch responded: "Do you have any idea how many loans came into BankFirst during that time period?" She said BankFirst typically allowed a "15-minute window" from the time it received closing documents by fax to the time it released the loan proceeds to the borrower.

Ultimately, prosecutors failed to convict any of the three home builders. Charges against one were dropped. Another was the subject of a mistrial. And the third was acquitted before the case went to the jury. "These were the wrong people on trial," says Mr. Deering, whose client, home builder Randall Tharp, was acquitted.

One of the biggest losers in the Atlanta scheme was Bear Stearns. A total of $6.8 million in Bear Stearns loans were used by the enterprise. The fourth-largest mortgage that Bear Stearns originated in 2006 went to a borrower in the Atlanta scheme. That involved a mansion on which Bear Stearns lent nearly $3 million. Today, that mansion is in foreclosure and listed at $1.75 million.

Bear Stearns says falsified income and asset documents are difficult to detect "if they are part of a sophisticated fraud ring." In the case of the $1.8 million loan that Bear Stearns issued to Mr. Wright, the New York telephone worker, the company says it verified Mr. Wright's employment and assets.

But Mr. Wright's attorney, Mr. Secret, says, "Bear Stearns certainly couldn't have verified any of the assets or any of the money. It simply wasn't there."

A relative newcomer to the mortgage-origination business, Bear Stearns in 2005 created Bear Stearns Residential Mortgage to focus on "Alt-A" mortgages, a category between prime and subprime loans. Bear says its Alt-A loans included stated-income mortgages that required verification of assets.

During its first full year of business in 2006, Bear Stearns Residential Mortgage originated 19,715 mortgages for a combined $4.37 billion, according to data compiled by the Federal Reserve and analyzed by The Wall Street Journal.

Bear Stearns Residential Mortgage rejected about 13% of applications, compared with an average denial rate of 29% nationally, according to the Fed data. Bear Stearns says that it had a lower denial rate because all of its applicants had already been screened through its "on line pre-qualifying" site before they submitted a formal application.

Since the scheme, Bear Stearns says it has enhanced its monitoring of payouts listed on closing statements. BankFirst stopped issuing residential mortgages altogether, citing the declining market.

Some banks victimized by the Atlanta ring say they depended in part on a party called the closing attorney to protect their interests. But often, lenders neither choose nor pay for the closing attorney: The buyer does. In this case, the closing attorney was part of the fraud ring. The 58-year-old lawyer, Raymond Costanzo Jr., known in the ring as "Uncle Joe," signed off on several fraudulent sales, and collected $250,000 from the scheme, the indictment alleges. In 2006, Mr. Costanzo pleaded guilty to bank fraud and is awaiting sentencing.

Of course, the Atlanta scheme wouldn't have worked if not for appraisers willing to approve values far in excess of what builders were charging for new homes. Indeed, Bear Stearns and BankFirst say they ordered multiple appraisals of the homes they financed. Yet no evidence has emerged of appraisers receiving kickbacks. And no appraisers got indicted.

Artificially Raised Values

In some neighborhoods, the fraud scheme itself may have artificially raised values. Another explanation is that the appraisal market is fiercely competitive. Experts say some appraisers may offer inflated values in exchange for their standard fee of several hundred dollars -- a strategy that can win business without exposing an appraiser to charges of fraud. "Appraisers get sucked into these schemes because they are starving for work and many of them don't know what the heck they are doing," says Carl Heckman, co-founder of the Georgia Real Estate Fraud Prevention and Awareness Coalition, composed of appraisers, lenders, mortgage brokers and residents.

In the neighborhoods where the Atlanta scheme operated, values have plummeted. Many homes associated with the scheme are now in foreclosure. Some have sold for as low as 50% of what buyers in the fraud ring paid. "The banks are getting more and more aggressive in their pricing because they don't want to own these homes," says Warren Lovett, a real estate agent with Coldwell Banker in Atlanta.

Mr. Lovett has taken listings for about 60 foreclosed properties this year. He estimates that half of the foreclosures he's encountered are due to fraud.

--Mark Whitehouse, Rick Brooks and Stephanie Chen contributed to this article.


URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119820566870044163.html

The most thieving US cities. 
A new slant to southern hospitality. Then, there's politically correct Seattle.

These are places, among the country's 50 most populated cities, with the highest per capita incidences of property crimes, as measured last year by the FBI.

Memphis, Tenn. leads the list. For every 100,000 people, there are 8,358 property crimes committed--about 19% higher than in runner-up Charlotte, N.C.

Consider this recent burglary chronicled by The Commercial Appeal, a Tennessee newspaper: A man walked into a business in a Memphis suburb and asked the owner for details about her shop's security cameras. The shop owner answered all of his questions. The man went away. Two hours later, apparently deciding that the security system wasn't up to snuff, he returned to pull off a successful heist.

