Many retailers attribute 25 to 40% of their annual sales to “Black Friday” (the Friday after Thanksgiving), which is normally a fairly solid gauge as to what the rest of the holiday shopping season will look like. In addition to “Black Friday,” we now recognize the following Monday as “Cyber Monday,” as the beginning of the online shopping season. For many retailers that are already close to ruin, the 2009 holiday shopping season is very likely to tell the story. It could be the final blow for a number of the nation’s retailers and mall operators, already feeling the negative influence of a diminished year for retail sales.

As I shared with you recently, the national spending habits of American consumers have certainly been altered over the past 18 months and the traditional attitudes that the buying public had in the past are forever changed. This means that the nation’s retailers will also have to make some changes in order to cater to the newly formed buying habits of their customers. The plans at the retail centers for this holiday season appear to be centered on traditional values and bringing family together since that appears to be the major desire of the typical shopper this year. Smaller holiday gift giving and more time focused on the important things in life – time with family.

Stores are still hurting from last year’s’ holiday shopping season, which economists say was the weakest buying period since 1967, when the Commerce Department started collecting such data. The feeling is this year could be worse. Consumers with worries about being laid off or reduced hours at work plus lower credit lines are contributing to the dwindling consumer interest in spending this holiday season.

The retail centers will be displaying more things like gingerbread houses while using the traditional red, green and gold holiday colors to touch the current mood of today’s consumer. We’re all looking back when life was easier, safer, and perhaps even happier; those are the values that will certainly attract this year’s holiday buyers.

And according to a recent survey by Information Resources Inc (IRI), about 77 percent of American holiday shoppers said that while they didn’t spend much on the holidays last year they are more willing to open their wallets a little wider this year. The respondents added that they will continue to search for discounts whenever possible. According to IRI “functional gifts such as iPods, Blu-ray players for less than $99, Smartphone’s and clothes such as sweaters and jackets will likely top gift lists.”

There are indicators that suggest the U.S. economy may be coming to the end of its worst days, many consumers remain concerned by limited credit, high unemployment and home foreclosures. The new American consumer continues to save at historically high levels while paying their down debt. Just examining those concerns imply that we could experience yet another challenging holiday season for the nation’s retailers.

The ability to really enjoy your life doesn’t take an infinite amount of money but it does take a desire to develop a list of goals and the capacity to apply your personal drive to guide your daily existence.  There are many people we use as role models.  I prefer to look at several people and take a little expertise from each.  I have definitely learned how to apply some of these important ethical values from my relatives and some from people I’ve become acquainted with through my business or personal life.  

What you do in your professional life helps pay the bills but you should also allow it to feed your spirit.  The key thing I’ve learned over the years is to push myself.  It’s very important to make an effort to achieve the unimaginable and solve problems that are more complex than you ever expected you could successfully complete.  That adage has served me well and has seriously helped me to recognize the balance of my life and put it into the proper perspective every day.  What about you?  Have you chosen what it is you’d like to accomplish in your life?  There’s no time like the present to come to some conclusions. 

All of us can accomplish our innermost desires if we first define our dreams and then go after them aggressively.  Ultimately it’s entirely up to each one of us to shape and develop a constructive pattern for our life.  There’s no right or wrong; there’s no black or white.  Occasionally you should try not focus so much on your abilities or on your resume.  Instead, center more on your passions.  Determine what it is you really love to do.  If you don’t have the knowledge you need to reach your objective, make it a major priority to begin filling the cracks and learn.  It’s all about education.   

There are plenty of different avenues to explore to get the information you need to succeed.  Call your local college or find out what training or educational opportunities your company offers.  Access to learning has never been easier.  Most of us actively use the Internet and that’s a great place to start.  You can actually sign up for online courses that you can accomplish at your own speed – right from your home.  The more you learn the easier it will be for you to adapt to new situations and increase your personal level of confidence.  During this rough economic period, lots of people are going back to class to earn an advanced degree or to take vocational courses to actually change careers.   

There’s no time like right now to start the process.  I know that making changes in your life can be very scary to some, but use the adrenalin to actively pursue the things your really want out of life.  Don’t be timid, don’t waste time.  Just do it.  Actively seek out others who share your passions and don’t lose sight of the dream.  But always remember; be thankful for what you already have in life.  Count your blessings daily and enjoy every moment of the ride.  There’s no place like the present to begin to experience a great deal of pleasure in your life’s journey, both on and off the job.

