The biggest economic shift in history – “Trading Down” – is moving into Phase II. This evolution can make you rich… or poor.

This transition will have a huge… positive impact on real estate in the USA and Ecuador.  We are looking at a different Ecuador property each day in this five part series.

See a picture and link to a Mindo property special below.

First let’s look at “Trading Down – Phase II”  because this will be at least three times bigger economically than anything we have known to date.

We can see the beginnings of Trading Down – Phase I in 1954 reflected in Ray Krocs concept of franchising and fast food.

Ray Kroc 1954 from McDonal’s museum site.

By 1958 McDonalds had sold 100 million hamburgers… a nutritional disaster…. but a sign of the times… when the middle class and boomers entered a golden era of having more material stuff.  Parents traded down from dining and eating at home for eating in the car.

These ideas worked because 60 million American baby boomers and their parents were shifting into a golden era.  This figure more than doubled over the years ahead  as boomers in Western Europe and Japan entered the era too. Franchising sped the system along.

Now BILLIONS more are entering the middle class. This will accelerate “Trading Down”.

We live in the richest, most incredible era that mankind has ever known. Our poorest have more than the richest of just centuries ago. Yet this can be hard to remember when caught in the day-to-day rush of the material rat race. Inspired investing is doing what we love and figuring out how to make money from it.

We increase our odds of success and enjoy what we are doing more. When times are tough and the economy slows, this perspective can give us time to sit back for at least a few moments and ask, “What do I really want to do with the rest of my life?”

The answer is the most important asset you will ever receive because “Trading Down” will also allow positive lifestyle shifts so enjoying the process will grow in importance.

“Trading Down” also enhances real estate in Ecuador and the USA.

This series look s at 11 reason why I believe international investors will invest more in USA real estate.

Part I looked at reasons #1 and 2. See here if you missed them.

Here is an excerpt from my newest report “Running Risk – How to Profit in Risky Times” that shows the the 3rd, 4th and 5th reasons why I have added US real estate to portfolio.

#3: Gloomy Markets Always Oversell.

I recall a New York Times best selling book written in 1992 written by Harry E. Figge Jr. and one of the country’s esteemed economics professors, Gerald J. Swanson entitled “Bankruptcy 1995: The Coming Collapse of America and How To Stop It.” This book told how US Federal debt would create a huge economic crash in 1995. The book sold millions of copies and many of us (including yours truly) shook in our boots. The lesson learned was that the sky was not falling. 1995 was the beginning of the biggest stock market boom in recorded history.

Then I remember Y2K. A reader sent me a note yesterday telling me how much he had lost because he had invested everything based on his expectations of a huge crash in 2001.

So when everyone is saying something is getting really bad, I usually begin to think that it is good.   If I am wrong betting this way at least I have bought my bad investments at low prices!

There is a lot of doom and gloom now when it comes to US real estate.  This is creating some great bargains because the US has many huge advantages that are ignored or dismissed.!

I expect innovation to change the world again. America usually does well with innovation.

Plus I agree the US dollar is most likely to fall.  This reduces US debt and makes US assets even more attractive.

#4: Demographics to consider.

Americans are getting younger. (Unlike most of the western industrialized world.)

In 1950 Europe had Twice US Population. Then in 1980 US fertility rates rose and the US began growing much faster than elsewhere.  At current growth rates by 2040 there will be more Americans than Europeans.

Yet there is plenty of space.  This is another reason I am positive about the USA.

#5: Lots of Real Estate.

The US is the world’s third-largest country by size (after Russia and Canada) and by population (after China and India).

Yet it has plenty of space. By 2040 America might have 400 million people. Compared to China’s 2 billion and India’s 1 billion.

The US is only about half the size of Russia; but it is 30% of all of Africa; about half the size of all of South America (larger than Brazil); larger than China; almost two and a half times the size of the entire European Union.

Most of that land is temperate or tropical like Hawaii and Florida. The only arctic area is Alaska.

The population density of 28 people per square mile is 168th of 256 nations compared to China’s 133 per square mile.

The country is rich in coal, copper, lead, molybdenum, phosphates, uranium, bauxite, gold, iron, mercury, nickel, potash, silver, tungsten, zinc, petroleum, natural gas, timber.

The US has the world’s largest coal reserves with 491 billion short tons accounting for 27% of the world’s total.

Plus the US has 18% arable land.  That’s the 68th best of 256 nations and because the USA is so large this means it has almost the largest amount of arable land.

China with 15% arable land is 79th among 256 nations.

This leads to another great American fundamental benefit… it is the breadbasket of the world.  We’ll see why this is important in Part #3 of this series.

Mindo Real Estate Special

See Today’s Ecuador property in a Mindo Cloud Forest here.

Gary

This series is formed from excerpts of one small part of my latest report Running Risk – How to Profit in Risky Times.

Belong to the International Club

Please join Merri and me.  Spread an epidemic of success… in health… wealth…. service to the community and personal fulfillment.   Be infected with positive purpose…. enthusiasm… fulfillment… extra income, profits and fun.

I invite you to join the International Club 2013-2014.  Save as much as $7,239 for as little as $177 a month.

As a club member you gain $7,792 of seminars, courses, online courses plus Spanish lessons and Ecuador tour discounts.

Join Merri and me  for seven courses and seminars that we’ll conduct in 2013 FREE.  Gain positive solutions to economic, financial and lifestyle developments.

Here are the courses you can attend at no cost.

June 14-15-16 Super Thinking Writer’s Camp, West Jefferson, NC.

August 31- Sept 1-2 Super Thinking Writer’s Camp West Jefferson, NC.

October 4-5-6 Super Thinking Writer’s Camp, West Jefferson, NC.

November 15-16-17 Super Thinking Writer’s Camp, Mt. Dora, Fl.

January 10-11-12, 2014 Super Thinking + Spanish, Mt. Dora, Fl.

February 14-15-16, 2014  Super Thinking Writer’s Camp, Mt. Dora Fl.

In addition members receive discounts on Ecuador farm tours and Spanish courses conducted by our Ateam Ecuador and Super Spanish teachers.  For example Super Spanish courses that are normally $699 are $175.  Ecuador real estate tours are reduced 20%.

Part of the courses we conduct are held on the New River in Ashe County, North Carolina.

New River

We’ll conduct three of the courses either at our farm or in this forest lodge.

50 delegates joined us.

The seminar in action.

After the seminar, International Club members join us at our home to talk with the speakers.

International Club members meeting in our home after a North Carolina seminar.

Four courses are in historic Mt. Dora, Florida.

Please join us this year through in Florida, and North Carolina FREE as an international club member… plus gain access to the agricultural tours and Spanish courses conducted by the Ateam Ecuador at a discount.

Super Thinking Spanish course at the historic train station in Mt. Dora.

There are many benefits of membership.

You (and a guest of your choice) can attend all eight of the seminars we have already set for 2013 plus any others we decide to conduct in the year ahead FREE.

As a club member you also receive seven online reports, courses and workshops worth $1,246 FREE.

The first of these seven online courses is “Tangled Web – How to Have an Internet Business,” normally sold at $299.

The second is our online course “Self Fulfilled – How to be a Self Publisher”, which has a $299 value. I am sending you this extra course free as I think it will help you have greater success. This is an extra $299 savings.

The third is our online course “International Business Made EZ” sold at $299.

You also receive fourth the 50 minute video by our webmaster David Cross on “How to Get Your Web Business Started”.

Your fifth course is the 50+ lesson course “How to Create your Own Website Using Sitesell” by Michelle Toole. (We are proud that this course was written by a student of our courses showing how well the 43 years of knowledge that Merri and I have accumulated and put into these programs can help you start your own global micro business.)

Sixth, you become a beta member in our newest online course “Event – Full Business – How to have a Seminar and Tour Business” currently offered at $349.

When you enroll, we’ll send you a password that makes the online courses easy to access at the Club website.  You can reserve as many seminars as you desire.

Five Positive Steps

Join Merri and me as we look at positive ways to prosper during 2013. Here are five ways to gain from the forces of change that can raise havoc with many.

#1: Having your own micro business for extra earnings, freedom, fulfillment and fun.

#2: Living and prospering in lower cost countries or small towns.

#3: Multi currency investing through US brokers and bankers abroad.

#4: Commodities that rise with inflation.

#5: Good value real estate…. especially multi dimensional and agricultural property.

We have specialized for over four decades in helping our readers excel in these five inflation beating opportunities.

The big benefits of belonging to the International Club are the power of repetition, updates and international friendships.  As a club member, you become friends with other members as you meet again and again.

Your first saving is on waived seminar fees for the seminars over the next year.

As you will see above and below you can attend Florida & North Carolina seminars.  If you attend just two of these seminars, the $1,799 membership fee will have already created a savings for you.

Yet there is more.  Much more.

International Club members meeting in West Jefferson for a reception after the North Carolina seminar.

Enough…. Enough with the Bad News.

Our 2013 mantra is BE POSITIVE in this negative world.  There is nothing as valuable as rarity but we need to remember that bad news sells. This means the mainstream media has slipped into offering information with an adrenaline rush.  Mayhem, murder and natural disasters.   These negative events will happen…. globally. We cannot do much about this.  Dwelling on insolvable negativity is not good for our health or wealth.

A recent quote from the Abraham Hicks website explains why nicely.

Continuing to tell stories of shortage only continues to contradict your desire for abundance, and you cannot have it both ways: You cannot focus upon unwanted and receive wanted. You cannot focus upon stories about money that make you feel uncomfortable and allow into your experience what makes you feel comfortable. A different story will bring different results: My thoughts are the basis for the attraction of all things that I consider to be good, which includes enough money, and health, for my comfort and joy.

Make 2013 Your Best Year Ever

What we can do is make ourselves Friendlier, More Compassionate, Happier, Stronger, More Energetic with greater intellect.  The way to start is to surround ourselves with successful, friendly, compassionate, happy, stronger, smarter, positive people who think as you do.

The International Club brings together experienced, like minded souls, who take a positive view and think outside the box… in constructive, thoughtful, doable ways.

Being in the club surrounds you with successful… positive… like minded souls.  This benefit alone is truly powerful stuff!

The courses you can attend free integrate Super Thinking with business and investing ideas and experience that enhance your health and wealth.

Focus on Ecuador & Smalltown USA & Canada

Learn how to create a BIG INCOME by thinking SMALL.   At the seminars you meet speakers who are attorneys and real estate experts for both Ecuador and small town USA.   You’ll rub shoulders with experts on global investing and pensions who can help you increase and protect your savings and pensions also how to increase the income you earn in positive ways you enjoy as you help your community.

(See a list of speakers you’ll meet at the club meetings along with other club members below).

Absorb  through  Osmosis

Merri and I are in our 45th year of organizing courses, seminars and newsletters about international and Super Thinking  lifestyles. The importance of this sharing… by like minded souls… was reinforced when a delegate from a course sent an email that said:

My Dearest Merri and Gary, Thank you for your most gracious hospitality last weekend. I am just thrilled at being a part of your group. You and Gary were exactly as I imagined you to be, warm friendly, kind, considerate, genuine, helpful, fun, sincere, what else can I say……I felt so comfortable in your presence and learned so much in your course. I was sad to leave the farm that Sunday afternoon. You made us all feel so welcome and cared about. You were so kind to make arrangements for a ride with the other delegates from the Charlotte Airport. They were so nice to me and so helpful, by the time the weekend was over I felt like they were my long lost brothers. Monday morning we all had breakfast at the airport together and I was so sad to see them go, I was sad the weekend was over, perhaps sad is not the right word for how I was feeling perhaps Gratitude is a better way to describe it. Grateful for having the opportunity to share the weekend with such wonderful, like minded Human Beings, in the beautiful mountains of North Carolina. Thank you Merri and Gary.  Thanks to you I now have new hope and a new direction to move forward in my life.  I know by attending your classes and conferences that through education and due diligence I will make the right choices.