"consumer self-service retirement planning tools", "retirement planning guides and advice" property crime

Six Car Care Myths and Mistakes
by Peter Valdes-Dapena
Monday, September 24, 2007provided byCNNMoney.com

Myth: Time to 'winterize'
Car maintenance doesn't need to be tied to the seasons. Other than possibly changing to winter tires, modern cars don't require special attention at this time of year the way that your parents' car might have.

"There's really not anything to do anymore," says John Ibbotson, workshop supervisor at Consumer Reports' Connecticut test track. Ibbotson maintains the magazine's fleet of test vehicles.

At least nothing you shouldn't be doing already. In other words, check your owner's manual, not the weather forecast.

Mistake: I don't need a tire gauge
You should regularly check the air pressure in your tires using a tire gauge. That's especially true now, because you're more likely to find them low as winter approaches. The air inside your tires is getting colder too, so it's shrinking. Even if air isn't leaving your tires, the pressure inside is going down because of contraction.

Your tires will lose about one to two pounds of pressure for every ten degrees of outside temperature, says Sinclair.

Myth: Wait, it's still warming up
Some people insist that your car will last longer if you let it idle until the engine reaches normal operating temperature.

It's true that running cold is harder on an engine than running warm. The oil is thicker, and it takes a little time - very little, really - for it to flow to all the parts of the engine that need it.

But letting the car sit while the engine is running doesn't help anything. It just wastes gas and pumps out needless fumes. You might as well get on your way.

Myth: Coolant lasts forever (or not at all)
Some drivers never bother about changing their coolant. Others are probably changing it too often.

You should change your coolant about every four years, Ibbotson advises. Coolant chemicals last longer than they used to, and newer engines aren't going to be damaged by leaving it in long.

Mistake: Honest Abe knows when you need new tires
You may have heard about doing the "penny test" to see when it's time to get new tires. Some experts want to toss that coin test in favor of the quarter.

But now some experts advise a more conservative approach. Instead of Lincoln's head on a penny, use George Washington's head on a quarter. That's about 4/32, or 1/8, of an inch. In track tests conducted by the tire Web site TireRack.com, using a quarter instead of a penny resulted in 24 percent shorter wet-road stopping distances.

If you can see Washington's wig, your tires are as close as you'll want to get to being bald.

Myth: I need to change my oil...a lot
Many people still believe they should change their car's oil every three month or 3,000 miles. But that advice doesn't take into account improvements in engines or oils. Not that changing it more often is bad for your car.

"It doesn't hurt the engine, says AAA's Sinclair. "It might hurt your pocketbook."

Rather than relying on an arbitrary - and outdated - rule of thumb, read your cars owner's manual for the recommended oil change interval. It will usually be longer than three months/3,000 miles. Many cars can go twice that long before needing an oil change, says Sinclair.

New synthetic oils can be left in even longer, sometimes tens of thousands of miles, says Sinclair.

But Consumer Reports' Ibbotson recommends sticking with the car manufacturer's suggested oil change interval regardless of what the lubricant's manufacturer may claim.
Copyrighted, CNNMoney. All Rights Reserved.

"consumer self-service retirement planning tools", "retirement planning guides and advice" RETIREMENT & auto safety

What Deposits the FDIC Protects
By TERRI CULLEN
The Wall Street Journal
November 18, 2007

As the financial industry struggles to absorb billions of dollars worth of bad loans, worries about bank failures are growing. That makes it important for depositors to understand the protection provided by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

Just last week, a Citigroup analyst speculated that online brokerage E*Trade Financial could see a run on its banking unit and need to file for bankruptcy court protection.

E*Trade said the comment was "irresponsible" and that it is "well capitalized by regulatory standards."

Bank failures are rare: Of 8,600 banks insured by the FDIC, only two have failed this year -- Internet-only savings and loan NetBank and Metropolitan Savings Bank of Pittsburgh.

The FDIC says "historically" depositors are paid -- up to the insurance limit -- within a few days after a bank closes, usually the next business day. Depositors can access the funds by opening an account at another bank or by receiving a check for principal and interest.

For example, when NetBank failed in September, ING Groep purchased $1.5 billion of the online bank's deposits and customers had immediate access to their savings.

Generally, checking and savings accounts, money-market deposit accounts and certificates of deposit are insured by the FDIC up to a limit of $100,000 per depositor, per FDIC-insured bank.

If a consumer has $100,000 in a savings account at one bank and a $100,000 in a money-market account at another, the depositor is covered for the full $200,000. If the two accounts were with a single bank, only $100,000 would be insured.

If savings are held in a joint account, each account holder is separately insured up to $100,000; your half counts toward your $100,000 limit at that bank.

