If you have followed my posts regularly you would have seen my posting regarding owning or renting your house..to which I have received violent protests. Here I am replying to the protests… “Own houses can be bigger than rented ones.” That is funny. You can rent a bigger apartment can you not? Most renters live […]

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The word risk is difficult to define. Just for this article I will define it as the ‘ability to lose capital’. Assuming this is the definition of risk, can you answer “how much risk can a person take?” For most relationship managers who have learnt ‘risk’ from high sounding professors (who have never met a […]

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Thanks to Satyam, now independent directors are all asking for a one-to-one meeting with the statutory auditors. One satutory auditor I know, told the board, sorry “I did not check the cash on hand” – and the board insisted that petty cash (in 47 locations) should be checked immediately. This is what is called being […]

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I live in Navi Mumbai (New Bombay) where the rules of the game are different for day to day living. I may sound a little like Raj Thakrey if I said this place has a more North Indian culture than a ‘amchi’ Mumbai culture (where I lived for 42 years before shifting to NM). Mumbai […]

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The key to quality insurance is in choosing a good quality Agent.  The word agent comes from the Indian Contract Act, 1872 and it is the Christian name for the guy who brings insurance / mutual fund product to your door step. Nowadays they have various names like Consultant, advisor, and the like, but I […]

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This article appeared in moneycontrol.com long back (cicrca 2006)…but it is still relevant, so here it is…. Immaterial of whether you are in your 20’s or in your 50’s and you are looking at an investment you should know some of the basics of investing, so here it is. By and large at some stage […]

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Many people including family has screamed at my idea of renting instead of buying a house (rather any asset). My idea is quite simple. Whatever you use has a cost. The cost of any product is made up of materials, overheads, interest, depreciation, and manufacturer’s margin. If you use a taxi say for 20 hours […]

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