This delegate’s comments about “belonging and feeling like a brother” to the other delegates is a wonderful refrain we have heard from our readers, year after year.

24 years ago Merri and I created a way that readers can join us to be immersed in a year-long learning program through our International Club.

The ideas behind this program began all those years ago in Vienna, Austria while we were conducting a course there.  One of our older delegates, had some sort of attack. The first fear was heart trouble. Several delegates took him to the hospital.  Others stayed with him there. I don’t think that delegate was alone for a minute!

What impressed Merri and me was that no one asked the delegates to help this man.

The friendships of delegates sharing many courses had just grown so strong that it was a natural reaction, just as if a family member was ill. Fortunately, it was only travel fatigue and the delegate didn’t miss a session of the course!

When you join our International Club 2013 you become part of a special family. The very first member to join the club all those years ago wrote, Thank you for the enjoyable and informative courses. I am pleased to be part of your international family and look forward to continuing my education at the next course.

His feeling struck a familiar chord. It has always been one of my greatest satisfactions to see how much fun delegates have getting together, sharing information and making friendships as we learn how to improve our health and increase our wealth.

The courses draw like-minded souls.  For this reason some delegates come back again and again. They come to learn, but also to be with their many friends made at the courses. When like-minded souls get together again and again to discuss a common purpose, magic happens! I can’t explain it in any other way-but it is true.

In a way our meetings are almost like family reunions. Perhaps it is getting together and reflecting on what has been said and what has been happening.

Learning with those who are also interested in the world creates thoughts that multiply the value of what we gain.  This is hard to describe but results are most powerful and wonderful!  This is to me is as important as the great financial benefit of attending many of our courses.

See the 2013 seminars in detail  below.

We started and have continued the International Club for 24 years because there are wonderful benefits from having repeat delegates at courses. Having repeat delegates makes the whole course somehow more exciting for all. Being a repeat delegate makes it easier to make and keep wealth and to lock in the knowledge you gain. It’s an exciting lifestyle. We have fun, gain adventure, discovery and friendships and share ways to improve our health and wealth!

You can see from the schedule above a very busy schedule for 2013. Very few club members actually attend every seminar.  Many  attend almost all of them!  Of course we hope you be with us for all of them, but even if you attend just two of the seminars, you gain considerable savings.

Another savings: Lifestyle for Two.

We want couples! As a member of the program, you are entitled to bring another person to every single course or tour. The cost for that extra person will be ZERO! You can bring whomever you wish. Bring your spouse, a friend, son or daughter, partner, accountant, adviser. You can bring the same person each time or a different person, whomever you choose to accompany you. (Accommodations and air fares relating to the courses are not included for members, delegates or their guests.)

The International Club fee of $1,799 is less than the price of two seminars.

I invite you to be a member of the International Club which allows you and your guest of your choice to attend all of these courses and tours.

Let’s prosper in these times of change. Won’t you join us in this exciting club and share Merri’s and my lifestyle for the next year? Join us at our farms and visit Ecuador. We look forward to seeing you at as many courses as possible and sharing this wonderful world of abundance and well being with you!

Gary

You can attend all of our seminar , courses online courses and more plus $1,246 of online value.  Club membership is $1,799. 

Become an International Club  Member $1,799 annual.

Attend as many of the courses below as you desire.

June 14-15-16   Super Thinking & Writer’s Camp West Jefferson, NC.

August 31- September 1-2 Super Thinking & Writers Camp at Merrily Farms, NC.

October 4-5-6 Super Thinking & Writer’s Camp West Jefferson, NC

November 15-16-17  Super Thinking & Writer’s Camp Mt. Dora, Florida

January 10-11-12, 2014 Super Thinking + Spanish  Mt. Dora, Florida

February 14-15-16, 2014  Super Thinking & Writer’s Camp  Mt. Dora, Florida

In additional Super Spanish courses will be scheduled in Canada, Mexico. and the US throughout the year.

(Dates subject to change).

Join us in 2013 and learn how to take advantage of the fact that the Sun Always Shines Somewhere

Yes, I want to become an International Club Member. 

Annual membership $1,799. Click  here.

Green international investments can help investors prosper due to the threat of an EMP terrorist attack.

Tuesday’s message at this site saw seven steps that could help us survive and prosper in a new era that could unfold due to a terrorist EMP attack.

Yesterday’s message looked at the importance of securing food in an EMP terrorist attack.

This threat of a terrorist EMP attack could accelerate opportunity in green international investments.

We’ll look at these in a minute… plus some Ecuador real estate plus how the risk of  a energy grid shut down could accelerate green investments.

First… let me reiterate… I do not think the sky is falling.  The sun always shines somewhere and the grass is not always greener on the other side of the fence.  God…Nature or whatever you wish to call your Higher Being always takes care of us. 

May I quote a wonderful passage about this from  John James Ingalls (a Senator from Kansas 1873 to 1891), address in “In Praise of Blue Grass.”

Grass is the forgiveness of nature–her constant benediction.  Fields trampled with battle, saturated with blood, torn with the ruts of cannon, grow green again with grass, and carnage is forgotten.  Streets abandoned by traffic become grass-grown like rural lanes, and are obliterated.  Forests decay, harvests perish, flowers vanish, but grass is immortal.  Beleaguered by the sullen hosts of winter, it withdraws into the impregnable fortress of its subterranean vitality, and emerges upon the first solicitation of Spring.  Sown by the winds, by wandering birds, propagated by the subtle horticulture of the elements which are its ministers and servants, it softens the rude outline of the world.  Its tenacious fibres hold the earth in its place, and prevent its soluble components from washing into the wasting sea.  It invades the solitude of deserts, climbs the inaccessible slopes and forbidding pinnacles of mountains, modifies climates, and determines the history, character, and destiny of nations.  Unobtrusive and patient, it has immortal vigor and aggression.  Banished from the thoroughfare and the field, it bides its time to return, and when vigilance is relaxed, or the dynasty has perished, it silently resumes the throne from which it has been expelled, but which it never abdicates.  It bears no blazonry or bloom to charm the senses with fragrance or splendor, but its homely hue is more enchanting than the lily or the rose.  It yields no fruit in earth or air, and yet should its harvest fail for a single year, famine would depopulate the world.

Our horses here at our Blue Ridge farm really believe this.

They are allowed to roam the farm freely except in our front yard.  But once a year, in the autumn, we let them in.

They crop and fertilize the lawn. This makes the horses really happy.

They love chomping, lying, rolling and sleeping in the grass.

Play in the grass

Blaze, the oldest, relaxes so much that when I sent this picture to our grandson Garren, he panicked thinking that Blaze was dead.

He’s not. Up he came…

On the subject of international investing and grass. I finally received my new Neuton weed eater.

This is a neat machine.

I have been using a Neuton electric lawn mower and when I ordered this weed eater they were 1,500 orders behind!

This shows the demand for green products.

Neuton says at its website: We are dedicated to making the world’s most innovative and dependable battery-powered lawn and garden equipment for people who care about the maintenance of their properties and the health of our environment.  Our forward-thinking designs reduce the noise and pollution of traditional gas power equipment, making yard work more enjoyable. Consistent with these goals, a portion of our profits are donated to community organizations working to clean our air.

Using innovative designs in rechargeable, battery-powered products we¹re developing unique and reliable tools that are easy to use and are easy on the environment. And together with our customers, we¹re redefining the way people care for their properties.

Designed in Vermont

Neuton battery-powered mowers are a reflection of the simplicity, ingenuity and values that define Vermont. At their core, Neuton battery-powered mowers are:

* Hard working – providing high powered cutting capacity with professional results
* Simple – delivering an ease of use and storage you won’t find elsewhere
* Responsible – exhibiting a profound respect for the environment

* A cleaner and more efficient way to mow your lawn. In fact, Forbes magazine recently rated Vermont the number one “Greenest State.”

Neuton and the Environment
Neuton battery-powered mowers are the #1 selling battery-powered mowers on the planet. Our belief in the environmental benefits of Neuton is a strong one. We call it our Clean Air Initiative.

Since we started, we have subsidized the purchase of thousands of Neutons across America in exchange for dirty/gas-guzzling mowers. In Southern California alone, 16,000 residents have replaced their mowers with Neutons. The result has been a staggering emissions reduction of 600 tons per year.

And with Neuton, reducing environmental impact extends even further.  The Noise Pollution Clearinghouse rated Neuton the quietest rotary mower you can buy.

The bottom line is you get big-time results, while leaving behind a small environmental footprint.

Neuton’s success shows the potential for green products.  The threat of an EMP terrorist attack has the potential to accelerate the value of green investments because it could shut down North America’s national energy grid.  Tis may speed up the development and use of individual energy systems.

Neuton is not a public company so we cannot buy shares, but tomorrow’s message looks at how to take advantage of good international green opportunity.

The risk of an EMP attack also accelerates demand for Ecuador real estate.

See for example how this sloping 10 acre corn field with outstanding 360 degree views, offers extra opportunity at Cotacachi real estate tours.

Gary

Let’s share ways and lifestyle alterations that protect as they provide joy, satisfaction, better health and enhanced wealth.

You may not be able to (or want) to move your home abroad or to a rural area.   Yet gardening, even in urban areas,  can be healthy and fun.  Holding some precious metals is probably a good investment anyway.  We should be taking care of our health even when their is no threat of war.

When it comes to holding assets abroad… our multi currency course can help.

Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

December 6-8 Blaine Watson’s  Beyond Logic & Shamanic Tour

December 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

December 11-13 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Join us in 2010.   Attend more than one seminar and tour and save even more plus get the three emailed courses free.

Our multi seminar-tour discounts have grown!  See the 2010 winter schedule below.  To Enroll click below.

1 real estate tour  $499 Couple $749

2 seminar courses & tours $949 Couple  $1,399

3 seminar courses & tours   $1199 Couple  $1,749

4 seminar courses & tours   $1,399 Couple $2,149

5 seminar courses & tours  $1,599 Couple $2,499

(Be sure to show in the comments section which courses and tours you are attending)

International Club attend up to 52 courses and tours in 2010 free.

Jan.   8-11     Ecuador Export Tour ($499) Couple $749
Jan. 13-14     Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Jan. 16-17     Coastal Real Estate Tour
Jan. 19-20    Quito-Mindo Real Estate Tour
Jan. 22-23    Cuenca Real Estate Tour

Feb. 11-14   Quantum Wealth Florida -International Investing & Internet Business, Mt. Dora, Florida ($749) Couple $999
Feb. 15-16   Travel to Quito and Andes
Feb  17-18   Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Feb. 20-21  Coastal Real Estate Tour
Feb. 23-24  Quito-Mindo Real Estate Tour
Feb. 26-27  Cuenca Real Estate Tour

Mar. 11-14     Super Thinking + Spanish Course, Mt. Dora, Florida ($749) Couple $999
Mar. 15-16    Travel to Quito and Andes
Mar. 17-18     Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Mar. 19-20    Cotacachi Shamanic Tour
Mar. 22-23    Coastal Real Estate Tour
Mar. 25-26    Cuenca Real Estate Tour

See our entire 2010 seminar and tour schedule here

See Neuton’s website here

A new international investing era could be created by a destructive scientific fundamental that is now so powerful it could overwhelm all other factors determining our wealth. This danger has such power that it could destroy most investors and much worse… end civilization as we know it.

Photo from Wikepedia report on Electromagnetic pulse weapons.

The most frightening part is that this force could unleash its destruction on us… now… at any time!

I want to share what, why and when this disaster could happen.

Then, I want to share how you can be protected rather than ruined.  We’ll even see how this, with luck, could be the creator of untold wealth which you, I, and a handful of cautious, insightful investors could share.