I am not a doctor but I would imagine that the simple reason some people get so over extended is that they run their credit cards up and then the interest literally chokes them.  What happens is that people get depressed.  When that happens, some people will go out to the mall or wherever and buy something, anything that doesn’t matter.  That immediately makes these individuals feel better, at least until they get buyer’s remorse.  Shopping for clothes, electronics, cars or whatever, is normally associated with a good feeling, so the next time you feel down you end up going shopping to buy something to make yourself feel better.  There are two problems with this; I doubt that many of you pull out cash to purchase these items, and you no doubt use a credit card.  If you don’t pay it off at the end of the month, you start to get hit with interest which is usually so high that it is hard to ever get ahead.

Second, the purchases get bigger; you will ultimately have to spend more and more to feel better.  This is a losing proposition all the way around.  What we need to do is eliminate credit all together.  We need to start paying for our purchases outright.  Yes, credit cards are okay, but you must use them wisely and pay them off at the end of each month.  So what else do you need credit for?  Maybe for a car or a home.  You can always a buy a used car and save money.  You can develop a strategy concerning your home loan by paying off extra principal every month. My point is, if you use credit, you have to have a plan to pay it off and get it paid off as soon as possible.

Credit only exists for one reason and that is to make you a slave to it and make the lender rich.  Everyone in America should start taking conscious control of their outstanding debt and begin to eliminate it.  Let’s make the lending institutions suffer a little, let’s make them squirm when they wake up one morning and realize that we have all decide to take back control of our finances.  Remember that if you are saving money you are making money.

Start calling all your creditors and ask them for an interest rate reduction, don’t take no for an answer.  You may have to talk to several people but you will find one that can help you lower your interest rate.  Not everyone at the bank will even know that they can lower your interest rate but they can and they will, if you are persistent enough.

If you are skeptical just know this, in one of our worst financial times I can remember the banks are doing everything they can to make more money at our expenses, so much in fact that the president has to get Congress to put restrictions on what they can and can’t charge for.  The banks are adding new expenses and fees to our accounts, they are raising interest rates faster then we can pay our bills.  Why? Because they are greedy and want to make sure we don’t get off their credit “drug,” so to speak. our society has become credit junkies.  It’s time to quit and start living debt free.  As a nation, we are spenders…not savers.  This paradigm has shifted over the last 40 years.  And we are bigger spenders than our brothers in the East. Asia, for instance, saves much more than we do and that has a global affect on our economies.  With financial times as tough as they are now, people are realizing that saving is something we all have to get back to. 

Let’s do it debt free.

Whether or not you are behind on your mortgage, you can ask your lender for a mortgage modification. Remember, if you are not behind on your mortgage you can still ask for a modification.  Rest assured you will be told that there is nothing they can do for you until you are late.  Do not fall into that trap!  I personally know many people that have gotten mortgage modifications after they were told they could not.  The lender told them they would have to be at least 90 days late.  I know for a fact they have never been late and had their balances lowered, the interest and/or payments lowered, forgiven or waived.  But you simply can’t take “no” for a answer

If you are late – same thing; don’t take “no” for an answer!  Just keep asking until you get the answer you are looking for.

Here is the first thing you need to do – whether you are late or not.  Call your lender and specifically ask for the Loss Mitigation department.  Again, don’t take “no” for an answer.  You may have to call multiple times, but you will find someone to answer the phone who actually cares and that can get you going in the direction you need.  What you will find out is that you will receive as many answers to the same questions as the number phone calls you make.

Once you get Loss Mitigation, let them know your situation.  Let them know whether you were laid off, fired, had a pay cut…whatever. You have to let them know your financial situation has changed from when you first purchased your home, including the fact that your home is probably worth 30 percent or less than when you initially bought it.  In fact you might even consider giving the keys back to the lender and just buy the house next door for 50 percent less.

I can tell you that the banks – all of them – need to cut deals to sell their real-estate owned and/or non-performing assets.  In fact, many of the banks are encouraged or even rewarded by the government for getting rid of their non-performing assets.  That translates into working deals out with you.

If the bank reworks your loan and makes it current, then the bank will be able to move that loan off their non-performing assets list.  They are very motivated to do this.  The longer the property takes to foreclose, the longer it takes the bank to free up the money they have tied up on the non-performing asset, thus they want to cut deals and modify loans more than ever before.  So don’t be the one reading this saying I already did what you are saying and was told “no.” If you are saying this, you will lose.  The banks are changing their minds daily.

After you have started the process with your lender, you can go to “Hope Now” online.  They may tell you that you cannot file with them, again don’t take “no” for an answer; insist that they do.  Hey, even if you get denied – so what.  I know people that have been denied numerous times by their bank and by the “Hope Now” program only to actually get approved many “no’s” later. And that goes for people that have never been late before.

