Do you buy a House or a Car first? [SURVEY]

• By CompareHero.my
• August 17, 2018

Update: Read the results here: Do you buy a House or Car first? [RESULTS]

Call it the “coming of age” or the “they’ve all grown up” phase from the parents, but at some point, in your working life, a mostly unavoidable question will appear: “To buy a house or buy a car first?”

To buy a House or a Car first?

Questions like these always get very bi-polar answers. You’ll get the one side that tells you to buy a house and another side that tells you to “just get a car first lah”. However, it’s not that simple as both purchases cost a lot of money and one appreciates while the other depreciates.

Kindly spare us a minute or two of your time to fill in the survey below by the 31st of August 2018. Rest assured that your information is anonymous and you do not have to provide your name nor IC number. (The survey has now ended, thank you for your contribution)

Why can’t people afford a house in Malaysia?

It is no secret that both property and car prices in Malaysia are at sky-high levels. Car prices in Malaysia have always been somewhat expensive, especially foreign cars, which have higher taxes. Foreign branded cars not only have higher local excise duties, but there are also import taxes on top of that.

Property prices, however, have been increasing madly. The price increase is most significant in Kuala Lumpur, with the prices decreasing the further away from the city centre. Just end of last year, Bloomberg did a piece on Malaysia’s house affordability, citing that the reason why more people cannot own houses is because the prices are simply way too high – not that people are unable to get loans, which have approvals that are close to 70% in our major cities.

The low-income problem of many

The increase in property prices or car prices is one thing, but the stagnating salary growth in Malaysia is yet another factor that affects a lot more. As we all know, the cost of living has been increasing, prices of everything from your teh tarik to your baby milk is going up. What hasn’t been going up however, is the income of many people.

MIER (Malaysian Institute of Economic Research) is saying that the real the problem isn’t the rising cost of living, but that the income levels are too low. The current government is looking to address this issue by bumping up the minimum wages to RM1500, but in gradual stages.

See more: How much do you need to earn to afford a house in KL?

 Why don’t House or Property Prices drop?

There actually has been a slight decline in property price in 2017, according to NST’s article on a downtrend in property prices. Even with the decline, however, prices are still out of reach when compared to their monthly earning. The median house price in our country is around 4.4 times the median annual household income, which puts house ownership seriously out of reach for most people – especially those in the B40 group.

See more: The T20, M40, and B40 Income Classifications in Malaysia

Do fill up our little survey and share with us by 31st August 2018 and we will publish the findings after that. So do share with us!
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Top Budgeting Software for Personal Finance 2018

• By CompareHero.my
• August 15, 2018

When it comes to money, most people have a hard time sticking to a budget and saving. With so many temptations to keep up with the latest technology and to indulge in deals you see all over Malaysia, most people struggle with their personal finances. The Malaysian Insight found that most millennial’s live outside their means and rely on debt to get by. Almost half engage in expensive credit card borrowings.

Whether you are just starting to think about setting financial goals or already on your way, consider using budgeting software to help you get in a more secure financial spot.

Here are the three top budgeting software’s for personal finance in 2018 according to TrustRadius:

#1 You Need a Budget (YNAB)

YNAB helps you design a budget and stick to it. The software is web-based and synced with all your devices.

It offers finance tracking and educational resources to help you get a handle your budget.

YNAB Pros

• Simple. You won’t get distracted with promotional deals, ads or non-budget related finance options.
• Low-Price. There is a free promotional trial for 34 days. After this, YNAB costs $6.99 a month.

YNAB Cons:

• Limited. YNAB does not offer features like credit card deals or automated bill paying.  
• Lacks Two-Factor Authentication. It does not have a higher level of security.

#2 Mint

Mint is a well-respected all-in-one financial planning tool. It helps you organize all of your financial information, including bills, credit score, investments and more.

The budgeting tool is web-based so you can access it from multiple devices. If you are looking for a cheap option, you can’t beat Mint’s pricing because it is free.

Mint Pros:

• All-in-one stop for your finances.  You can see your upcoming bills, your overall budget, track your investments all in one place.
• Easy to use. The interface is simple to use and your finances are put in easy to understand graphics.

Mint Cons:

• Ads and offers. Because Mint services are free, they make money through offers that you may not want to see.
• Financial planning services. Although there is a blog with educational resources, this app is not designed to replace a financial planner.

