Tips For Buying Used Cars So You Don’t Get Cheated
The first step when buying a car is taking it for a test drive. As you drive, pay attention to the sound of the engine, and how it handles. If the car passes the test drive ask the owner if you can have your mechanic check it out. The smart buyer always has his mechanic look over a vehicle before he buys it.
Remember, used cars are sold “as is”, which means if you discover a problem with the car after you have bought it, you will have to pay someone to fix the problem.
Even if your mechanic can’t look at the car before you buy it, you can always ask for the service records. Dealerships should be able to pull up the service records by looking up the car’s VIN number. If the dealer won’t do it for you, there are Internet sites that you can use to find the records yourself.
If you are buying the car from the previous owner, you can ask that person if he is the original owner. He may be able to give you all of the service records for that car. Even if he is not the original owner he still may be able to give you a part of the service records.
Just remember, buying used cars might be scary, but if you are armed with the right information you will have a smaller chance of being swindled.
Travel Money + Foreign Exchange Made Clear
When you’re traveling, you’ll want to make a quick holiday money comparison to see how you can get the best exchange rates. Obviously, wherever you go, you’re going to need money, and you’re going to need it to be in the local currency. And of course, you don’t want to spend an arm and a leg getting a hold of that local currency. Fortunately, everything you need to know to make sure you’re getting a fair shake, you can learn in just a few paragraphs. So here’s what you should keep in mind about the money exchange…
Knowing The Exchange Rates
Don’t just trust the exchange websites. They’ll be charging a premium for exchanging the money, so check the actual exchange rate on a financial news website and make certain that the exchange people are dealing straight with you. Look, a lot of money changes hands in the exchange market, and wherever a lot of money changes hands, there will be unscrupulous people just trying to make a quick buck. So just make sure that the people you’re dealing with aren’t charging you much more than the actual exchange rate from country to country. Find a low premium.
Look All Over
There are dozens and dozens of exchange companies out there, and not all are created equal. Again, there are a lot of scammers because it’s a high-volume business when it comes to cash. Look at all your options, don’t just go with the first company you find that seems reputable enough. What you want is a combination of a great exchange rate, reliability, and fast response time. Obviously, a super low exchange rate ranks first here, but not at the expense of the uncertainty that comes with a company that can’t quite verify its reliability. If you’re never going to see the money you just paid for, it’s not that great a deal in the end.
Use the Web
It’s a competitive market, and it’s most competitive online. This is the age of the internet, and the web has really dropped the price on things. If you just want to wait until you get to the airport in Thailand or Mexico and use whatever services they have there, go ahead, and spend more than you would probably like to since it’s your only option. If you want choices, and you do, then you’ll want to shop around online, compare the different exchange companies, and go with the best one you can find.
Future Book Betting Traps And How To Avoid Them
Sports betting futures wagers can be an entertaining and profitable investment, but there are a number of pitfalls. These are some things to avoid:
You gotta shop around: More specifically, you have to ’shop points’ just as you would with a straight bet. This is crucial in all forms of sports betting but particularly key with futures wagers. There are often greater variances in the prices from book to book on future plays than any other type of wagering proposition. The reason for this is simple–most books are less concern with what the ‘other guys’ are doing as they are with keeping their own position ‘in balance’. All in all, the sports betting marketplace just doesn’t react as quickly to changing futures prices as it does to individual game lines.
Don’t try to pick the winner in a competitive marketplace: This may sound sort of counter intuitive since the general idea of betting on futures is to determine the actual winner but it’s really not. Like everything else, its essential to always be mindful of the value you’re getting. In a futures market with several legitimate contenders at the top the price offered is seldom high enough to properly compensate for the risk you’re assuming. Here’s an example: in a hypothetical NCAA hoops tournament Duke is +200 to win the national championship. They’ve certainly got a shot, but at a payback of only 2/1 its hard to justify a wager at this point with the potential for so many interceding events that can make a championship more problematic. Such events as injuries, a tough tournament draw or even just going into a slump at the wrong time can happen to any team but when you bet a higher priced team–a ‘dark horse mid major at 15/1 for example–you’re getting “compensation” for assuming the “risks” of betting on a proposition with so many unknown variables.
In mathematical terms, we’re simply not being offered odds on a favorite that offer a good value in comparison with the ‘true odds’ of the event occurring. Let’s say we bet Duke at +200 to win the NCAA tournament. If we could magically play the NCAA tournament over 100 times, would Duke come out on top more than 33 times? If not, they’re a poor value at the price. At a higher price, I might be interested but at +200 the value is simply not there.
Note that the more competitive the market, the more difficult it is to find good value on a favorite. In a smaller field, or in a field with one dominant competitor it can be easier. For example, say the UFC were to have a tournament involving heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar and three male figure skaters. Even if Lesnar was slightly injured, or not at the top of his game he’d essentially have a 100% chance of beating the smaller, effeminate men who are untrained to fight. If a book installed Lesnar as a -1000 favorite in this spot, it could still be considered a good value. It’s never easy to risk a lot to win a little, but from strictly a mathematical standpoint it makes sense.
Don’t get seduced by big underdogs: Sports betting is not a place to make the “big killing”. It may happen occasionally, but more often it doesn’t. While a sports book might offer a huge price on a cellar dwelling team to win the World Series, the big payback does not mean its a good value. On a practical level, there’s probably nothing wrong with throwing a few bucks on a wager like this with a huge payback if the impossible occurs. My only problem with this is that making too many bets like this just perpetuates bad sports betting habits. If you’re strictly a recreational player, no big deal. If you aspire to bet professionally, or at least want to pursue it with some degree of seriousness I’ve always maintained that you need to develop discipline that’s not situational. In other words, if you want to be a serious sports bettor you need to approach it with a consistent level of seriousness at all times. If you want to chase a huge, life altering jackpot go to Las Vegas and play the Megabucks slots or buy a Powerball ticket.
On a more theoretical level, a big price alone is no way to justify a wager. The concept of value works the same at the bottom of the barrel as it does at the top: make sure the price you’re getting on an underdog accurately reflects their “true odds” of winning.
Don’t waste your money on ridiculous prop bets: Occasionally sports books offer ridiculous bets to get press or to be funny. For example, a book once offered odds on Demi Moore, Ashton Kutcher and Bruce Willis all hopping into bed together and releasing a video tape of the proceedings. You’d no doubt get a huge payback were this to happen, but the ‘true odds’ of such an event transpiring far exceeded even a big potential payback.
