I’ve found one article which important for us to understand.. enjoy.. 

“Due to skyrocketing health care costs, health care coverage is an essential thing to have these days. If you lack adequate coverage, you could be facing financial catastrophe after an unforeseen illness or injury. There are many different kinds of coverage for you to choose from, depending on your provider and your personal medical needs.The first thing you need to ask yourself is: what are my needs? Will I be using my medical insurance a lot or only during emergencies? These kinds of questions will tell you exactly what sort of health care coverage you want. If you don’t think you will use the insurance often, for instance, then perhaps you should pay a lower premium up front and carry a higher deductible. Remember that the reverse is also true; i.e., a lower deductible means a higher premium. This may come back to bite you however, depending on how high you set your deductible. You never know when you may be injured or fall ill. Of course, if your employer is providing your insurance, you are probably somewhat bound by what they offer. If you feel that it is not enough, then you can opt to supplement your coverage elsewhere.

Basic health care coverage usually consists of hospitalization and outpatient surgery coverage in case of major illness or injury. These are the bare essentials. More detailed plans cover routine doctor’s office visits, physician services, pharmaceutical, or preventative care. Though adding any one of these options to your coverage will raise your premium, they are generally included in most employers’ benefits package and should be seriously considered. The coverage that most employers offer is usually a good guideline to follow when deciding what coverage you want.

Though it may sound like a good idea to save money and simply get the cheapest coverage possible, it is usually a good idea to at least get your routine doctor’s office visits covered. By and large, this is the most common use of health care coverage and generally where most cases start out. Think about the last time you were sick. What did you first consider — the hospital or a doctor? Most people don’t want to deal with the hassle of going to the hospital to treat a minor illness and would rather just go to a local doctor’s office.

You should also seriously consider pharmaceutical coverage. You don’t realize how expensive drugs are until you have to pay for them out of pocket. Pharmaceutical coverage allows you to pay only a small co-pay and your provider pays the rest. Considering that you will often be prescribed two or three different drugs for something as simple as a sinus infection, this kind of coverage is fairly essential and ultimately may save you a lot of money.

At the end of the day, only you can decide what health care coverage you need. You can just get the basics, but you should seriously consider covering doctor’s office visits and pharmaceutical coverage, especially if you have children. These are the most common uses of medical insurance and will probably save you a lot of money in the long run”.

by Jon Arnold

A carpenter uses a set of house plans to build a house. If he didn’t, the bathroom might get overlooked altogether.

Rocket Scientists would never begin construction on a new booster rocket without a detailed set of design specifications. Yet most of us go blindly out into the world without an inkling of an idea about finances and without any plan at all.

Not very smart of us, is it?

A money plan is called a budget or ‘belanjawan’ in Malay… and it is crucial to get us to our desired financial goals.

Without a plan we will drift without direction and end up marooned on a distant financial reef.

If you have a spouse or a significant other, you should make this budget together. Sit down and figure out what your joint financial goals are…long term and short term.

Then plan your route to get to those goals. Every journey begins with one step and the first step to attaining your goals is to make a realistic budget that both of you can live with.

A budget should never be a financial starvation diet. That won’t work for the long haul. Make reasonable allocations for food, clothing, shelter, utilities and insurance and set aside a reasonable amount for entertainment and the occasional luxury item. Savings should always come first before any spending.

Even a small amount saved will help you reach your long term and short term financial goals. You can find many budget forms on the internet. Just use any search engine you choose and type in “free budget forms”.

You’ll get lots of hits. Print one out and work on it with your spouse or significant other. Both of you will need to be happy with the final result and feel like it’s something you can stick to.

If you fail to plan, you plan to fail…. adios.

Have you ever noticed that the things you buy every week at the grocery and hardware stores go up a few cents between shopping trips? Not by much…just by a little each week but they continue to creep up and up.

All it takes for the price to jump up by a lot is a little hiccup in the world wide market, note the price of gasoline as it relates to world affairs.

There is a way that we can keep these price increases from impacting our personal finances so much and that is by buying in quantity and finding the best possible prices for the things we use and will continue to use everyday… things that will keep just as well on the shelves in our homes as it does on the shelves at the grocery store or hardware store.

For instance, dog food and cat food costs about 10% less when bought by the case than it does when bought at the single can price and if you wait for close out prices you save a lot more than that.

Set aside some space in your home and make a list of things that you use regularly which will not spoil. Any grain or grain products will need to be stored in airtight containers that rats can’t get into so keep that in mind.

Then set out to find the best prices you can get on quantity purchases of such things as bathroom items and dry and canned food.

You will be surprised at how much you can save by buying a twenty pound bag of rice as opposed to a one pound bag but don’t forget that it must be kept in a rat proof container.

You can buy some clothing items such as men’s socks and underwear because those styles don’t change, avoid buying children’s and women’s clothing, those styles change and sizes change too drastically.

Try to acquire and keep a two year supply of these items and you can save hundreds of dollars.

Good luck!