#3 My Tabung

My Tabung is a financial app specifically created for Malaysians by Bank Negara Malaysia. It is an app to help you create a budget, track income, savings, and expenses. It creates a simple graphic for users to easily analyze their financial standing.

My Tabung also includes financial advice and suggestions. The app is free to use and available for Android and iOS users.

My Tabung Pros:

• Developed by Malaysians for Malaysians. You don’t have to be a member of BNM, but anybody in Malaysia can use it.
• Financial Tips. If you are like most Malaysians, you might need help getting your finances back on track. The financial advice My Tabung offers is practical and helpful.

My Tabung Cons:

• Not many categories. If you are a more detail oriented person or have non-traditional budget items, it can be difficult to edit your budget.
• No investment option. If you are looking for a more advanced way to invest your money, consider another app targeted for long-term financial planning.

We highlighted three top budgeting software apps for your personal finances.  Remember these are just suggestions and it is wise to check out customer reviews from www.trustradius.com to see what fits your needs best.
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100 Ideas for Personal Finance

• By CompareHero.my
• August 14, 2018

What is Min-Maxing My Personal Finances?

Min-Maxing (which has its roots in role-playing games) is the process of minimizing weaknesses and maximizing your strengths. The end result desired is for optimization and better results.

Min-Maxing my personal finances is all about taking many small steps to ruthlessly cut your weaknesses and gain many small incremental gains to improve your personal finance.

Select 2 ideas to implement each week and you’ll be done within less than a year!

100 Ideas for Min-Maxing My Personal Finances

Personal Finance Basics

1. Have an overall financial plan
2. Set S.M.A.R.T. financial goals to achieve
3. Have a 3-6 months emergency savings
4. Pay yourself first when you receive your salary
5. Have a budget and stick to it
6. Manage your debt
7. Grow your net worth
8. Maximize your tax benefits
9. Know your retirement numbers
10. Give generously

General Spending

1. Cut expenses on unnecessary spending
2. Use generic alternatives when shopping
3. Bring your own (reusable!) water bottle when dining out
4. Calculate the price per unit when buying groceries
5. Pay off your credit card balance in full every month
6. Avoid lifestyle creep as your income goes up
7. Get and stick to a retailer /groceries membership program
8. Apply and use a cashback credit card like Maybank 2Card
9. Download and spend using e-wallet apps like Boost App that offer cashback (referral code: ste5fno)
10. Earn cashback using cashback sites/apps like Shopback

General Income & Savings

1. Save/invest at least 20% of your income
2. Apply for a high yield bank account like the OCBC 360 account
3. Already a Maybank M2U account holder, apply online for M2U savers
4. Take advantage of the latest best FD promotional rates
5. Renegotiate your pay to increase your income
6. Jump to a different company or different industryand be rewarded
7. Sell your junk online or to a cash converter location
8. Take up a part time / side income / online business
9. Use your hobbies / gifts / talents to earn some moolah
10. Take online YouGov surveys

Dining & Entertainment Related

1. Cook in bulk & freeze
2. Organize a pot bless (pot luck) instead of dining out every time
3. Skip sweet drinks when eating out (even Nando’s has free water now)
4. Get the Entertainer App
5. Use dining deals offered by your telco (phone) provider or credit card
6. Download the restaurant apps that give you better savings like the McD app
7. If you frequent Starbucks, get the Starbucks card/mobile app, and Starbucks tumbler
8. Get free movie tickets via GSC birthday month / TGV membership
9. Borrow books from friends/library
10. Buy books on sale especially Big Bad Wolf/Popular book fair

Travel & Tech Related

1. Get a credit card with travel/lounge benefits
2. Select a flight rewards/membership program with an airline/alliance you like
   • OneWorld
   • Star Alliance
   • Sky Team
3. Search for the best value flights using Skyscanner
4. Travel during off-peak season if your vacation time is flexible
5. If you travel often, buy annual travel insurance
6. Make use of the Apple student discount
7. Don’t chase the latest phone models
8. Check if it’s worthwhile getting a free/discounted phone with a locked-in plan
9. Use TIME Broadband if available in your area
10. Use strong passwords