Retirement accounts are also insured at FDIC-insured banks, including individual retirement accounts, Roth IRAs, Simplified Employee Pension (SEP) IRAs, Savings Incentive Match Plan for Employees (SIMPLE) IRAs, certain deferred compensation plan accounts, self-directed defined contribution plan accounts, and self-directed Keogh plan accounts.

All your retirement accounts at the same insured bank are combined and the total is insured up to $250,000 -- above and beyond any insured nonretirement accounts at the same bank.

Deposits in revocable trust accounts -- payable-on-death accounts and living trusts -- are also insured at FDIC-insured banks. Under certain conditions, each beneficiary of the account is separately insured up to $100,000. But these accounts can be complex beasts, and so the agency recommends that account owners call (877) 275-3342 to determine who and what is covered.

"consumer self-service retirement planning tools", "retirement planning guides and advice" RETIREMENT & FINANCIAL SAFETY

THE JOURNAL REPORT:
Guide To Social Security
The toughest questions. The best calculators. The coolest strategies. And a lot more.
By By GLENN RUFFENACH

"consumer self-service retirement planning tools", "retirement planning guides and advice" Social Security Questions and Answers

Senior Citizen Homes & Communities

How to Fit Your Treasures into Smaller Retirement Living Space

To accent treasured possessions while transforming space into beautiful, functional home is goal of Redesign for Retirement Living

By Melissa H. Kuzma

Nov. 2, 2007 - Like many children of the “Sandwich Generation,” Sue Thomas found herself helping her mother move into a local 55+ community. As a decorator with over 20 years of experience, Sue immediately made the connection between redesign and retirement communities. Why Redesign is Ideal for Retirement Community Living

Redesign is a form of interior decorating that emphasizes the use of existing furniture, artwork, and other treasures. Older adults have had a lifetime to accumulate furniture, mementos, and family heirlooms so they typically do not want or need to purchase a room full of new furniture.

The decision to move to a retirement community is often followed by the difficult task of downsizing. By the day of the move, only the most precious possessions make the transition. It makes sense to want the treasures of one’s life to be displayed and used to their fullest potential.

Most people have used their furniture and grouped their accessories the same way for years. This familiarity makes it difficult to envision new groupings or uses. A redesigner has the advantage of looking at these items with a decorator’s eye a fresh perspective, enabling the redesigner to create beautiful new arrangements their clients never would have considered.


Before... After...

Though most retirement communities have employees who can help place furniture and hang pictures, they are typically not interior decorators or designers. Artwork is rarely hung at the right height and furniture is not used to its fullest aesthetic or functional capacity. Using each piece to its best advantage is an essential part of redesign in smaller spaces.
http://seniorjournal.com/NEWS/Housing/2007/7-11-02-HowToFit.htm

By Kathleen Fackelmann, USA TODAY
Connie Lesko's not looking for the jolt that a cup of hot java offers.

Instead, she's hoping new research that shows caffeine may protect against Alzheimer's pans out: The 56-year-old from Wimauma, Fla., has two parents with this incurable disease.

KIM PAINTER: Good news, coffee lovers

"I've never been much of a coffee drinker," she says. "But now I'm thinking — what the heck — I'll have a cup."

Lesko and others are betting on research suggesting that caffeine will offer protection not just against Alzheimer's, but also against Parkinson's. Together these degenerative brain diseases affect about 6 million people in the USA. Cases of both diseases are expected to explode in the next few decades.

"Boomers are coming of age, and large numbers of them will develop neurodegenerative diseases," says Zaven Khachaturian, president and CEO of the Lou Ruvo Brain Institute in Las Vegas and the former director of the Alzheimer's unit at the National Institute on Aging.

The coming epidemic has fueled a search for drugs and other interventions that might slow the onset of these diseases, he says. If research by Gary Arendash and others holds up, boomers might be able to get some protection simply by enjoying an espresso.

"Caffeine is the most widely used psychoactive drug in the world," says Arendash, a researcher at the Byrd Alzheimer Institute in Tampa. "We think it might protect against Alzheimer's."

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Consumers Union Offers “Guide to the Security Freeze”

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Starting November 1, consumers in all 50 states will be able to freeze access to their credit files at all three major credit bureaus to prevent identity thieves from opening fraudulent accounts in their names. By that date, all three major credit bureaus will offer “security freeze” protection to all consumers living in the eleven states that have not passed laws requiring it and the five states that currently limit this protection to identity theft victims.

To help consumers learn how to take advantage of this powerful identity theft safeguard, Consumers Union, the nonprofit publisher of Consumer Reports, is making available online an updated “Guide to Security Freeze Protection” at www.FinancialPrivacyNow.org

"consumer self-service retirement planning tools", "retirement planning guides and advice" identity theft

These banks are tops at protecting consumers from ID fraud
MarketWatch
By Andrea Coombes 

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Bank of America Corp. took top honors for the second year in a row in a report ranking the largest U.S. banks on how well they protect their customers from fraud and identity theft.