Before I explain how to safeguard your family from this possible upcoming disaster, let me explain that I first began to understand the magnitude of the risk after reading the New York Times best selling novel “One Second After” written by bestselling author, William R. Forstchen.

The story had extra meaning for me because it shows life in a small North Carolina town (similar to where Merri and I live during the summer) after an electro magnetic pulse is detonated by terrorists over the United States.

In the story the electrical grid and anything using a computer stopped working due to an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) created by just three small nuclear devices, launched from container ships and detonated high above the USA.

Without central communication and distribution, mass devastation and chaos ensued immediately.   The agony was terrible and life almost unfathomably complicated.

What made this fiction meaningful is that the book really documents and details the West’s dangerous reliance on technological systems which are so extensive that no one even recognizes them any more.

Adding to the terror of this book is a forward by Newt Gingrich and and afterword by Captain Bil Sanders (USN) one of the foremost experts on EMP. His comment  on how an EMP exploded over the US would create the Compton effect and how it would have “devastating consequences on our country” should be examined and understood.

It was Captain Sanders’ deep understanding of EMPs that made the warning in this book so powerful.

In a moment we’ll share ways to protect against this disaster… that could happen to all of us… suddenly… at any time.

First here are three facts that you should know.

EMP Fact #1: Many countries, including the US have EMP weapons that have nothing to do with a nuclear bomb and are quite small. They essentially put out a high energy very sharp spike of energy – high frequency and very short wavelength, short duration pulse.

However it is the nuclear EMP device that creates the greatest risk.  These are nuclear bombs that DO NOT CREATE DAMAGE FROM THEIR BLAST, HEAT OR NUCLEAR FALLOUT.   Instead the weapons create an electrical wave that fries just about anything with a computer.  A survey of open sources over the past decade finds that knowledge about EMP and EMP attack is evidenced in at least Britain, France, Germany, Israel, Egypt, Taiwan, Sweden, Cuba, India, Pakistan, Iraq under Saddam Hussein, Iran, North Korea, China and Russia.

Russian and Chinese military scientists in open source writings have shown how to design nuclear weapons that generate an extra powerful EMP effect called Super-EMP that can destroy even the best protected military and civilian electronic facilities.

EMP Fact #2:  This risk has grown to such an extent that America’s electrical grid is so vulnerable to terrorist attack that the Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson is pushing a bill to give the energy commission broad authority for “true emergency situations.”

This is explained in a recent USA Today article entitled “Electrical grid vulnerable to terrorist attack”  by Thomas Frank.  Here are excerpts from that article: It sounds like a science-fiction disaster: A nuclear weapon is detonated miles above the Earth’s atmosphere and knocks out power from New York City to Chicago for weeks, maybe months.

This graphic is from the USA Today article linked below.

Experts and lawmakers are increasingly warning that terrorists or enemy states could wage that exact type of attack, idling electricity grids and disrupting everything from communications networks to military defenses.

An expert panel that Congress created to study such an attack says it would halt banking, transportation, food, water and emergency services and “might result in defeat of our military forces.”

“The consequences would be catastrophic,” said Joseph McClelland, director of the energy commission’s Office of Electric Reliability. Full recovery could take up to 10 years, he said.

The scenario involves a phenomenon called an “electromagnetic pulse,” or EMP, which is essentially a huge energy wave strong enough to knock out systems that control electricity flow across the country.

The immediate effect would resemble a blackout. Although blackouts can be restored quickly, an EMP could damage or destroy power systems, leaving them inoperable for months or longer.

House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., is pushing a bill to give the energy commission broad authority.

At a committee hearing in July, Steve Naumann of energy giant Exelon said the authority should be limited to “true emergency situations.”

The commission studying the threat says the U.S. is ill-prepared to prevent or recover from an EMP, a vulnerability could invite an attack.

“We are not well-protected at all,” said Michael Frankel, who was executive director of the commission.

EMP Fact #3:  If an EMP event takes place, the Western World could quickly run out of food. Here is an excerpt of a transcript of a speech given by Professor Sir John Beddington, chief scientific adviser to the British government, at the GovNet SDUK09 event.  This has become know as “The Perfect Storm” speech.

I spoke here last year at about the same time about the issue of the food crisis and the burgeoning increases in food prices that were being driven by population growth, use of biofuels and so on.

The first problem here is that we really have a major issue. This graph takes a little bit of explanation; it is the ratio of our reserves to our consumption. What it is showing is that last year is the lowest level of reserves that we have had as a proportion of our consumption in years, since 1970 and actually since records were taken of this sort.

That means that we’ve got somewhere like reserves of around 14% of our consumption, that implies, give or take, 38 or 39 days of food reserves if we don’t grow any more.

As you can see, it’s the lowest level that we’ve actually had.  Is that a problem?  Well the answer is yes it is going to be a problem.  We saw the food spike last year; prices going up by something in the order of 300%, rice went up by 400%, we saw food riots, we saw major issues for the poorest in the world, in the sense that the organisations like the World Food Programme did not have sufficient money to buy food on the open market and actually use it to feed the poorest of the poor.

But this is England, not North America.  Right?

Beddingdon’s note shows that North America might not be able to rely on Europe for much food assistance and…

America’s food reserves are even worse as explained in this excerpt from last year’s article “The US has no grain reserves” published in the Tri State Observer, Milford, PA. The excerpt says:  Larry Matlack, President of the American Agriculture Movement (AAM), has raised concerns over the issue of U.S. grain reserves after it was announced that the sale of 18.37 million bushels of wheat from USDA’s Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC) Bill Emerson Humanitarian Trust.

“According to the May 1, 2008 CCC inventory report there are only 24.1 million bushels of wheat in inventory, so after this sale there will be only 2.7 million bushels of wheat left the entire CCC inventory,” warned Matlack. “Our concern is not that we are using the remainder of our strategic grain reserves for humanitarian relief. AAM fully supports the action and all humanitarian food relief.

Our concern is that the U.S. has nothing else in our emergency food pantry. There is no cheese, no butter, no dry milk powder, no grains or anything else left in reserve. The only thing left in the entire CCC inventory will be 2.7 million bushels of wheat which is about enough wheat to make 1⁄2 of a loaf of bread for each of the 300 million people in America.” (MY BOLD)

The CCC is a federal government-owned and operated entity that was created to stabilize, support, and protect farm income and prices. CCC is also supposed to maintain balanced and adequate supplies of agricultural commodities and aids in their orderly distribution.

“This lack of emergency preparedness is the fault of the 1996 farm bill which eliminated the government’s grain reserves as well as the Farmer Owned Reserve (FOR),” explained Matlack.

This is backed up by a Scienceblog article that says: “The US Government Has Zero Grain Reserves.”

In 1996, the Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform Act of 1996 (“Freedom to Farm Act”) called for elimination of government stockpiles of grain.  I’m sure someone thought it made sense, at the time.

Now, the United States government has no reserves of butter, cheese, dry milk, barley, corn, oats, sorghum, soybeans, wheat, rice, sugar, honey, peanuts, canola seed, crambe, flaxseed, mustard seed, rapeseed, safflower seed, sunflower seed, peas, lentils, chickpeas, and cotton.  [Source: US Farm Service Agency, Current CCC Inventory (PDF file)]

The book, “One Second After”, clearly and very dramatically (but I am not sure how accurately) drives home the point that unless a person takes a unique financial stance that his finances, and maybe even his or her life, could be wiped out.   Many military and scientific studies support this monumental economic, social and life threatening risk.

Yet you do not have to ruined by EMP.  You may even find that this potential weapon will create extra ordinary wealth that a few investors will share.  Here is how and why.

First, there is no proof that an EMP event as described above would create quite the havoc mentioned above.

Here is how one scientist whom I have known for years and trust completely, explains this.

“I’m not sure how large an effect the nuclear device would have above the atmosphere — the pulse might dissipate somewhat along the earth’s electromagnetic field.  It would probably take out a lot of communications and military satellites.

“Electronic devices that are not attached to any power source and that do not have an antenna when the EMP pulse hits could survive – even better with some shielding material.”

EMPs could be the driving force for the next investing era.

Just like the nuclear threat in the Cold War…  an EMP attack may never happen.   Yet because it could… the perception of risk… has created a huge rush by many governments to develop new weapons and forms of protection… just as during the Cold War.

This site and our multi currency site have repeated many times how stock market bulls and bears are based on cycles of human interaction, war, technology and productivity.

These cycles are intricately connected with the new waves of productivity that grow from the great human platform of combat. The cycle goes like this.

An economic downturn enhances a war or threat of war. Struggles for survival in the war (like the Civil War, WWI, WWII and the Cold War (WWIII), super charge inventiveness that creates new forms of productivity…the steam engine, the internal combustion engine,  production line processes, jet engines, TV, farming techniques, plastics, telephone, computer and lastly during the Cold War, the internet.

Each new invention helped win a war.  Shifting the technology to domestic use… after the war… created a boom.

Each boom leads to excess.

Each excess led to a correction.  The correction creates an economic downturn.

The economic downturn enhances a war or threat of war.

Here we are… in the correction again… at the correct time when we should expect that another war (or threat of war such as the Cold War) should begin to build!   This latest downturn started almost exactly (1998), 16 years after the last boom began (1982)…which began after the last great human struggle called the Cold War.

If the cycle repeats, the struggle should build now due to the poor economy.

The key for spotting the greatest investment opportunities is to spot the next big invention… the technology that will spin out of WWIV.

The key is that a problem must have such severe consequences (such as losing the war and being destroyed) that all stops… all logics of return on investment are ignored.  Technology and research are pushed full steam ahead regardless of cost. The threat must be real and serious… like EMP.

There are seven steps you can take to assure that you are not destroyed by an EMP.

#1:  Move well away from the USA…. to an agriculturally based country.  This is one reason Merri and I have been active in Ecuador for nearly 15 years.

#2: Move to Small Town USA.  Our sites have been looking at the benefits of this for years and why we live on agricultural property.

#3:  Create your own source of food.

#4: Create a local source of hardened energy and communications.  This is one reason our newest real estate purchase is also agricultural property and already has a HAM radio tower installed.

#5: Keep some gold and or silver on hand.

#6: Know how to take care of your own health.

#7:  Hold some assets outside of North America.

Merri and I have already taken six of these seven steps… and are well on our way to completing the seventh step.  From this we learned one really important point.

You should not suffer in the process of  gaining this protection either.

Merri and I did not move to the country… buy our Blue Ridge farm… set up our own food supply… start our garden… buy agricultural land in Florida… get a ham radio tower… buy gold and silver… organize assets out of the US and become involved in taking care of our own health naturally because we were worried about EMPs.  We did so because we wanted to.

Chances are that an EMP attack will NOT take place.  During the Cold War nuclear bomb shelters were not required!

Yet can we take a chance?  Ignoring this risk and with no action is not the answer either.

Instead let’s share ways and lifestyle alterations that protect as they provide joy, satisfaction, better health and enhanced wealth.

You may not be able to (or want) to move your home abroad or to a rural area.   Yet gardening, even in urban areas,  can be healthy and fun.  Holding some precious metals is probably a good investment anyway.  We should be taking care of our health even when their is no threat of war.

When it comes to holding assets abroad… our multi currency course can help.

Since mankind began, every generation has endured some great threat or risk.  Yet here we are… still growing!  Only time will tell whether EMP will create havoc or the greatest new wave of wealth we have seen.  Whichever, Merri and I will be here to share the experience with you.

Gary

The greatest asset of all is the ability to earn wherever you live, which brings everlasting wealth.

This is why we offer our course Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business.

A clear mind and healthy body are also a vital assets… plus a second language is a powerful diversification tool.

This is why I am giving everyone who enrolls in our North Carolina or Ecuador International Business & Investing seminar in October or November our “Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business Course” (offered at $299) free.

Here are comments from a reader about the way we help:  Thank you for your inspiration and information outlining foreign banking and retirement.  Your comments and suggestions are welcome for planning the steps to evaluate the early stages of living abroad.

Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

December 6-8 Blaine Watson’s  Beyond Logic & Shamanic Tour

December 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

December 11-13 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Join us in 2010.   Attend more than one seminar and tour and save even more plus get the three emailed courses free.

Our multi seminar-tour discounts have grown!

See the 2010 winter schedule below.

To Enroll click below.

1 real estate tour  $499 Couple $749

2 seminar courses & tours $949 Couple  $1,399

3 seminar courses & tours   $1199 Couple  $1,749

4 seminar courses & tours   $1,399 Couple $2,149

5 seminar courses & tours  $1,599 Couple $2,499

(Be sure to show in the comments section which courses and tours you are attending)

International Club attend up to 52 courses and tours in 2010 free.

Jan.   8-11     Ecuador Export Tour ($499) Couple $749
Jan. 13-14     Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Jan. 16-17     Coastal Real Estate Tour
Jan. 19-20    Quito-Mindo Real Estate Tour
Jan. 22-23    Cuenca Real Estate Tour

Feb. 11-14   Quantum Wealth Florida -International Investing & Internet Business, Mt. Dora, Florida ($749) Couple $999
Feb. 15-16   Travel to Quito and Andes
Feb  17-18   Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Feb. 20-21  Coastal Real Estate Tour
Feb. 23-24  Quito-Mindo Real Estate Tour
Feb. 26-27  Cuenca Real Estate Tour

Mar. 11-14     Super Thinking + Spanish Course, Mt. Dora, Florida ($749) Couple $999
Mar. 15-16    Travel to Quito and Andes
Mar. 17-18     Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Mar. 19-20    Cotacachi Shamanic Tour
Mar. 22-23    Coastal Real Estate Tour
Mar. 25-26    Cuenca Real Estate Tour

See our entire 2010 seminar and tour schedule here

Read the entire articles:

Electrical grid vulnerable to terrorist attack

The US has no grain reserves” published in the Tri State Observer, Milford, PA.

Will the Volt put voltage back into General Motors shares?

Will the new Chevy Volt add energy into an electric investment portfolio?

Probably not… because small is beautiful.

In this era of rapid change a company’s value is its idea… less its size and experience.   A monster organization like GM… even trimmed down comes from the muscle car experience. Changing course from the “Giddiyap 409″ attitude to “Go Green” requires enormous effort.

Yet who will come out ahead?

Chinese? South Koreans…. even Japanese?  Europeans?

The Japanese and Europeans have the benefit with their small, crowded nations, narrow and winding roads. They have always had to think smaller than in the US, where soft big and fast were the norm.

Japan’s gas prices are almost double those in the US and Europe’s are sometimes triple…. so when America’s cars were getting bigger… Europe’s and Japan’s were shrinking.

The Chinese and South Koreans are relatively new to the game so their mindset may not be as formed.

Americans did not learn much from the 1980s oil crisis.  Americans made pretty crappy, small cars at that time… the Dodge Reliant…  yuck!  No wonder Chrysler went broke.

The Ford Mustang had fallen from its great beginning to a miserable low and the Chevy Malibu wasn’t any better.  We should not be surprised that the Japanese grabbed so much market share.

GM rebounded with the Suburban.  Ford watched F150 pickup sales soar. Chrysler  made the minivan an every day affair and American drivers moved from gas guzzling muscle cars to gas guzzling SUVS and trucks.

Here are reader comments from our last message about green investing.

Greetings Gary, Thank you for printing the electric engineer’s letter. He is a smart guy, and used good illustrations. In his passion for reminding us that a battery is like a bucket [of course he is right] he managed to throw out the benefits of the battery out the window.  I hope he doesn’t impede you from reporting on new tech you hear about in the future. We all knew what you intended. The real point is reducing our grid use [via wind solar, whatever] and being able to store it economically. If this battery works it is the breakthrough you reported.  Please don’t lose your passion, tell us as many of the details of the vision you see, please. Happy Trails, and keep up the good work.

No chance I’ll lose my passion! I have grand kids and my children are really passionate about this so they push me right along. From the investing point of view, I know that big problems create big opportunity and there are few bigger problems than environmental pollution.

Here is another reader:  In response to the solar battery section of this post, it may interest you to access National Geographic’s August’s “Picture of the Month”.  Scout around the site until you find the series of photos from their recent article on the current state of solar power technology.

You may know that the WSJ recently had an article about a meeting Correa had with a Russian delegation to discuss Russian help building a nuclear energy plant in Ecuador. The WSJ (which hates Correa) was on red alert. But the general feeling in other media is that the Russians are meddling in “our” backyard in response to us meddling in “their” former sphere of influence, particularly those missiles in Eastern Europe.  I continue to be puzzled why no one in Ecuador, or interested in Ecuador, is looking at developing a solar power industry. Apart from the obvious abundance of stable and intense year-round solar radiation, a distribution system along the north/south axis of the Andes would avoid all the problems of moving oil and gas through mountains and volcanoes from the eastern Amazon basin west to the Pacific ports for trans-shipment.

The lack of solar would seem a puzzle until one thinks it through. Solar power is still costly and poor nations tend to go with the least expensive choice.   Plus who would help?  Solar could make Ecuador independent and no one seems to have that on their agenda.

Mankind must become greener. This is a huge problem and because problems create opportunity, demand for electric cars that help the environment may continue to grow.

When looking at investment ideas in electric cars think small… the winners are not likely go come from America’s… big (mostly busted) three.

See Jyske Bank’s Financial Friday including an interview about electric investing in cars.

Gary

The greatest asset of all is the ability to earn globally in many currencies.

This is why we are providing a special three for one offer with our  course Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business that can help you create your own internet business.

Our emailed course “Tangled Webs We Weave – How to Have Your Own Web Based Business” is a continuing educational program.  You receive the first 28 lessons when you enroll and a new lesson every week or two.

This course teaches how to create a web based business and is developed from the ongoing experiences that we have from our successful and profitable internet business.

This course is well worth the enrollment fee of $299… but currently you also receive two additional courses FREE.

The other two courses are #1: International Business Made EZ, and #2: Self Fulfilled – How to be a Self Publisher.

These two courses have sold for $398 and thousands have paid this price. We add them to your course at no added cost as I believe they will help you develop a better business in these crucial times..

Even Better Get All three Courses Free

To make this offer even more compelling,  I am giving everyone who enrolls in our North Carolina or Ecuador International Business & Investing seminar in October or November all three courses, “Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business Course,”  “Self Fulfilled- How to be a Self Publisher” and “International Business Made EZ” free.

Join us with Jyske Bank and my webmaster David Cross in West Jefferson North Carolina. Learn more about global investing, how to have an international business at the seminar.

Oct. 9-11 IBEZ North Carolina with our webmaster  David Cross & Thomas Fischer of JGAM

Or head south to Ecuador!

October 16-18 Ecuador Southern coastal tour

Oct. 21-24 Ecuador Import Export Tour

Oct. 25-26 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Join us with Peter Laub of Jyske Global Asset Management in Ecuador. Learn more about global investing, how to have an international business at the seminar.

Nov. 6-8 IBEZ Ecuador Seminar

Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

December 6-8 Beyond Logic Shamanic Tour

December 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

December 11-13 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Join us in the mountains and at the sea. Attend more than one seminar and tour and save even more plus get the three emailed courses free.

Attend any two Ecuador seminar or tours in a calendar month…$949 for one.  $1,349 for two.

Attend any three Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$1,199 for one.  $1,799

This 9-hole Ecuador golf course is for sale.

See more on Ecuador golf

This is a small business opportunity, a 21.39 acre estate with an executive golf course, pitching and putting, 6 greens on a 5 acre area.  It has six cabins plus a two bedroom, one bathroom house.

This property was one the market at one time at a price that was too high… $1.6 million dollars.

Now the owner has adjusted it down to a realistic price  $860,000 in his offer below… but I believe he will take less as he offered us a commission which we explained we do not take.  Use this fact… that you are coming to him without a brokerage cost… if you get into a negotiation.

Here is what the owner sent

Rancho Totoral Hostería & Laguna Golf Course

Business & Promotion

NAME:       RANCHO TOTORAL HOSTERIA & LAGUNA GOLF COURSE.

OFFERS:
•    A 85,574.01 m2 Lot (21.39 acres approximately)
•    An executive golf course, pitching and putting, 6 greens in a 2 hectares (5 acres) area, with a sprinkle irrigation system; 3” water pump with a 10 H.P. diesel motor.  The irrigation water supply is from the property reservoir. (Off season)
•    The right to have 15 hours 40 minutes of irrigation water.
•    BENYE 254 –Tractor.
•    CARONI 3 blades LAWNMOWER (rough cut).
•    TORO REELMASTER FRAME 7 blades reel to cut fairways.
•    MOTOCULTOR BCS 745- 3blades LAWNMOWER to cut prior greens grass and to aerate the golf course.
•    TORO GREENMASTER 1000- to cut greens extra fine.
•    GROOMING REEL – attaches to the GREENMASTER to make vertical cuts to the greens.
•    A 1.000 liter tank to fumigate (2 wheel axis, rim 15) with a 3.5 H.P.  BRIGGS STRATTON gas motor and a 1.5” pump.
•    WAGON (2 wheel axis rim15).
•    REPAIR WORKSHOP with a variety of maintenance tools.

HOSTERIA:
•    6 LODGE CABINS (31 m2 or 333,56  sq2), each one in excellent conditions, color T.V., wall to wall carpet, balcony with lagoon and mountains view, unique garden bathrooms. Two double beds in each room.
•    RESTAURANT/CAFETERIA- max capacity 60 guests, bar, lounge, direct TV service, restrooms, lobby and kitchen in an area of 269 m2 (2,894  sq2).  All restaurant and kitchen items included.
•    PATIO area- roof, includes a clay oven and a laundry room
(47 m2 /505,72 sq2).
•    CLEAR ROOF TERRACE PATIO (120 m2 / 1,291.2 sq2).
•    HOSTERIA  MAIN ENTRANCE with an electric gate.
•    MAYTAG Washer and Dryer.
•    RESERVOIR CISTERN of 16 m3 for drinking water.
•    HOUSE on 2nd story includes: 2 bedrooms, 1 bath, living room and a loft (147 m2 / 1,582.72 sq2)
•    LAGOON ACCESS with a 64m  shore.
•    Wonderful gardens and cobbled paving paths.

VALUE OF PROPERTY, CONSTRUCTION, EQUIPMENT AND MACHINARY.

•    A 85,574 m2 Lot (21,39 acres) based on Municipal appraisel.
•    Six available cabins (186 m2 / 2,001.36 sq2  approximately).
•    Restaurant, Restrooms, lounge with DTV, front desk lobby, and kitchen (269 m2 / 2,894 sq2 ).  includes restaurant supplies for 100 guests.
•    A 2 bedroom 1 bath apartment on second story and a loft on the third floor.
•    Outdoor lounge, a clay oven, and worhshop (47 m2 / 505.72 sq2 )
•    translucid roof terrace patio (120 m2 / 1,291.20 sq2).
•    pressure Water pump,  maytag washer and dryer.
•    cistern (16m3) drinking water reservoir.
•    cobbled paving paths, gardens, and electric gates.
•    executive golf course (pitching and putting, 6 greens,
(off season )
•    golf course  machinary:
•    BENYE 254 –Tractor.
•    CARONI 3 blades LAWNMOWER (rough cut).
•    TORO REELMASTER FRAME 7 blades reel to cut fairways.
•    MOTOCULTOR BCS 745- 3blades LAWNMOWER to cut prior greens grass and to aerate the golf course.
•    TORO GREENMASTER 1000- to cut greens extra fine.
•    GROOMING REEL – attaches to the GREENMASTER to make vertical cuts to the greens.
•    A 1.000 liter tank to fumigate (2 wheel axis, rim 15) with a 3.5 H.P.  BRIGGS STRATTON gas motor and a 1.5” pump.
•    WAGON (2 wheel axis rim15).
•    REPAIR WORKSHOP with a variety of maintenance tools.