Auto Related

1. Get sturdy tyres (Malaysian roads suck)
2. Save costs long term with regular on-time service, proper tire pressure, and regular rotation
3. Bring own engine oil instead of using the marked up expensive one at the shop
4. Wash your car yourself
5. Consider buying almost new cars and save on the massive early years depreciation
6. If buying pre-loved, get a good mechanic to check to avoid buying a lemon
7. Don’t text while driving (the risk of an accident far outweighs the time you save)
8. Check online pricing before selling/trading to a dealer
9. Get rid of junk weighing down your car
10. Buy auto insurance

Health & Risk Management

1. Exercise regularly
2. Consider exercising from home or with a low-cost home gym
3. Eat more vegetables
4. Buy own fruits (not cut fruits)
5. Have fruits/oats-only diet days
6. Cut sugar from your diet
7. Brew your own coffee (and skip the sugar)
8. Go through a regular insurance policy review
9. Get at least a basic will written
10. Make sure your nominees for EPF, insurance, unit trust, PRS are up-to-date

Investment Related

1. Have a personal investment plan
2. Sell/switch your losers; ride your winners
3. Avoid money games and get rich quick schemes
4. Don’t follow “hot tips”
5. Don’t panic over short term price movements
6. Have an investment strategy
7. Have an entry and exit plan
8. Have a long-term perspective
9. Reinvest your dividends
10. Always look to pay lower/discounted fees

Property Related

1. Location, location, location
2. Calculate your projected yield and returns
3. Know your ideal tenant profile for rental properties
4. Check the developer info and track record
5. Buy property with low/zero down
6. Check for the best property insurance MRTA/MLTA
7. Consider property refinancing for better rates/unlocking equity
8. Be prepared in case of interest rates hikes
9. Consider outsourcing property management
10. Consider indirect property investment (e.g. REITs)

Equities Investment Related

1. Use a low-cost local shares brokerage
2. Don’t gamble
3. Know your circle of competency
4. Avoid following the crowd
5. Invest in equities via long-term fundamentally strong opportunities
6. Build a diversified equity portfolio over different sectors and industries
7. Record all your investments via an investment journal
8. Invest not only in Malaysia but globally
9. Use a low cost global shares brokerage
10. Learn how to read and understand how the economy affects the market

This article first appeared on MyPF at 100 Ideas For Min-Maxing My Personal Finances. MyPF is a website dedicated to helping people simplify and grow their personal finances.

Heboh Kebangkitan Pelaburan Bitcoin?

• By CompareHero.my
• August 3, 2018

Money Lover App Review – Track your expenses!

• By CompareHero.my
• August 2, 2018

As a long-time avid collector of many things (action figures, model kits, diecast models, etc), the habit of budgeting and managing my money has long been around since I was in sekolah menengah. I clearly remember keeping whatever pocket money I received in a brown-covered notebook that was commonly used in school then. In that very same book, I kept track of my spending on my toys and some food – my mother taught me to make ledgers in it, splitting into credit, debit, and balance at the end of each week.

Pen and paper governed all the filing needs back then, but today we have smartphones, and our smartphones have apps.

Money Lover Review

Back in 2015, I figured that I needed to start being serious about tracking my expenses – I had stopped using the little brown notebook then. Realizing the power of my smartphone, I browsed the Google Play Store for a financial tracker of sorts and came across Money Lover.

What is Money Lover?

Source: MoneyLover.me

Money Lover is, at its core, an expense tracking app. You can setup several ‘Wallets’ in the app and add transactions (as an expense or income) to each of the wallet at any time, which can also be automated, ideal for monthly bills. In addition to that, there are many other built-in features that are handy, such as a calculator, foreign currency exchange rates, ability to scan receipts, and so on.

For more accurate tracking of your expenses (and as a paid subscription service), Money Lover can also be connected to certain banks and services in Malaysia, such as CIMB, Maybank, Public Bank, RHB, AmBank, Bank Islam, and Hong Leong bank, as well as Paypal. They recently added crypto-currency to its list of linked services too.

Keep in mind that Money Lover is free app, but with limitations. You will have to pay to upgrade your free account to a premium one to get full access to all its features. With the exception of extra icon packs and bank account integration which requires the subscription service.

A free account will only have the following:

• Usage of only 2 Wallets, 1 Budget, 1 Saving campaign, and 1 Event (inclusive of budgets, saving campaign, and event you’ve already completed)
• In-app ads

Paying to upgrade to the Premium version as a one time payment (I paid RM3.90 back in 2015, currently it is going forRM29.99 at 50% off) will give you:

• Unlimited number of Wallets, Budgets, Savings, and Events
• Ad-free experience
• Premium support from the Money Lover team
• Ability to export transactions to Excel or CSV format
• Work and sync across devices and platforms.