J.P. Morgan Chase, Washington Mutual Inc. and Wells Fargo Co. tied for second place, and Citibank came in third in the study published Wednesday by Javelin Strategy & Research.

The study looked at 25 banks that together hold 50% of U.S. checking-account deposits... The study measured banks' policies for preventing, detecting and resolving fraud, focusing on measures that consumers experience, not internal bank security policies. For instance, banks got top marks for alerting customers of unusual transactions -- say, a wire transfer to a foreign country or an unusually big withdrawal amount...alerts are particularly important because almost one out of two cases of identity fraud are first detected by the individual.

Lowest-ranked were Comerica with a score of 24, Banco Popular with 31 and Bank of the West with 35.

"consumer self-service retirement planning tools", "retirement planning guides and advice" Rettirement fraud

Retirement outlook not as bleak as many think, AgeLab head says
by Robert Powell
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
provided by MarketWatch

Most retirement gurus are extremely pessimistic about the future. Some are modestly hopeful. But there is one who is "wildly optimistic" about what's in store for the millions upon millions of aging baby boomers. Meet Joseph Coughlin, Ph.D., director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's AgeLab.

In short, the AgeLab is working on a future where older citizens not just add years to their life but add life to their years. And it's a life that will include fun, purpose, health, wealth and -- not surprisingly -- technology. "We see that it will be a great time to grow old," said Coughlin, who last week released, along with The Hartford, research about retirement rationalizations.

more

"consumer self-service retirement planning tools", "retirement planning guides and advice" retirement preparation,, retirement, financial considerations, health costs

Things the DMV Will Not Tell You
by Kirsten Vala
SmartMoney.com
Thursday, November 1, 2007

1. "It's our pleasure to confuse you."
2. "Your used car could be a ticking time bomb on wheels." Remember those pics of flooded car lots after Hurricane Katrina? You could end up buying one of those cars today and never know it.
3. "When it comes to car theft, we're part of the problem." There's another way criminals take advantage of flimsy DMV car records: stolen car's vehicle-identification number is switched with that of a junked car, and a clean title is obtained from the DMV.
4. "You think getting your license is a hassle -- try filing a complaint."
5. "We're just as good at breaking the law as enforcing it..." DMV employees must deal with the public and handle sensitive information, but unsavory characters can slip through anyway.
6. "...and we all but enable identity theft."
7. "Just because you can't see doesn't mean you can't drive." A 2007 study by market-research firm TNS showed that one in six drivers would fail a state test if they took it today.
8. "Fake ID? We fall for it all the time."

"consumer self-service retirement planning tools", "retirement planning guides and advice" DMV secrets, DMV driver secrets

AP
Economy Grows at Brisk 3.9 Percent Pace in Summer, Best Performance in 1 1/2 Years
Wednesday October 31, 10:23 am ET
By Jeannine Aversa, AP Economics Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The economy picked up speed in the summer, growing at a brisk 3.9 percent pace, the fastest in 1 1/2 years and an impressive performance even as a credit crunch plunged the housing market deeper into turmoil.

The latest snapshot of the country's economic health, released by the Commerce Department on Wednesday, suggested that the economy is demonstrating much resilience and thus far holding up well to the strains in the housing and credit markets, which had intensified during the third quarter and rocked Wall Street.

A second report from the department showed construction spending rose 0.3 percent in September, the best showing in four months. All-time high spending in both commercial construction by private builders and government projects more than offset weakness in home building.

For the entire July-to-September quarter, individuals ratcheted up their spending. U.S. businesses sold more goods abroad and boosted some investment at home. Those were some of the main factors helping to push up overall economic activity during that period. The ill effects of the housing slump and credit crunch, however, didn't deter consumers in the summer.

"consumer self-service retirement planning tools", "retirement planning guides and advice" Economy growth, US Economy snapshot

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety
Top Safety Pick 2007 award winners

Large cars: Audi A6, 2008 Ford Taurus with optional electronic stability control, 2008 Mercury Sable with optional electronic stability control, Volvo S80,

Midsize cars: Audi A4, Saab 9-3, Subaru Legacy with optional electronic stability control

Midsize convertibles: Saab 9-3, Volvo C70

Minivans: Hyundai Entourage, Kia Sedona

Midsize SUVs: Acura MDX, Acura RDX, Ford Edge, Ford Taurus X, Honda Pilot, Hyundai Santa Fe, Lincoln MKX, Mercedes M class, Subaru B9 Tribeca, Volvo XC90

Small SUVs: Honda CR-V, Subaru Forester with optional electronic stability control

read more

"consumer self-service retirement planning tools", "retirement planning guides and advice" safest 2007 cars

The Best Credit Cards and Financial Services
picks for excellence from credit cards to checking accounts
from Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine, November 2007

Credit cards

BEST CASH-REBATE CARD
American Express Blue Cash

Earn 1% on everyday spending -- gas, grocery and drugstore purchases -- until you reach $6,500, after which you earn 5%.