ASKING PRICE   $ 860.000,00.-

Contact

EDUARDO VILLALOBOS
RANCHO TOTORAL HOSTERIA & LAGUNA GOLF COURSE
rtotoral@imbanet.net
www.ranchototoralhosteria.com
P.O. BOX 10-01-224  Ibarra
Telefax: (593-06- 2955-544)
Cell:  094805605

Here is more on this Ecuador golf course for sale.

The lake in question is Laguna Yaguarcocha, just five minutes north of the city of Ibarra and a little more than half hour drive along main highways north from Cotacachi.

There is a ridge which runs between the lake and the city of Ibarra and from a local lookout point you get the view of the lake above and also the city below.

The property is called Rancho Totoral.

Here’s a picture from just last Sunday of our Imbabura real estate group eating lunch on the newly constructed patio. By the way, Eduardo the owner, tells me the architect designed roof over the patio cost just $8,000 to put up last summer.

Last Sunday, just as all our delegates were finishing lunch I strolled over to Eduardo and asked if he wanted to present his project. He has about 22 acres in total and had been thinking of building some townhouses with a local constructor. To my complete surprise he said, “..well actually me and Patricia (his wife) have decided to sell the whole property”.

Suddenly I found myself with unexpected news to convey to the group. As we strolled out on to the grounds, one delegate, a successful internet company owner, said “let me guess – $1.8 million” and I said close ” but the asking price is $1.6 million”.

Of course, not all of us have that kind of money but if that price sounds a little high, bare in mind that just bare land around this desirable lake is selling at $10 per square meter and Eduardo’s price is only for the land and buildings – he’s asking $18 per square meter for thousands of square meters of construction and a 9 hole functioning golf course with the business thrown in. Here’s a shot of one of the fairways below with the lake and mountains in the background.

The altitude here is just under 7,000 feet and as such the climate is warm with only the slightest hint of an early morning chill. Here is the 44 seat restaurant below and the building it’s inside. (The patio can seat a further 100 people).

This area has a perfect climate around the lake and not surprisingly the lake is a weekend trip destination not just for Ibarra’s inhabitants but also folks from Quito and even further away. Here’s a couple of early morning shots of the lake as I arrived yesterday with the early morning mist just about burned off.

Laguna Yaguarcocha is also the site for Formula 3 races around a fast circuit and previously the races were run on the road that runs clean around the lake. Paragliding is a popular early morning sport, launch yourself of a nearby hill and glide serenely over the lake just as this guy was doing yesterday morning. Snow capped Cotacachi volcano was easily visible through the trees in the distance this clear morning.

Here are some shots of the road outside Rancho Totoral and also the entrance to the property and the driveway down to the restaurant and house, one think I like about this property is the mature gardens and tremendous variety of plants and trees.

Patricia and her daughter in-law relaxing outside the house

The golf course itself is the only one in the country north of Quito. You can go round and round the course all day long for $25. It’s pretty much a pitch and put course although I can assure you that wouldn’t be the case for me! Mind you if I owned this property I’d be out walking this property every morning just as I did with Eduardo yesterday morning.

Irrigation.

The bar and kitchen.

More cabin shots.

Lake Yahuarcocha.

Here are a couple of shots of the course.

There is wonderful club house.

Lush Gardens

And some charming guest cottages on the first tee. We’ll visit them again next course. Hope you’ll join us there.

There is a race track that wraps around Yaguarcocha Lake.

One wonderful thing about owning Ecuador real estate is that there is just about everything in this area from hot springs, to glorious mountains to great fishing to wild cloud forest preserves to golf to Formula 3 car racing.

Several delegates recently went to the races at lake Yaguarcocha. You can see some shots of the race below.

Start of the Ecuador real estate races at Yaguarcoacha

French participate in Ecuador real estate races at Yaguarcoacha

Winner at Ecuador real estate races at Yaguarcoacha

Last April, 2006 it was announced that Latin America motor sport took a big step forward by introducing the PanAm GP Series races. This is a brand new racing series that makes a significant impact on racing in Central and South America.

This series includes races in Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Columbia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Panama and the United States at Homestead in Miami. There is extensive TV coverage on the Fox network.

Although Merri and I are not fans, for those that like this type of sport there are many kinds of races from Formula 3 to motor bikes to souped up go carts here that add one more business dimension to this land.

Whether you want real estate in America, Ecuador or anywhere in the world, look for distortions. They offer value that can improve your lifestyle and increase your wealth.

Here are more pictures.

On our last real estate tour.

Landscaping and…

the cabanas from…

far and…

Here is

the entrance and restaurant.

Contact

EDUARDO VILLALOBOS
RANCHO TOTORAL HOSTERIA & LAGUNA GOLF COURSE
rtotoral@imbanet.net
www.ranchototoralhosteria.com
P.O. BOX 10-01-224  Ibarra
Telefax: (593-06- 2955-544)
Cell:  094805605

Gary

See this property on our real estate tour. Enroll here. .

Attend any two Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$949 for one.  $1,349 for two.

Attend any three Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$1,199 for one.  $1,799 for two.

There is great power in global investing diversification.

Sunrise at our North Carolina farm.  We diversify because the sun always shines somewhere.

Pure capitalistic theory says that in the long run… a global economy is good for everyone….overall.

Technology gives us the ability to buy from those who serve us best, wherever they are  in the world.  Why should we buy poorer quality goods locally at a higher price when someone from elsewhere can serve us better and for less.

Plus if we produce something better than anyone else we should be able to sell our product or service anywhere in the world as well.

Floridians and Californians buy apples from Oregon and North Carolina.

Oregonians and North Carolinians buy oranges from Florida or California because these areas each have special advantages… excellent conditions to produce and deliver those fruits clear across a continent, better and for less.

Global market advantages can be based on geography, infrastructure, skills sets, labor costs etc.

The theory of globalization is good but the process is not smooth. Globalization creates unemployment in many places and distorts many economies in the short term.  This usually pushes the process into the political arena and gets governments involved.  Governments often act based on political considerations rather than for good, long term economic reasons.

Plus business if given a chance… does not always encourage a free economy either.  Give big business a monopoly and they’ll tie up free trade even faster and much more efficiently than a government.

There is little, as businesses or investors, that we can do do to change these facts.

We are usually better off to adapt and take advantage of whatever situation exists instead.

This is what creates power in diversification.

Sunrise at our Ecuador hacienda.

The sun always shines somewhere. When our business and investments are diversified, we just have a better chance that our investments and business will be somewhere where there the business climate is sunny.

For example… a recent message Ecuador Beats Inflation looked at excerpts from a recent AOL.Money article by Jim Kuhnhenn entitled “White House Projects $9 Trillion Deficit”: In a chilling forecast, the White House is predicting a 10-year federal deficit of $9 trillion — more than the sum of all previous deficits since America’s founding. And it says by the next decade’s end the national debt will equal three-quarters of the entire U.S. economy.  But before President Barack Obama can do much about it, he’ll have to weather recession aftershocks including unemployment that his advisers said Tuesday is still heading for 10 percent.  Overall, White House and congressional budget analysts said in a brace of new estimates that the economy will shrink by 2.5 to 2.8 percent this year even as it begins to climb out of the recession. Those estimates reflect this year’s deeper-than-expected economic plunge.

Yet at the same time a Wall Street Journal article entitled “Ecuador Inflation To End ’09 Below 4%”  By Mercedes Alvaro shows that Ecuador’s economy is growing.
Here is an excerpt: QUITO (Dow Jones)–Ecuador’s inflation rate will end 2009 below 4% and the economy will grow close to 2% this year, President Rafael Correa said Wednesday.

“The annualized inflation will be below 4%,” Correa said late Wednesday in a radio and TV address. “There is not recession. Ecuador will have a growth of about 2%.”  “We have faced the biggest world crisis successfully,” Correa added. Early Wednesday the central bank said the Ecuadorian economy overall is poised to expand 1% in 2009.  Ecuador’s gross domestic product grew 6.52% in 2008 while inflation reached 8.83%.  According to central bank data, Ecuador’s liquid international reserves stood at $4.0 billion as of Aug. 21.  Last week, the central bank president, Carlos Vallejo, said that the government will repatriate in the coming days some $300 million of Ecuador’s liquid reserves invested abroad.  Ecuador’s liquid international reserves include public-sector deposits with the central bank, revenues from oil exports, loans from multilateral lenders and minimum reserve requirements from private banks.  In May, the central bank established a liquidity requirement forcing private banks to keep at least 45% of their assets and investments in Ecuador to draw back cash and boost domestic liquidity.

Sunrise on…

Sunrise over Mount Imbabura.

Because I am diversified in Ecuador, Georgia, Florida and North Carolina, in 2007, I was selling Florida property at the top of the market.  I was buying Ecuador real estate with those returns. Now that Florida  is down and Ecuador real estate has risen,  I am selling Ecuador real estate and buying in Florida.

A huge portion of all profits in business and investing come from timing.  Most commodity, stock and real estate markets go through ups and downs.  If you plan your investments and liquidity so you sell only at favorable times, global investing diversification enhances your chances of always having assets someplace where there is a seller’s market.

Sunrise shot from our hotel Meson de las Flores.

So when you think Ecuador… or Mexico or Panama… or wherever…. also thing diversification.  The sun always shines somewhere and your changes of financial suntans increase when you diversify.

Gary

The greatest asset of all is the ability to labor at what you love wherever you live. This brings everlasting wealth.

This is why we are providing a special three for one offer with our  course Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business

This course can help you create your own internet business.

Our emailed course “Tangled Webs We Weave – How to Have Your Own Web Based Business” is a continuing educational program.  You receive the first 28 lessons when you enroll and a new lesson every week or two.

This course teaches how to create a web based business and is developed from the ongoing experiences that we have from our successful and profitable internet business.

This course is well worth the enrollment fee of $299… but currently you also receive two additional courses FREE.

The other two courses are #1: International Business Made EZ, and #2: Self Fulfilled – How to be a Self Publisher.

These two courses have sold for $398 and thousands have paid this price. We add them to your course, at no added cost, as I believe they will help you develop a better business in these crucial times..

Even Better Get All three Courses Free

To make this offer even more compelling,  I am giving everyone who enrolls in our North Carolina or Ecuador International Business & Investing seminar in October or November all three courses, “Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business Course,”  “Self Fulfilled- How to be a Self Publisher” and “International Business Made EZ” free.

We always conduct our autumn North Carolina course on the first weekend of October… the best time to enjoy  the leaf change.

Join us with Jyske Bank and my webmaster David Cross in West Jefferson North Carolina. Learn more about global investing, & how to have an international business at the seminar.

Oct. 9-11 IBEZ North Carolina with our webmaster  David Cross & Thomas Fischer of JGAM

You’ll see views like this on your way to West Jefferson for the October seminar.

Or head south to Ecuador!

October 16-18 Ecuador Southern coastal tour ONLY FOUR SPACES LEFT

Oct. 21-24 Ecuador Import Export Tour

Oct. 25-26 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

In Cotacachi the weather is always spring like.  Here is the village plaza near our hotel Meson de las Flores.

Join us with Peter Laub of Jyske Global Asset Management in Ecuador. Learn more about global investing, how to have an international business at the seminar.

Nov. 6-8 IBEZ Ecuador Seminar

Let our friendly staff at Meson de las Flores serve you.

Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

This shorts weather photo was taken from our beach penthouse in February.

Join us in the mountains and at the sea.  Attend more than one seminar and tour and save even more plus get the three emailed courses free.

Attend any two Ecuador seminar or tours in a calendar month…$949 for one.  $1,349 for two.