Okay, this is especially for you former Countywide people out there.  I have heard that Bank of America is so far behind that they are suspending actions of foreclosures on their Countrywide loans until they get caught up.  Furthermore, I specifically know someone who has a loan with Countywide that is currently going through the modification program.  They were about 90 days late as of February and called Bank of America to request a mortgage modification; they also filed with “Hope Now.”  Here is what has happened so far.   Nothing!  I mean nothing!  Well, except they haven’t made a payment and their loan is current.  What the bank did was tack the past due payments of the loan to the backend and then made the loan current.  They then said that until they get caught up to review the modification request no payments would be due and that the loan would stay current. So each month they get a statement from the bank giving them the loan balance and showing that they are current with nothing owed.  It has been months since the modification request. If you have an old Countrywide loan, start making your calls now requesting a mortgage modification.

I hope this helps you and don’t forget you must have faith above all things.  Don’t give up or as my uncle says, “don’t take yourself out of the game, it always gets better and as long as you move the ball along, things will change.”

All my best –

James Dicks

Look, we all have enough to keep our minds busy on a daily basis.  Our day-to-day routines with our families and our jobs normally guarantee a steady stream of decisions to make and problems to solve.  So, why worry about the world’s financial markets.  Most of the situations that change the direction of the markets are completely out of our control anyway.  What we should be concentrating on is how we can create a personal portfolio that is relatively immune to these outside events.  Create a portfolio that can weather the storm of global uncertainty. 

You’ve heard all of it before.  Diversification and proper money management are the best methods of insuring that your investments will be protected from the highs and lows in the markets.  In a diversified portfolio, should a single investment react poorly to negative national or international events, you can normally count on another investment to make up the difference. 

Examine your personal investment structure on a semi-annual basis, or at the very least, annually.  Really investigate what you are invested in.  Do your holdings include stocks, what about interest rate instruments, mutual funds, real estate, commodities, the foreign exchange markets?  Choose the opportunities that give you the most comfort.  Learn as much as you can about the investments you don’t understand that could possibly help your future financial growth.  For instance, if you don’t understand REIT’s (Real Estate Investment Trusts), read about them, ask questions, study the topic before you make any monetary move.    

Once you are involved in a particular investment, make sure you follow its progress.  If you are trading stocks, always set your stops and limits to guard against losses.  If you are investing in a 401(k) plan at work, study your investment options often and rebalance, when necessary.  The key to a positive investment life is education. 

You can count on the world situation being volatile today, tomorrow, next week, and probably for the rest of your life.  The stock markets will continue to show weakness on some days and strength on others.  If you meet the challenge of creating a balanced portfolio through diversification you most likely will worry less and definitely have more time to enjoy the most important things your life has to offer, family and friends.   It really is that simple.

We have recently seen a number of economic reports that portray a slowing of the misery the economy has been passing along to all of us and that is a very good thing – if it’s true.  We now know that the past eight years of dramatic growth in our economy was caused by a credit bubble.  Easy credit, mainly from home equity, fueled a consumption boom which, in turn, also created a stock market boom.  The last eight years of growth, like the dot com bubble bust, was entirely make-believe.   Not until we return to 2001 values for both the housing and stock markets, will the global economy hit bottom and be able to begin a solid and believable recovery.  I personally think we’re almost there. 

Home prices in many areas of the country have lost very large percentages of their value leaving owners, in many cases, without a dime in equity but still consumers are starting to show some early signs of assurance, if even just a little.  For instance, the most recent University of Michigan consumer sentiment report showed that confidence increased to 69 from 68.7 in May.  The report said the slight growth in the confidence level was due to slowing job losses, new reports that showed housing and manufacturing stabilizing, and belief that the Obama administration’s fiscal stimulus just might help encourage consumer demand.

A “psychological” bottom will be seen when positive news begins to replace the negative news we grown accustomed to hearing every day.  We all need to hope and pray that this bottoming trend continues, barring anything in the news from changing the direction of the recent improvements in the global economic situation.  Remember what happened after the attacks of 9/11?  There’s plenty of “bad” stuff going on around the world today and let’s pray that mankind is smarter than that – but you and I know the distinct and disturbing answer to that question. 

Since economic numbers (whether from the government or corporate America) compare themselves to the same period in the year ago period, good news probably won’t start hitting the street until the end of this year; more than a year after the stock market collapse of September 2008.  And if the unemployment and weak home prices persist, that will more than likely keep us all apprehensive and it will become less probable that we will decide to get back out there and spend, at least for the rest of the year. 

Americans must start to center on the country’s economic growth rather than their personal situations or what we hear from the national media.  Once that happens we will all be more likely to pull out our wallets which will create some needed economic growth, well-being and, ultimately, global recovery. All we can do is hope the best and look for the bottom.  Remember, we’re all in this together. 