BEST LOW-RATE CARD
Simmons First National Bank

For consumers with excellent credit, Simmons's no-fee Platinum Visa comes with a fixed rate of 7.25%.

BEST AIRLINE-MILES CARD
Citi Premier Pass Elite

The card costs $75 per year, but it takes only 20,000 points to earn a domestic ticket. And points are easy to acquire.

BEST TRAVEL CARD
Capital One Platinum Plus Mastercard

Capital One doesn't pass on the 1% currency-conversion fee from MasterCard.

GASOLINE CARD
BP Rewards Visa

Earn 5% on gas you buy at BP stations, plus 2% on airline tickets, lodging and rental cars.


Financial services

BEST CHECKING ACCOUNT
ING's Electric Orange

This account pays a minimum 3.5% interest rate and gives you a MasterCard debit card plus free online bill-paying. Send an electronic check or fill out a paper check online that ING will send for you. Bonus: no minimum balance and no fees except for special services, such as stopping a payment.

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Three Ways to Gauge Auto Safety
by Michael Giusti
Friday, October 19, 2007provided byBankrate

When it comes to automotive safety, size does matter -- but it isn't everything.

Increasingly, automakers are turning to a new generation of safety features and design tricks to help make today's vehicles safer than ever. The real standouts are those gadgets, like electronic stability control, designed to help avoid accidents in the first place. But in the end, no amount of engineering can defy the laws of physics when, inevitably, a crash happens.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the federal agency that performs a battery of crash tests on every car sold in the United States, if all other things are equal, a heavier vehicle will generally offer better protection in a crash than a smaller one. This is particularly the case in two-vehicle crashes when a large vehicle is pitted against a smaller one.

More from Bankrate.com:

• Auto Industry Friends Can Help You Save

• Best Mileage: Manual or Automatic?

• The Virtual Car Lot Experience

"If you put your children in a large car, they will be safer than if you put them in a small econobox," says Jonathan Linkov, managing editor of autos at Consumer Reports magazine, which ranks the safest vehicles each year based on crash tests performed by NHTSA and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, which performs its own set of collision trials.

But just because one vehicle has more mass than another doesn't mean it will necessarily offer the most protection, says Joanne Helperin, senior features editor for Edmunds.com.

In a crash, "a lot comes down to technology," she says.

Three aspects of car safety
Car safety comes in three flavors:

• Passive safety features, such as seatbelts and airbags
• Active safety features, designed to help avoid crashes
• Design features that absorb crash energy and protect occupants

Passive safety
When most people think safety features, typically the first things that come to mind are airbags and seatbelts. While they are important features, many people don't realize that all seatbelts and airbags aren't created equal.

The newest generation of airbags, for instance, uses sensors in the seat to judge the size of the passenger and adjusts its force accordingly. This can be a big advantage in the case of a small passenger who might be injured by a full-force airbag deployment.

The location of the airbags also makes a big difference. One of the biggest lifesavers is side-curtain airbags. These airbags, which can be mounted in the side of the seat, in the ceiling, in the doorpost or even in the door itself, offer several types of protection for the occupants.

First, they help in the case of a rollover, Linkov says.

"What happens is the vehicle senses you are about to roll over and it deploys the side curtain airbags. Those then keep your head, torso and arms inside the vehicle and out of harm's way," he says.

The inflating cushion also helps shield you from flying debris that might otherwise do serious damage in a side-impact accident.

This is especially important because, unlike in a head-on or a rear-end accident, where you have a lot of steel between you and the other vehicle, in a side crash, all you have is a thin car door protecting you.

Russ Rader, spokesman for the IIHS, said the benefits are so profound that no vehicle tested by the IIHS has performed well or earned a good rating in the side impact test without side airbags.

Like improved airbags, a seatbelt isn't just a seatbelt anymore. The new generation of seatbelts offers features that help protect passengers more efficiently by using features like energy management and pretensioners, which sense an accident and pull back on the belts to get the passengers into safer positions.

Active safety
The biggest breakthrough in automotive safety over the past few years has been in the features designed to actively avoid accidents in the first place. These include things such as blind spot warning systems that use cameras and sensors to scan your surroundings and sound an alarm if you begin changing lanes while someone is lurking beyond your field of vision. A similar gadget scans the lane ahead of you and begins buzzing if you begin to drift out of your lane -- a handy tool on long, monotonous road trips where you might be prone to drifting off to sleep.

