CPF Housing Loan Early Repayment?

Is it better to make lump sum payment to pay back your housing loan?

In an attempt to answer this question myself, i have created an excel spreadsheet to calculate how much would i save if i have made lump sum payment.

As an example:
If my loan amount is $200,000 for 30 years at 2.6%
Each month the loan repayment amount is $800.68
At the end of 30 years, I would have paid $288,244.60
That is $88,244.60 in interest!

However, if i choose to pay $1000 at the end of first year of my loan term.
At the end of 30 years, Total payment is $286,819.63
So i will save $1,424.97 - $1,000 = $424.97

On the other hand, what happen if i decide to put the $1000 into my CPF ordinary account?
At the end of 29 years when i fully repaid back my loan. The $1000 in my CPF ordinary account would become $2,046.41 compounded for 29 yrs at 2.5%! (this amount will be even higher if you opt to invest in other dividend yield stocks that give more that 2.5%)

Effectively, you will be better off by 2046.41 - 1424.97 = $621.44
Well you never know all these until we actually sit down to calculate!

Screenshot of the spreadsheet that i used:


Configuring your own loan amount, repayment period and lump sum payment.


Spreadsheet provide summary to give clear numbers.


You can now download the spreadsheet and customized it to your own loan amount, repayment period and lump sum payment. For only SGD 2.50. Click on "Buy Now" button. For the price of less than a McDonald Meal.... @ only SGD 2.50 Get your own housing loan calculation spreadsheet now and figure out how much you can save!

You will be redirected to the download link immediately after payment.

Java applet problem in Firefox 3

Arggzz.... updated to Firefox 3 automatically yesterday.
Today, tried to access some sites with Java applet and Firefox 3 is not working well!
Mostly, internet banking sites.

Without tweaking,
DBS internet banking is working
OCBC internet banking is working.

UOB internet banking cannot initialize the java applet.
Same goes for Fundsupermart.
And i read in some forum that Citibank internet banking is not working well with Firefox 3 too.

Went to google for the solution and realized that there is 2 ways to resolve this.

1. Download User Agent Switcher add on for Firefox

******* from Mozilla forum ***************
I had the same problem with FF3. Called the citibank support. Was given a solution that works for now.

1. Download this addon (User Agent Switcher) from the URL
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/59

2. Install it and on the FF3 Tools ---> User Agent Switcher, and select either one of the browser. Then login. Should work.

3. You'll also have to perform step 2 everytime you want to use FF3 to logon to Citibank.

4. I think the problem is not exactly with the applet but rather the new FF3 (aka Mozilla 5) is not yet recognised by their system. They are using BEA so this could be a security feature to ensure only the recognised (or compatible) browser types get connected. Hope they can get the changes done quickly to rectify this.
******* from Mozilla forum ***************

OR

Another contributor at the forum suggested the following:

******* from Mozilla forum ***************
1. type "about:config" in the url.

2. right click and select NEW --> STRING

3. type in "general.appname.override" as preference name.

4. type in any word such as "hello" as value.

voila! citibank singapore should load correctly now. the reason i think is that the website couldnt work correctly with some versions of Netscape, so citibank purposely blocked those browsers from loading. and strangely, firefox still uses Netscape as its browser 'appname' identifier. alternatively, you can use the useragent switched addon, but you will have to click on it to load a different useragent profile everything you wanna do the online banking.
******* from Mozilla forum ***************

In the end, i used the second option, Added "general.appname.override" BUT with an empty value. And it works for me!

I hope Firefox can have an update soon for this issue.

Roger Crawford-Short Motivational Clip

Roger Crawford was born with four underdeveloped limbs--basically, from his elbows down and from his knees down, his limbs did not grow properly. He have two fingers on his right hand and one on his left. As a result, doctors predicted he would be unable to walk and would have limited dexterity.

Check out America's Possibility Coach, Roger Crawford and be amazed at human's ability to overcome.....

"Challenges are inevitable. But Defeat is optional" ~ Roger Crawford.

One or more files could not be updated - Thunderbird and Firefox in Windows Vista

I have the problem of thunderbird software update failed. Every time i start thunderbird, i will get the error message pop up "One or more files could not be updated. Please make sure all other applications are closed and that you have permission to modify files, and then restart Thunderbird to try again"



After putting up with it for a couple of day, i finally had enough...
Went to google for a solution. Came across this blog that recommended deleting some files in the profile's update directory. However, i am worried that that might caused some other problem. Apparently, the issue caused is because when the application is not running in administrator mode in Vista computer, it do not have privileges to do lots of things.

So the simple solution is to close Thunderbird and use "Run as administrator" to start it up.

After that, it updates successfully and the irritating message is gone!

Building Rapport With People

I have been reading personal development and self help book for sometime. Recently started to attend seminars. This weekend, i am attending Blair Singer's 2 day sales and leadership seminar.

In the seminar, when talking about building rapport with people we are working with. It boils down to this few key points

1. Be interested. Be genuinely interested in what your counter part is saying.
2. Enter into their world 1st. Ask them about themselves, what do they do, what are their interest.
3. From there, find common ground (shared realities). Build on those shared realities.
4. Ask for verification. Check with our partners if our understanding of the topics in the conversations are correct.

From the interactions establish above. Take note of what type of person our partners are primarily. Visual, Auditory or Kinesthetic. Each type exhibits some main characteristics which i will talk about later.... Now i need to go back to the seminar... lunch time over! =D