See also: CompareHero.my 2017 Banking Apps Awards Winners

Using Money Lover for the past 3 years

I first started out using Money Lover with a single Wallet in the app, tracking whatever cash I had in my real physical wallet at that time. Finding the entire app very useful and intuitive, I soon began wanting to use the app more comprehensively; I paid for the premium version and started using more Wallets to track my accounts, setting up budgets for my hobbies, food, and even my travel expenditure to Tokyo in Japanese Yen.

Using the Money Lover app is actually a very simple experience, though the other features such as having renewing budgets and travel mode come with a small learning curve to fully utilize it. To funnel down the long list of features so it is easy to understand what it can do, I’ve laid down what I use Money Lover for below!

Money Lover Features I use

Tracking my transactions

It goes without saying that the main reason everyone uses a finance tracking app is to keep track of their transactions on a day to day basis. I track every single transaction that I make, be it from the cash in hand or that in the bank accounts. The transactions are tracked by choosing categories, such as food or shopping, but they aren’t just limited to expenses – income is also present, such as the salary category.

A transaction feature I find really nifty in the app is that it is possible to transfer money from one Wallet to another, making it useful to track actions such as funds transfer or ATM withdrawals – it even includes a “transaction fee” option when transferring.

Overview of my expenses

Source: MoneyLover

At any time, I can access an overview of my transactions of my wallets at different time intervals. The app provides the overview in a very intuitive pie-chart; I can easily view what categories I spent the most on in that month.

Using the Events and Travel Mode for my holidays

While planning my trip to Tokyo, Japan end of last year, I realized that Money Lover would be an invaluable tool for me to set my budget and also track my expenses before and during the trip. I added in my holiday trip with the Events feature (creatively named “Tokyo Trip”) and set the end date. What the Events feature does is that it groups all your spending (of any Wallets) under one Event, making it easy to look back at related transactions.

With the Event created, every transaction I made in preparation for the trip, such as buying winter clothes, I would tag it under the “Tokyo Trip” Event. While I was in Tokyo, I turned on “Travel Mode” so that every transaction I made would be automatically be tied to “Tokyo Trip”.

I really like this feature as it gives me a clear overview of how much I’ve spent on my trip (it’s well under the budget, phew) and it helps to see where exactly I might have spent a little more than needed.

Transferring between currencies among my wallets

For that very same “Tokyo Trip”, I created another Wallet in Japanese Yen so that I could accurately transfer money to it from another Wallet. The Money Lover app can update internally on the latest currency exchange rates so that when I transferred from Malaysian Ringgit to Japanese Yen, it automatically converted it for me.

Keep in mind that the currency exchange rates in the app are just an estimation based on international rates worldwide and it will be different depending on where you did the exchange. In my case, I had to make some slight adjustments upwards because the money changer had a slightly higher rate.

Setting my monthly budgets

Source: MoneyLover

For each Wallet I have, I have set up monthly budgets to keep my spending in check. Each budget made can be set to any amount and for any period of time. I typically make budgets for my hobbies and food for a month. Money Lover will give you notifications when you are nearing the limits of your budget and even warn you if you’ve overspent it by a specific amount.

The notifications are a great thing, it does help to make me realize if I’m overspending at any time of the month. It even shows me a chart with my recommended daily spending, projected spending, and my actual daily spending (on average).

See also: 5 Budgeting Apps You Can’t Live Without

Reminders for my monthly Bills

We’ve all been there – forgetting to pay that one bill. A little nifty feature in Money Lover is that I can set up recurring bills that are due every month and it will remind me when the due date is near or when I’ve forgotten about it. In the Bills tab, the total sum of my bills of the month is shown, giving me an overview of how much I should set aside that month.

Should you use Money Lover?

As mentioned earlier, Money Lover is simple to use and the many other features it has serve only to enhance just about everyone’s management of their finances. I find the app intuitive to use and it’s green and white theme is very welcoming. I highly recommend everyone to give it a try – it’s free after all!

For Android: Click here!

For iOS: Click here!

For Windows: Click here!

Do you already use an expense tracker? Let us know!

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