Another gadget designed for long-distance trips is a distance-sensitive cruise control that adjusts your speed automatically if the car in front of you taps on the breaks.

Helperin says one camera-based feature that is becoming more popular the longer it is on the market is the rear parking sensors for large vehicles with big blind spots, such as sport utility vehicles.

"Those are less about saving your life than they are about saving those outside the vehicle," she says. "They are just terrific if you have kids. They help avoid back-over deaths or injuries."

She says with the proliferation of SUVs, cases of accidentally backing over a child playing in a driveway have blossomed. "There is a movement to get more cameras as standard equipment to avoid that kind of accident in the first place," she says.

Car design
Gadgets and niceties aside, all the safety experts agree on one safety feature that is a must-have for all new cars: electronic stability control.

Sold under a variety of names, including dynamic stability control, vehicle stability control, electronic stability program and vehicle stability enhancement, all the systems work in a similar way to keep you safe. Stability control works in concert with your antilock breaks and constantly monitors each wheel. If one starts spinning out of control, like when you take a turn too fast or hit a slick spot, the car's onboard computer automatically applies the brakes on that wheel to bring it, and the car, back under control.

"Stability control is great. It can help keep the vehicle under control in almost any avoidance maneuver," Linkov says.

This device is so promising, the Federal Highway Administration has proposed a rule that would require all manufacturers to begin equipping passenger vehicles under 10,000 pounds with stability control as an optional feature starting with the 2009 model year. The rule will then require manufacturers to make the feature standard equipment on all vehicles by the 2012 model year.

"Stability control is being compared with the seatbelt in terms of the number of lives it can save," Helperin says.

NHTSA maintains a list of cars that offer stability control as an optional feature on its Web site.

In addition to stability control, NHTSA also recommends buyers choose vehicles with side airbags and another cutting-edge technology called variable ride-height suspension. This smart suspension will adjust the center of gravity on high-riding vehicles, such as SUVs, to keep them under control during a turn and help avoid a rollover.

"Rollover prevention is a biggie," Helperin says. "That's because even though rollovers aren't all that common in the grand scheme, they do account for high percentage of the road fatalities each year. These new smart suspensions are great because they help you keep control and avoid the rollover in the first place."

Tale of the test
The experts agree that no matter how much technology you include in a vehicle, it can't keep you completely safe, because, hey, it's called an "accident" for a reason.

And in those accidents, the laws of physics dictate that big typically wins over small, all other things being equal.

But that doesn't mean that the safest thing to buy is the biggest honking thing on the road.

"You've got to remember, even if you buy the biggest thing available, there will always be something bigger," Linkov says. "If you are in a sedan, it might be an SUV, if you are in an SUV, it might be a city bus, or even a semi."

With that in mind, buyers should turn to the crash-test scores for their best fighting chance. Those crash tests are important because they measure things like the correct frame rigidity, safety cage strength and where different components, like the steering column and brake pedals, go during a collision.

"These are things you can't necessarily see on the showroom floor," Linkov says.

And as a rule, these are the things that the more expensive models tend to consider in their designs, Helperin says.

Price of safety
But while many of the safest vehicles on the road come with large price tags, Rader says a keen shopper can now find safe vehicles on almost any budget.

"When we first started crash testing, it tended to be luxury makes that did better early on, but that has changed," Rader says. "Consumers can find very safe vehicles in all price ranges today."

But where cost does tend to correlate to safety is in the options.

"The luxury cars will be the ones that enjoy the best features first," Helperin says. "Then they trickle their way down to the rest of us."

And just as shopping merely by price doesn't necessarily guarantee safety, neither does shopping by reputation.

While many brands, such as Volkswagen, Saab and Volvo all enjoy a reputation for building solid cars, Linkov warns that you should still do your homework.

"One brand may do well with many of their cars, but then have a low-end entry-level one with few features available, and that may not be the safest car around," he says.

Another thing you shouldn't take for granted are convertibles.

"We saw with convertibles, a brand that may make a safe sedan may not hold up as well in a convertible model," Linkov says.

Up until this year, the IIHS didn't test convertibles. Fortunately, though, Rader says his agency was pleased with most models they tested.

"We really were surprised so many convertibles performed so well in these tests," he says.

The key to whether a convertible held up as well as a comparable sedan was how the manufacturer compensated for the lost structural integrity the roof offered.

"The roof is a key component to the structure of these vehicles. When you take it off, you have to compensate in other parts to maintain the rigidity, and that is challenging," he says. "But we found that some manufacturers were doing a very good job."

And, again, there is no way to tell if the engineers did a good job just by looking at it, only by checking the crash-test data.