Attend any three Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$1,199 for one.  $1,799

Read the entire article Ecuador Inflation To End ’09 Below 4%

Here is an Ecuador investing and  business ideas for Ecuador or anywhere you live.

In a moment, I am going to show you how to own this 16 room hotel in Otavalo for almost nothing… maybe even free.

First let’s look at a business idea for this hotel… rootlessness… a growing global problem.

Problems create opportunity so there is business opportunity in rootlessness.

Technology has given mankind the ability to work, live and invest globally… a wonderful benefit.   Yet this mobility has created a problem as well.

One of my messages many years ago (2002) outlined that there would be a growing market for friendship in this modern era.

That message said: The market for friendship has to grow because technology has made society so  mobile. I for example have lost nearly every single really good friend from school.  I haven’t seen most of the friends I grew up with for forty five years. I imagine they still live in Portland, Oregon, but maybe not. They might all have become travelers like myself. Out of a six pack of school buddies, Steve is the only one with whom I keep in touch.

When I moved to North Carolina, I visited the local car mechanic named Jay Dee to have some work done on my 1986 Suzuki Samari Jeep. This is the perfect farm car but often needs work.  Jay Dee’s garage is a barn by his house and local people sort of collect around that barn to shoot the breeze, spit a little tobacco and talk over old times. “Remember old Johnny Blevins and that time he threw you in the creek,” one of them might say. “Well darn that must a been fifty years ago.”

My Samari… 23 years old and only 62,000 original miles.

I love being with these wonderful mountain people and their easy going, friendly ways. They have such deep roots and ties and are comfortable and at ease with their friends. They know who they are, where they are and who their friends are because they have been with them their entire lives. These people aren’t hanging around Jay Dee just to get their cars fixed. They are enjoying a ritual of friendship that has united them since they were kids.

I love this! My friendships are scattered and far flung all over the world. I sometimes don’t get to see my friends for years!

A huge segment (much of the wealthiest) of the population no longer lives where they were brought up. They have lost touch with their roots.  The more technology removes us from our origins, the more the market for togetherness and friendship grows.

Friendship is an extension of togetherness and can develop around many themes. For the mountain folk of North Carolina or anyone who remains rooted in their birthplace the theme is mostly “down home”.

These friendships are tight and if you have ever heard the phrase “You ain’t from around here are ya, boy,” you have experienced the reverse side of this type of friendship. The implication is that with these long term, locally based friendships, the only way to be a friend is to have been there for years.

Some of the years I lived in Gloucestershire, England were spent in a tiny village named Chalford. I lived over  a local pub there, “The Mechanics Arms.” Though I was a newcomer to the area I was accepted as an old timer because of family ties. One man in his sixties, who visited the pub every night however wasn’t quite part of the crowd.

Many of the locals talked about him as the new man in town. I was surprised later to learn he had lived in Chalford for nearly thirty years!  The locals would always view him as less trustworthy because he had not been born and raised there. Childhood experiences were the basis of their deepest friendships.

Many of us will never have this type of long term familiarity friendship.We have moved around too much. This creates markets for many types of new friendships.

Networking is a form of business friendship. The theme of the friendship is scratch my back and perhaps I can scratch yours or we will both be better off scratching each others’ backs. Such friendships can be local, state or country wide or as mine span the globe. They can be very informal or very formal.

The market for formal friendships has already exploded.  Incredible growth of support groups such as AA are a sign of the momentum in the friendship market. Such groups offer a format for formal friendships and range from disease support groups to abused support groups. Each offers an organized way to have friends. The growth of these groups is not because there are more problems than thirty years ago. The growth is because of the increasing market for friendships.

We can see this trend spreading everywhere. For example one telephone company has recognized this growing trend and has successfully built its business around the idea of calling “family and friends.

This thought (that a market for friendships would grow) was correct.  We see this on the internet with one of the biggest trends being social networking sites.

A recent New York Times article, “Invisible Immigrants, Old and Left With ‘Nobody to Talk To” by Patricia Leigh Brown reveals a sliver of this problem.

Here is an excerpt from this article:   They gather five days a week at a mall called the Hub, sitting on concrete planters and sipping thermoses of chai. These elderly immigrants from India are members of an all-male group called The 100 Years Living Club. They talk about crime in nearby Oakland, the cheapest flights to Delhi and how to deal with recalcitrant daughters-in-law.

Together, they fend off the well of loneliness and isolation that so often accompany the move to this country late in life from distant places, some culturally light years away.

“If I don’t come here, I have sealed lips, nobody to talk to,” said Devendra Singh, a 79-year-old widower. Meeting beside the parking lot, the men were oblivious to their fellow mall rats, backpack-carrying teenagers swigging energy drinks.

In this country of twittering youth, Mr. Singh and his friends form a gathering force: the elderly, who now make up America’s fastest-growing immigrant group. Since 1990, the number of foreign-born people over 65 has grown from 2.7 million to 4.3 million — or about 11 percent of the country’s recently arrived immigrants. Their ranks are expected to swell to 16 million by 2050. In California, one in nearly three seniors is now foreign born, according to a 2007 census survey.

Now let’s look at this 16 room hotel in Otavalo that you can have for almost nothing… maybe even free and how it could offer a business that solves this problem.

First, let me detail the hotel and why a fabulous bargain has come up… and how this hotel can fit into the friendship market.

This  is an really good Ecuador income opportunity, a…

hotel for sale in Otavalo.

The owners have had this on the market for a number of years at one million dollars. We thought this price was too high and never wrote about it.

Earlier this year they dropped the price to $750,000 and offered us $150,000 commission if we sold it. I wrote then:  The owners offered us a $150,000 commission to sell the hotel. We are not brokers and do not take commission so our reply was “cut the price for our readers”!  This would place the price at $600,000… an interesting value.

$600,000 may have been interesting but the owner now just emailed us and dropped the price to $495,000.  This places the price beyond  an interesting value into the bargain range.

Plus the owners again offered us a commission.  We do not take commissions so whatever (how much commission was not clear) amount they would pay could be deducted from this price.

This makes the hotel a real bargain.

At $750,000 the commission of $150,000 was 20%.  We don’t know of course about the commission, and I didn’t want to wait to verify this because this hotel is valuable, beautiful and it could  work out at about $35 a foot on the building and leaves you the land (which right next to Otavalo market is worth a lot).

Yet there is more. I believe you can get the land and the 16 room hotel for almost nothing.

I’ll explain how below.

First: the hotel details. The hotel is right next to Otavalo Market, one of the largest tourist attractions in Ecuador.

The property has these characteristics:  Appx. 30,000 sq. feet of  land and 12,000 sq.  feet of  building in 3 apartments and 16 hotel rooms.

Property Details:  The property consists of approximately 30,000 square feet of land, with trees, gardens and many types of exotic birds.  The gardens…

are large… well groomed and…

have a wonderful patio.

Ma too likes it there.

There is approximately 12,000 square feet of solid brick and cement construction.

On the property, there is plenty of room for expansion and development, especially in a town where there is absolutely no land left to develop.  The building is built in the old colonial style with finely crafted hardwood arched windows and doors, rustic floor tile and traditional clay-tiled roof.  The building is constructed according to U.S. anti-seismic standards.

The owner claims this is one of the best built constructions in Otavalo—and one of the prettiest in the city!

The building boasts excellent water pressure on all four floors. (Please don’t pooh pooh this quality!) The building has a powerful, propane gas-fueled boiler system capable of producing up to 700 gallons of hot water a day.  With access to the land/building from two streets, the property has frontage on 3 streets, which have been newly paved by the City of Otavalo.

Characteristics:  16 rooms, large social area (restaurant), large working kitchen, two medium-sized apartments, one large penthouse apartment, small building in back (approximately 250 square meters) that serves as a laundry room and storage facility, which also has a full bathroom and a working fireplace.  This could easily be converted into a small rental property.  Adjacent, yet private, to the main property, and which consists of 350 square meters of our total property, is a working area and parking garage (which can accommodate approximately 6 cars), with clothes lines, and general storage area.

First floor: Consists of large working kitchen, with back door exit to outdoor enclosed pantry/food storage room, laundry area and herb garden.  There is a large dining room (approximately 2,500 square feet) with excellent working fireplace, and space to comfortably entertain 60 or so people.

Reception.

Restaurant is beautiful also.

The dining room leads outside onto the tiled patio and garden where there are tables and chairs for serving and relaxing, and this area may be used to accommodate another 30 or so people.  Also on the first floor there are 8 rooms which have served as hotel rooms, each 55 X 45 feet  in size with large bathrooms.

All rooms face out into the garden and the property is in front of Mount  Imbabura.   Hundreds of hummingbirds and exotic birds roam the grounds.

Patio seen from one of the three apartments.

Hotel room…

shots.

Second floor: There are two spacious apartments, each about 1,100 square feet in size, with glass windows looking down onto the garden.

Apartment #1 view…

Apartment#1 bedroom.

Apartment #1 Living room

and kitchen.

Each apartment has a large bathroom and a kitchenette with small balconies in the back.  Also on the second floor there are 8 more rooms, equal to the rooms on the first floor, that open onto a balcony over-looking the garden.

Apartment #2 living room

Bedroom.

bathroom.

Third floor:  There is a very large “penthouse” apartment, approximately 2,250 square feet with large glass windows and a large balcony overlooking the garden.  This apartment has one bathroom with a small adjacent room that may be converted into a sauna, large spacious kitchen and living room, two large bedrooms, and a large working fireplace.

Penthouse…

views.

Penthouse.

Penthouse fireplace.

Kitchen.

Penthouse bedroom.

Extra room.

Penthouse bedroom #2.

The Roof: The penthouse apartment has stairs that lead to the roof, where there are two 5,000 gallon reserve tanks for storing water (if needed), as well as more storage space.  As stated before, there is excellent water pressure on all 4 floors.  Also includes a solar hot water system which connects into the boiler system.

Two 5,000 gallon water storage tanks…

plus solar water heater.

This is an excellent facility with wonderful grounds in a high priced area..

Let’s look at the owner’s explanation of why they have lowered the price… then we’ll see how to get this hotel for almost nothing.

Hello Merri and Gary,  This is Margaret from Ali Shungu in Otavalo. I have been living up here on the mountain for about 6 months full time, going back and forth to the Hotel.  I feel better up here in my little house with my projects.   I have been recovering from an illness and have been in the hospital in Quito. They said that if this diverticulitis does not clear up, and it has been bad for about 6 months with 3 months of vomiting, fever, etc.,–that I will need an operation to remove it.  I’m drinking all kinds of herbs and aloe vera cactus and only boiled simple foods, and hoping to heal without an operation.  Did 2 rounds of antibiotics, might have to do more…….I will say though, that the hospital bill was not that bad in Voz Andes for all the tests that I had and treatments, etc.   I will now take care of myself more, and do more praying!  I might need intravenous antibiotics but I do not want to go back to the hospital in Quito.

There you have it… a owner whose health no longer allows them to run the hotel nor wait out a high priced buyer.

Here is how to get this 16 room hotel for almost nothing. I believe that the three apartments, if separated from the hotel and sold on their own, are worth near the price of the hotel.   I do not know the Otavalo real estate market so well…but I have seen the apartments and penthouse and they are exquisite.

If they are and if you can buy this for hotel in the $400,000 range… this means the 16 room hotel, the grounds and the restaurant are almost free.

This will require some negotiating, some work and legal work  (Ecuador lawyers are not very expensive)… but could provide one heck of a deal.

We have put our Ecuador Living subscribers in touch with the sellers.  To gain this contact information you can subscribe to Ecuador Living here.

If the hotel is not under offer, we’ll show it on our upcoming October Andean Real Estate tour.    See tour details here.