Today our “American Dream” is at risk in every neighborhood from coast-to-coast.  It’s not just a newspaper headline anymore, it’s actually happening to us.  I have seen many communities lose their sense of identity as families watch other families they have known for years suffer foreclosure on their homes.  Vacant homes are not what we ever imagined the “American Dream” to be; it’s not how we thought this story would end.  We, as Americans, have always worked hard to obtain this “dream” but now the unemployment rate has hit 9.4 percent and so many qualified and dedicated individuals are out of work.  The “dream” seems to be slipping away from us and there’s not a thing we can do about it. 

We, the people of a “former” America used to graduate from school, go to work for a company for 40 years, retire and live the rest of their days on a corporate pension in a paid off house.  That just isn’t the case anymore.  The one thing that many elderly American’s will be bringing with them into retirement is their mortgage.  This will place a real burden on their fixed income. 

But wait just a minute….it just came to mind that the American Dream was never about greed, fortune or lofty positions.  It was always about a promise that tomorrow could be better; a thought that we could leave an even better life for our children and our grandchildren.  That’s the problem.  Hey, we need to remember that we can lose our homes and just get another one.  That’s not even an issue.  The one thing we can’t lose is our values and our sense of family and community.  That cannot happen or the dream is dead.  We are Americans; we can always turn the situation around. 

We just celebrated the 65th anniversary of D-Day.  Those were tough times.  Following a decade of depression, we were suddenly forced into a World War that took millions of our precious lives.  Those left behind willingly took jobs in aircraft manufacturing plants, grew their own gardens in the backyard in order to eat, and dealt with a rationing system that forced them to do without more than not.  Maybe it’s time for all of us, as an American population, to get tough.  You have to admit, we’ve gotten soft.  I’d rather my family not experience hard times for one moment but these are challenging times and we all need to get strong.  All I’m saying is we need to start to adapt, improvise and overcome.  That’s what I learned as a young recruit in the U.S. Marine Corps and now these attributes are making it around full circle into my personal life. 

No matter who is in control of the U.S. government, our population is in a constant state of complaint.  So, I think it’s time to shift the focus from the government to our personal lives.  Let’s all start to take more responsibility for what is happening in our lives.  If you look closely, I think you’ll find more good things happening than bad things.  Try it.  Write down three good things that happened to you today.  Stop the constant complaining and consider what is going right in life.  It will be better for you, your family, your neighborhood and your country.  We can all do this – allow history to repeat itself and allow the “tried and true” American spirit to bring us to new heights from this day forward.

Since President Obama started campaigning years ago, he has been talking about some sort of national service; although this sounds like an interesting concept when you first hear it, there are many things to consider.

Do we need another draft?  The reserves are taxed; the National Guard is taxed and more specifically used for operations that may stretch their very scope.

What happens when people stop volunteering? I mean it was only about 10 months ago that the military branches were struggling to meet recruiting goals, then comes a horrible economy and recruiting goes up; but that isn’t the real answer to the problem nor is a draft. I was just discussing this very issue with my uncle and he had some great insight.  Instead of paraphrasing what he told me I decided to just share it with you as he wrote it.

What people probably don’t remember is every time you force someone to do military service you divide the country. History has proven this time and time again. It doesn’t work.

On the other hand for very little additional money you can make service so darn financially and motivationally attractive that few would turn down.  Give full education as it use to be. Give health benefits; give career assistance with actually a job preference and government contract preference to people who serve. People will be standing in line. And if someone argues that this produces a system that attacks the poor, my real argument would be… give me a generation and you will see the greatest distribution of wealth the country has ever seen because the poor who take advantage of jobs, increased wages, health care and post military education will no longer be the ones who are poor. Adults will tell their children in the next generation they better serve or else.

I couldn’t have said this better myself, in fact most of this is supposedly already being done or shall I say it was supposed to be done or offered.  If you are currently serving or have served you know that we are falling short of what should really be offered.  If you are not a veteran think about this and if you are, you know what I am talking about.  Prior to getting out of the service, you have to start planning for your medical journey with the VA and that will be a journey like no other.  Trying to get your benefits through the VA is a long and drawn out process, if it ever does get handled correctly.  I know lots of politicians are trying to make a better system but many of them have never served or tried going through the system; it can literally take years before you get you benefits. 

The horror stories you hear are some of the very reasons that recruiting suffers and that mandatory service is spoken in the halls of Congress among other places; fix what we have and deliver what we already promise we will do.  The military is like a business and there is no better way to attract new customers (new recruits) than to deliver, as promised.

James Dicks