How to shop
If all these details seem overwhelming, the experts say the best thing to do is to start by looking for a vehicle that fits your lifestyle. If you know you need to haul construction material to a work site, don't look at anything other than pickups. If you have seven children, then a sedan is out of the question. If you need great fuel efficiency, then an SUV probably isn't going to be your best bet.

Then, once you choose the type that fits your lifestyle, look for vehicles that score well on both the IIHS and the NHTSA crash testing in that class.

Both sets of tests look for different strengths and weaknesses. "Ideally they should do well in both sets of tests," Rader says.

But beware. Just because a sedan performed best in its class, that doesn't necessarily mean it would be safer than an SUV that tested in the middle of its class. That's because the crash tests generally only show how a vehicle would hold up in a crash if it collided with a similar vehicle. But on the other hand, that supersized SUV may be more inclined to roll over. Again, the choice between different types of vehicles should be about what fits your lifestyle the best.

Finally, look carefully at all the optional safety equipment.

"But you know, if you are looking for a vehicle that is going to protect you in a wide range of scenarios, the safest are midsize and larger sedans and minivans," Rader says. "Statistics show us they have the lowest death rate of anything else on the road."

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by Tom Herman
Friday, October 19, 2007
The Wall Street Journal

Many Fail to Claim Deductions Tied To Local Outlays

Millions of people overlooked an important tax break and made other costly mistakes earlier this year on their 2006 returns, according to a recent report by the U.S. Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, a Treasury Department unit.

For example, nearly 2.1 million taxpayers who were eligible to deduct their state and local sales taxes didn't do so, up 50% from the previous year. These people missed taking advantage of potentially $3.6 billion in deductions,

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Today's Seniors Are Smarter
Tests Suggest Less Mental Decline for Current Generation of Elderly
By Salynn Boyles
WebMD Medical News
Reviewed by Louise Chang, MD

Oct. 5, 2007 -- Senior moments notwithstanding, elderly people are smarter today than they were less than a generation ago, a new study suggests.

Researchers found that when it comes to mental acuity, 74 is the new 59

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provided byTheStreet.com

Lack of preparation can come back to haunt retirees. Veto says that the most important factor in determining a happy retirement isn't how much money people have saved for it but how much they have planned for it. This article is a must read.

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Means Test Sought for Medicare Drug Plan

By Jonathan Weisman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, October 5, 2007; Page A01

The Bush administration is advancing a proposal to levy higher premiums and deductibles on upper-income seniors enrolled in Medicare's new prescription drug benefit, raising fees on beneficiaries with incomes over about $80,000 a year, administration officials said yesterday.

The administration is working with Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) to attach to upcoming legislation a "means testing" provision that would save the government billions of dollars. In the past, however, similar proposals have been blocked by the furious response of seniors.


The Senate rejected a similar proposal from Sen. John Ensign (R) in March.

"You say it saves money and these people can afford it, but it also eats away at the incomes of seniors. It erodes their sense of the reliability on these federal programs, and it certainly erodes political support," said John Rother, policy director for AARP, the powerful senior lobby. Does the senator propose to increase his OWN health plan costs without voting himself a pay raise?

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The Harris Poll ®#96, October 2, 2007
Nation Financially Divided as Two in Five Say Household’s Finances Have Improved in Past Year and Two in Five Say They Have Gotten Worse

However, Plurality Expects Things to Get Better Six Months From Now

The roller coaster ride continues on Wall Street with the Dow Jones fluctuating up and down, but still close to its record high. The housing woes continue with inventory staying on the market longer and home sales dropping. American attitudes towards their own finances are just as mixed as these leading indicators. When compared to a year ago, two in five (39%) say their household’s financial condition has improved while almost the same number (38%) say it has gotten worse and one-quarter (23%) say it has remained the same.

Regionally, there are some differences in household finances. Those in the West are most likely to think things are going well as 45 percent say things have improved and just three in ten (31%) say things have worsened. (read more)

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Why Less Medical Treatment May Be Good For You
By Nancy Shute
Posted September 26, 2007

The more medical care you receive, the sicker you'll get. That's the stark message in Overtreated: Why Too Much Medicine is Making Us Sicker and Poorer, Shannon Brownlee's new book. Brownlee, a senior fellow at the New America Foundation (and a former senior writer at U.S. News & World Report), examined research from around the country on which medical treatments actually make people healthier and what individuals can to do ensure that healthcare doesn't kill them.
Related News

* Do You Actually Need a Physical Exam?
* Health Screening Tests That Everyone Needs
* Navigating the Hospital (July 15)
* Video: Health Features
* Health Community

Most of us think that going to a medical specialist means we get better care. But you say that's not the case. How come?
THIS IS THE LINKTO THE REST OF THE ARTICLE:

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By Nell Henderson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, September 12, 2007; Page HE01

When the first Marine Corps Marathon took place, in 1976, the oldest runner to finish the 26.2-mile race was 58 years old. On the race's 30th anniversary last year, the oldest finisher was 82 -- one individual's testament to how Americans are aging differently than they used to. So who's "old" these days? The 60-year-old with twins in preschool? The 65-year-old launching a second career? The 70-year-old with no gray hair, no wrinkles and great cleavage?