Merri and I are not involved financially in any way with this offer.  We have not looked at the hotel’s financial accounts, legal situation, titles, nor had an engineering inspection, so be sure to take all normal precautions if you are interested.  Especially look at the labor obligations you’ll absorb.

Our recommendation for those who are interested in Ecuador is to come visit first… look around… rent and stay awhile… before you buy.  One reason for this recommendation is that when you are here awhile you’ll see bargains… like this and I believe for the reasons stated that Hotel Ali Shungu is now a bargain.

Now let’s see how this creates opportunity from the problem of rootlessness.

Americans and Canadians are flocking to Ecuador.  I know.  Our Ecuador Living business is going wild.  The subscription pace has almost doubled recently and the request for rentals in this area has skyrocketed past our ability to keep up!

The demand is especially strong at the lower income level… those who are retiring and can no longer have a decent life in Canada or the US… especially in places where there is winter sun.

There people are isolated… often not speaking Spanish and with little to do.   So Turn this hotel into a residence for gringos. Provide free internet… US papers…. weekly Spanish lessons… a support program… group tours, travel assistance etc.

There is one more value.  Yesterday’s message How to Make Money in this Multi Currency Era explained how, due to the falling US dollar, Ecuador real estate has become a 10% better value since this last February.

Gary

The greatest asset of all is the ability to earn globally in many currencies.

This is why we are providing a special three for one offer with our  course Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business that can help you create your own internet business.

Our emailed course “Tangled Webs We Weave – How to Have Your Own Web Based Business” is a continuing educational program.  You receive the first 28 lessons when you enroll and a new lesson every week or two.

This course teaches how to create a web based business and is developed from the ongoing experiences that we have from our successful and profitable internet business.

This course is well worth the enrollment fee of $299… but currently you also receive two additional courses FREE.

The other two courses are #1: International Business Made EZ, and #2: Self Fulfilled – How to be a Self Publisher.

These two courses have sold for $398 and thousands have paid this price. We add them to your course at no added cost as I believe they will help you develop a better business in these crucial times..

Even Better Get All three Courses Free

To make this offer even more compelling,  I am giving everyone who enrolls in our North Carolina or Ecuador International Business & Investing seminar in October or November all three courses, “Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business Course,”  “Self Fulfilled- How to be a Self Publisher” and “International Business Made EZ” free.

Join us with Jyske Bank and my webmaster David Cross in West Jefferson North Carolina. Learn more about global investing, how to have an international business at the seminar.

Oct. 9-11 IBEZ North Carolina with our webmaster  David Cross & Thomas Fischer of JGAM

Or head south to Ecuador!

October 16-18 Ecuador Southern coastal tour

Oct. 21-24 Ecuador Import Export Tour

Oct. 25-26 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Join us with Peter Laub of Jyske Global Asset Management in Ecuador. Learn more about global investing, how to have an international business at the seminar.

Nov. 6-8 IBEZ Ecuador Seminar

Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Join us in the mountains and at the sea. Attend more than one seminar and tour and save even more plus get the three emailed courses free.

Attend any two Ecuador seminar or tours in a calendar month…$949 for one.  $1,349 for two.

Attend any three Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$1,199 for one.  $1,799

Read the entire article Invisible Immigrants, Old and Left With ‘Nobody to Talk To here.

Frequency and health are connected.

One way of looking at everything is as a collage of frequencies.

Good health is the body operating as a bundle of correct, natural frequencies.

A recent message for example looked at how the frequency of music can integrate the brain hemispheres and accelerate super thinking.

The process is also good for health.  That same article for example showed how healers globally use the frequency emitted from the conch shell because the form of these shells represent the Golden Mean.

In mathematics and the arts, the golden mean is the ratio of expansion in nature when all frequencies are in harmony. This mathematical constant is about 1.618033.

In other words each ring of a conch shell (that has grown in harmony) is about 1.6 larger than the last.

Non stressed flowers unfold on the Golden Mean.

Adolf Zeising, a mathematician and philosopher, found the Golden Mean expressed in the arrangement of branches along the stems of plants and of veins in leaves. Animal skeletons, the branches of veins and nerves expand on the Golden Mean.  The Golden Mean rules the proportions of chemical compounds and the geometry of crystals.   The Golden Mean is a universal law as Zeising wrote, “the ground-principle of all formative striving for beauty and completeness in the realms of both nature and art, and which permeates, as a paramount spiritual ideal, all structures, forms and proportions, whether cosmic or individual, organic or inorganic, acoustic or optical; which finds its fullest realization, however, in the human form.”

So hearing the Golden Mean in music or sound helps balance our being.

We built our North Carolina farmhouse on the Golden Mean… a rectangle 1 wide by 1.6 long.

We can gain balancing frequencies in other ways such as through nutrition.

Ecuador shamans use conch shells, tobacco smoke, floral water, herbs, chants, music and dance to balance frequencies.

For example Theanine (chemical name: r-glutamylethylamide), one of the chemicals found in green tea, helps balance the system. Theanine is used to reduce stress and anxiety without the tranquilizing effects found in many other calming agents.

Scientific evidence shows that Theanine stimulates the brain’s production of alpha waves, making the user feel relaxed but alert and not drowsy. It also helps the body produce other calming amino acids, such as dopamine, GABA, and tryptophan. As might be expected from a calming supplement, Theanine may be able to lower elevated blood pressure as well.

This is why I was excited to receive the note below from my friend, health care provider and fellow trustee on our foundation Landofthesun.org, Joe Spano, MD.

Here are Merri and me with Dr. Joe Spano (left) and Dr. Jim Key both board certified in anti aging at a shamanic ceremony on the ancient Inca Rumicucho pyramids.

When Joe gives me a health idea, I listen. His resume shows why:

Joe attended Louisiana State University School of Medicine in New Orleans from 1959 – 1963. His internship was done at Mixed Medical and Surgery; Kings County hospital center, Brooklyn, New York. His Medical Residency was at Veterans Administration Hospital and Tulane University School of Medicine, New Orleans. He had special training at Resident in Clinical Cardiology under John H. Phillips M.D., Chief of Cardiology, Veterans Administration Hospital, New Orleans.

Joe was an instructor in Physical Diagnosis at Tulane University School of Medicine. He was a Research Fellow in Medicine for gastroenterology at Harvard University, Thorndike Memorial Laboratory, Boston City Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts. He served in the Military from 1967 to 1969 in the USAF, 3560th USAF Hospital, Webb AFB, Texas; Chief of Internal Medicine; Chief of Professional Services; Chief of Laboratory Services; Chief of Radiology.

Joe has honors, membership and diplomat to American Board of Internal Medicine, Harvard Trained Gastroenterologist, American Board of Anti-Aging Medicine, Phi Beta Pi Medical Fraternity. He is listed in ”Best Doctors in America“, America’s Top Physicians (Research Council of America) and was chief of staff at Naples Community Hospital.

Joe sent this note:  Gary I have taken the liberty of sending you a few bottles of green tea, pomegranate and blueberry extracts that the business I am involved with provides. Try them and see what you think.

Thera-green Tea contains only pure, wild crafted, Chinese Green Tea and herbs.
Thera-Green Tea contains natural antioxidants derived from Green Tea, Lotus Leaf, and Kudzu Root.

Thera-green Tea helps fight free-radicals. It is an excellent addition to a weight loss program… provides immune support… nourishes cardiovascular health and
promotes healthy collagen production.

Blueberries  have one of the highest anti-oxidant ratings of all the  berries. Although the acai berry, the mangosteen  berry, and the gogi berry all are enjoying a  lot of  publicity, the blueberry is a superb  source of the chemicals such as quercetin, vitamin c, resveratrol, and anthocyanidins that neutralize free radicals which wreak havoc on cell membranes and dna making it equal if not superior in efficacy.

Extracts of blueberries enhance brain function and reduce brain aging  according to recent research, along with bilberry (a component of thera-blueberry)  improve night vision and may slow macular degeneration.  Eye strain is decreased as well.

Thera-BlueBerry contains the pure, raw pulp of whole wild Blueberries, plus
extracts of Pomegranates, Bilberries, and Elderberries.

One dropper is equivalent to 10 cups of the blueberry juice. It requires this much to get the various health benefits that have been ascribed to blueberries.

The convenience is a major advantage, I add the extracts to my water, oatmeal, and cereals.

One still has the benefit of the super food berries, even in the off season.

This is not to indicate that fresh berries are not better and that in Ecuador those fresh juices aren’t more delicious and nutritious.

Thera-Pomegranat contains all natural extracts of real whole Pomegranate fruit.  This ancient fruit has modern health benefits. Originating from Persia and mentioned in the Old Testament, pomegranate has been found to  have many positive effects on health. synergistically blended with Green Tea and Elderberry extracts.

Daily consumption of this fruit juice or its extracts seems to decrease progression of atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries).

Also, it may improve circulation to the heart under stress.  The polyphenol content, notably the anthocyanidins (gives it the color) has been shown  to reduce the progression of prostate cancer.

Because it enhances nitrous oxide production in the body the juice has been helpful in some men with erectile dysfunction. Concentrated pomegranate juice may be useful in lowering ldl (bad) cholesterol and reducing blood pressure.

Like cranberry juice its chemical components inhibits the ability of bacteria  to adhere to the urinary bladder wall and cause infection.

The fresh fruit is not available year round and the juice in supermarkets is expensive.

Therefore, the concentrated juice extract available as thera-pomegranate  from preferred medical supplements is a convenient was of getting your daily health requirement.

One or two droppers is all that is needed daily.  Regards, Joe

I am not selling these supplements but use these green tea and fruit extracts as  part of  my anti-aging strategy.

Joe has been kind to extended  a 10% discount to readers GaryaScott.com and ecuadorliving.com.

If you have questions or wish to order these supplements contact Joe Spano at shamanspano@usa.net

Thera Green Tea Supplement Facts

1 ml (1 full dropper) supplies
Servings Per Bottle 60
Amount Per Serving  % DV
Green Tea extract (leaves)
(minimum 90% polyphenols, 50% EGCG) 110 mg †
Proprietary blend of Lo Han
extract (fruit) and Stevia extract (leaf) 31 mg †
Lotus extract (leaf) 25 mg †
Kudzu extract (root) 10 mg †
Chinese Licorice extract (root) 2 mg †
† Daily Value (DV) not established
Other IngredIentS: purified water, natural glycerin, natural
lemon flavor

Thera Pomegranate supports healthy cardiovascular system
(heart, veins, blood and arteries), brain health, liver health,
stomach health, immune health, healthy lipid levels in people
with diabetes, skin and prostate health.  It also balances stress.

Thera Pomegranate Supplement Facts
1 ml (1 full dropper) supplies
Servings Per Bottle 60
Amount Per Serving  % DV
Pomegranate extract (juice) 100 mg †
Pomegranate extract (fruit) 50 mg †
Green Tea extract (leaf) 50 mg †
Proprietary blend of Lo Han
extract (fruit) and Stevia extract (leaf) 30 mg †
Elderberry extract (fruit) 30 mg †
† Daily Value (DV) not established
Other IngredIentS: purified water, vegetable glycerin, natural
flavor, citric acid

The bottle of this blueberry extra says is can help:

#1: Support cognitive function
#2: Concentration and memory
#3: Maintain eye and retina health
#4: Promote urinary tract health
#5: Support healthy glucose metabolism

The formula contains:

Blueberry powder (whole fruit) 65 mg †
Bilberry extract (fruit) 20 mg †
Elderberry extract (fruit) 20 mg †
Pomegranate extract (fruit) 20 mg †
Proprietary blend of Lo Han
extract (fruit) and Stevia extract (leaf) 20 mg †
Blueberry extract (juice) 15 mg †
purified water, vegetable glycerin, natural
flavor, ascorbic acid

This extract helps fight free radicals and is an excellent addition to weight loss
programs. Plus it provides immune support.

I am not selling these supplements but use these green tea  and fruit extracts as  part of  my anti-aging strategy.