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In a world of self-important talking heads, who don't seem to heed the advice they give to retirees, there are two sources of outstanding retirement financial counseling that can benefit all. One of them is Ben Stein, the economist who also writes for Yahoo Finance, the other is Motley Fool, who's members have reaped substantial financial returns, while never sacrificing safety. The Motley philosophy goes something like this, ..."How to Retire in Style. Human beings, it is said, are distinguished from other species by our ability to think ahead and to plan ahead. That may be true. It is also true, though, that most of us have great trouble thinking about the long term and preparing for it. We're too caught up in the daily "thick of thin things." In this way we carry with us the immediacy of our animal cousins...". Ben Stein takes this no-nonsense approach, "Anticipating All the Retirement Variables. It's been a scary summer, and a true stock market correction is yet to come. Why not make a bulletproof investment?

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Excerpt:

RETIREMENT PLANNING CAN be a daunting task. Whether it's figuring out how much to save or how to manage those savings in retirement, many investors wish they had professional help.

But working with a financial adviser isn't cheap. Fee-only financial planners — those who are not paid a commission for the investment products they sell — can charge between $150 and $300 an hour, according to Dennis Houlihan, a fee-only Certified Financial Planner (CFP) in Fort Wayne, Ind. Having a comprehensive plan drawn up and followed through, he says, adds up to $2,500 at the bare minimum.

What if you can't spend that much? Over the past few years, large mutual-fund companies like Fidelity, Vanguard and T. Rowe Price have developed services that, for a small one-time fee or even no fee at all, will create a retirement saving and management plan. Lately, they've enhanced these services with a human touch: They now offer consultations with a personal advisor and annual follow-up conversations to tweak your retirement plan as needed.

T. Rowe Price launched its revamped advisory services earlier this month, following a similar move by Vanguard this April. Fidelity, which currently offers to its investors a suite of online retirement planning tools, plans to make those tools available to non-Fidelity customers by the end of the month.

These services aim to come as close to having your personal advisor as possible, at a fraction of the cost. Vanguard charges a one-time $1,000 fee, while at T. Rowe Price you'll pay $250. Both companies waive the fee for clients who bring $100,000 or more to the company or already have invested at least $500,000 (with T. Rowe) or $250,000 (with Vanguard). Fidelity's services are entirely free. (For more details, see the table below.)

How the services work: Investors provide detailed information on their financial situation online or by mail. A financial advisor at the fund company reviews it and puts together a retirement plan. Once the investor receives the plan, he or she gets a call from the advisor to talk about it and make changes, if necessary. (At Fidelity, the plan is created automatically by a set of interactive tools. For live help, investors can call a toll-free number to speak with an investment advisor.)

Once the plan is ready, the advisor can execute the parts that involve the company's own products. He or she can adjust your asset allocation by selling or buying mutual funds for you, for example, as long as they're the company's own funds.

But are these services as good as the impartial advice of an independent financial planner? The answer depends on whom you ask. The fund families say their planners are qualified: Vanguard's advisors all have a CFP designation, while T. Rowe's work under the supervision of CFPs.

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OK, you’ve got a frequent flier number, even a credit card that gives out additional flyer mileage. You’re ready to take that trip. You’re ready to use these free miles only to find out that they have expired!!!!

SO WHAT CAN YOU DO TO GET THE MOST OUT OF YOUR ACCUMULATED FREE FLYER MILES?

Be a one-card person.
The biggest mistake that you should not make is that you use several frequent flyer programs. Bad. All you do is water down the end result. I’ve got one word, CONSOLIDATE. Keep all your earned miles in ONE frequent flyer account. That’s how you speed up qualifying for the best benefits and travel awards.

Keep them active. Be sure to make other purchases, other than airfare, on that credit card. You click on to your airlines website, and, with your credit card, purchase something small i.e. a magazine subscription. That will keep your miles active.

Complete a Survey. Take a few minutes and complete a survey on
www.e-miles.com you will not only keep your miles active, but you might be rewarded with a few extra miles.

Get a Credit Card. Yes I know that you don’t want or need one, but, it is to your advantage to have an airline-affiliated credit card. Next time you make a credit card purchase use your airline-affiliated credit card for gas, or clothing. Rack up those extra miles.

This is the site that, in my opinion, will help you get the best frequent flyer deals:
http://www.cardratings.com/frequentflyercreditcards.html
`

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