Joe is kind enough to extended  a 10% discount to clients of  Gary Scott.

If you have questions or wish to order these supplements contact Joe Spano at shamanspano@usa.net

Everything is frequency and when in balance our frequencies are golden.  Yet there are many frequencies in the modern world from noise to fast food to micro-waves that disturb our natural frequency balance.

You can help restore the Golden Mean within in many ways…. through music, nutrition and being surrounded by nature.  We look forward to sharing Good Vibrations with you. Hear even better balancing vibrations below.

Gary

The greatest asset of all is the ability to labor at what you love wherever you live. This brings everlasting wealth.

This is why we are providing a special three for one offer with our  course Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business. This can help you create your own internet business.

Our emailed course “Tangled Webs We Weave – How to Have Your Own Web Based Business” is a continuing educational program.  You receive the first 28 lessons when you enroll and a new lesson every week or two.

This course teaches how to create a web based business and is developed from the ongoing experiences that we have from our successful and profitable internet business.

This course is well worth the enrollment fee of $299… but currently you also receive two additional courses FREE.

The other two courses are #1: International Business Made EZ, and #2: Self Fulfilled – How to be a Self Publisher.

These two courses have sold for $398 and thousands have paid this price. We add them to your course, at no added cost, as I believe they will help you develop a better business in these crucial times..

Even Better Get All three Courses Free

To make this offer even more compelling,  I am giving everyone who enrolls in our North Carolina or Ecuador International Business & Investing seminar in October or November all three courses, “Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business Course,”  “Self Fulfilled- How to be a Self Publisher” and “International Business Made EZ” free.

We always conduct our autumn North Carolina course n the first weekend of October… the best time to enjoy  the leaf change.

Join us with Jyske Bank and my webmaster David Cross in West Jefferson North Carolina. Learn more about global investing, how to have an international business at the seminar.

Oct. 9-11 IBEZ North Carolina with our webmaster  David Cross & Thomas Fischer of JGAM

You’ll see views like this on your way to West Jefferson.

Or head south to Ecuador!

October 16-18 Ecuador Southern coastal tour

Oct. 21-24 Ecuador Import Export Tour

Oct. 25-26 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

In Cotacachi the weather is always Spring like.  Here is our group meeting at the Cotacachi museum next door to Meson de las Flores.

Join us with Peter Laub of Jyske Global Asset Management in Ecuador. Learn more about global investing, how to have an international business at the seminar.

Nov. 6-8 IBEZ Ecuador Seminar

Let our friendly staff at Meson serve you.

Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Ecuador winters are shorts weather on the beach as this photo shows.

Join us in the mountains and at the sea. Attend more than one seminar and tour and save even more plus get the three emails courses free.

Attend any two Ecuador seminar or tours in a calendar month…$949 for one.  $1,349 for two.

Attend any three Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$1,199 for one.  $1,799

Here is Balancing Baroque Music Vivalidi Four Seasons Autumn for Super Thinking.

Here is an important Ecuador & international banking update created by the wonderful world of mobility in which we live.

Our global mobility provides huge benefits… broadens our horizons and enriches mankind through global trade.   Yet being global also creates some problems… one of them is banking.

This site recently posted a message about Ecuador banks that began with, “I do not trust Ecuador Banks.”

This is not a slight on Ecuador.  This statement is a comment on the realities of trying to maintain control of one’s own wealth in an era where almost all governments are increasing control over money.

The banking article was followed by  another article stressing  the importance of diversification in Ecuador Diversified.

Here is a reminder of the importance of this information.  A couple of years ago I purchased a block of buildings in Ecuador planning to resell them.  I am according to plan selling them now and recently received a payment.

My attorney wrote this to me:

They deposited funds in my account last Wednesday to pay for the condo and asked me to send to you.  There is a 2% tax on money going out of Ecuador which was recently established, plus bank commissions.  I will wait for your instructions  to wire these funds to you.

There previously was a 1% tax but it has now been increased to two percent. This increase is not a big deal but a step in the wrong direction and a reminder that we should never trust any one country, currency or banking system.

I just sent our Ecuador Living subscribers an alert about one more Ecuador banking problem.  Ecuador Living subscribers click here.

Learn how to subscribe to Ecuador Living here.

Hence my mantra to have what I call a “Six Point Command Posture” which is to:

Live in one country
Bank in a second country
Invest in many countries
Earn in two or more countries
Use a company incorporated in a fifth country
Take a second residence

Where to Bank

Knowing where to bank is a growing problem… especially for Americans.  Non Americans should read this article any as you’ll see that you are not exempt from this problem either.

Americans are being crushed between a rock and a hard spot.

The Rock. Many US banks will no longer accept Americans residing overseas because they have a foreign address. This has been caused by the US Patriot Act.  Banks have to know their clients so they refuse to accept (or keep) clients with overseas addresses, even Americans who have banked with them for decades, but change their address.  The following banks have been sited as closing accounts with just 30 days notice of long term customers just because they took on a US address: Ameriprise, Bank of America; Bank of New Hampshire; Citibank; Citizens Bank; Edward Jones, St. Louis; E- Trade; Fidelity Investments; INGDirect; JPMorganChase; Morgan Stanley; National City Bank in Riverview, Michigan; Provident Bank, Maryland; Smith Barney; T. Rowe Price; USAA Federal Saving Bank; Vanguard mutual fund; Wachovia; Washington Mutual; Washington Mutual Investment, Spokane; WellsFargo; Zions Direct.

The Hard Spot. At the same time the IRS has created a set of regulations that discourage non US banks from accepting Americans.

Many Swiss and British based banks will no longer accept Americans.

Here’s an excerpt from a 13, June 2009 Telegraph article entitled “Lloyds Bank hit by Obama tax purge” by By Louise Armitstead:   Banking group drops American customers in UK ahead of costly proposals to stamp out tax evasion  Lloyds Banking Group is ditching American customers based in Britain pending a crackdown on international tax evasion planned by President Barack Obama.

This week American private client account-holders at Lloyds’s received letters informing them of an “important change in policy regarding clients who are resident, domiciled or linked to the United States by property or asset holdings”. They were told the bank had “no choice” but to “cease acting as your investment manager.”

One letter sent to Bank of Scotland’s portfolio management division, which is now part of Lloyds, said: “The USA has a mature regulatory environment governed by its Securities and Exchange Commission. These regulations mean that we are not licensed to manage portfolios for US clients.”

The letter added: “Unfortunately we cannot offer an equivalent service from within Lloyds Banking Group.” Clients have been advised to transfer their assets.

One recipient, who has lived in the UK for over 25 years, said: “After all this time, I’ve suddenly been told I must take my money elsewhere and I don’t understand why. Now I’m scared that other banks won’t take me on either.”

The Brits are no the only group shedding US account holders.

A July 12, 2009 USA Today article entitled “Some foreign banks drop U.S. clients because of UBS flap”  by Kevin McCoy explains how other banks have booted Americans as well.  An excerpt says: The closely watched Justice Department court fight to get the names of 52,000 suspected American tax evaders from Swiss banking giant UBS has prompted some other foreign banks to drop U.S. clients they once welcomed, tax experts said Monday.

Eager to avoid a similar struggle with federal prosecutors, banks including Credit Suisse and HSBC in recent weeks have notified American clients they must close their offshore accounts or transfer them to the institutions’ U.S.-based operations, where tax reporting requirements are far stricter.

“Overall, the international banking community, and particularly the offshore banking community, has been very friendly to American account holders,” said William Sharp, a tax law specialist at the Sharp Kemm law firm in Tampa. “That changed in the past couple of months as a result of the UBS case.”

The Dutch were early in dropping American clients.

ABN AMRO, a huge, Dutch based, international bank gave all clients  with U.S. passports within 30 days notice in 2008 and then closed their accounts because of the  high costs to comply with U.S. regulations.

Expect this problem to get worse! Beginning in 2010 stronger US reporting rules will force even more overseas banks to stop accepting Americans.  They simply cannot afford to fill all the obligations.

Americans should not feel totally alone…nor should non US investors feel totally safe from being shut out of a banking center.

According to the British Times Newspaper, Barclays Bank used the US anti-terror laws to shut down the personal bank accounts of British citizens who were working for Iranian owned businesses.

The bank enforced anti-Iran sanctions under the US Patriot Act.  Accounts of Iranian owned companies that operated completely legally in Britain were shut.  But Barclays went much further. They amazingly shut down accounts of directors of these companies and even more amazing they shut the personal accounts of ordinary staff members, including clerical officers, computer engineers and bank tellers, just because they worked for an Iranian owned company.

Here is an excerpt from a June June 6, 2008 Times of London article entitled, “Barclays bank rejects customers to comply with US terror law:”  Barclays began the account closures in February, shortly after reports from industry sources that US Treasury agents had been touring the City of London putting pressure on financial institutions to withdraw from any form of business that might have Iranian links.

One source told The Times that City banks had been warned that they would lose access to the US market if they continued to deal with Iranian businesses. Barclays has extensive business interests in the United States.

Case study: Cast out in the supermarket

Chris was doing the shopping in Tesco when Barclays rang to tell him that his bank account was being closed. Later that evening his wife was told that her Barclays account, which she had held for 25 years, was also being closed.

Chris, 46, works in IT for Bank Saderat, and his wife is in the accounts department of Melli Bank. Both institutions are Iranian-owned. “They said it was because of sanctions but I knew there were no British sanctions on the banks. I asked them if they were responding to US laws and they said they didn’t have to give me a reason,” he said.

The couple opened new accounts with one of Barclays’ rivals but they had difficulty transferring standing orders, especially Chris’s child-support payments. He said: “I know that UK banks are being pressured by America to stop all dealings with Iran but what impact will it have to shut an English bloke’s account with an English bank? The Iranians won’t give a monkey’s. What upsets me is the lack of respect Barclays have for their customers.”

This last comment hit me strongly… the lack of respect many of the big banks have for their clients.

This is one reason I have enjoyed banking with Jyske Bank in Denmark for more than 20 years.  Jyske is big and well managed enough to be very safe, but small enough to provide genuine care and attention to the individual.

This is why I was not surprised that a number of years ago, Jyske made the decision to spend a lot of time, energy and money to comply with US law so they could continue to serve US as well as non US investors around the world.

This shift though has created some confusion. For example a Reader from the Netherlands sent me this note:  Hello Gary, Since beginning of this year we are subscribed to your newsletter. In your articles we read that it is possible to go to Jyske Bank and start doing multi-currency for about 30,000 dollars. We were very enthusiastic about this philosophy and asked the Jyske Bank for information. However we were very surprised when we got information back including the message that we have to start with $150,000 euro. Can you help us and maybe clarify the misunderstanding about this starting amount?  Thank you very much in advance!

The services and minimums required by Jyske Bank Private Bank (JBPB) for non US investors differs from those offered by Jyske Global Asset Management (JGAM) who serves US investors.

Jyske Global Asset Management (JGAM) offers Americans managed accounts, advisory accounts and IRA services to US clients.

JGAM’s managed accounts provide Americans with access to international investments in all currencies, traded on all stock exchanges.

There are two levels of managed accounts for US investors:

Mutual Fund Managed Accounts, $50,000 to $200,000.  Accounts from $50-200,000 are mainly  invested in mutual funds and ETF`s in order to get the appropriate diversification.

Individual Investment Managed Accounts from $200,000 up are mainly invested in individual securities as trading costs are not prohibitive for this size of account.

There are two forms of advisory accounts for US investors.

Advisory Accounts for US Residents.  Accounts for US residents are available and provide access to investments in currencies, commodities and US listed securities.

Advisory Accounts for Americans who are resident outside the US.   US citizens who are resident outside the US (proof of residence is required) have access to investments in currencies, commodities and all international investments in all currencies, traded on all stock exchanges.

The minimum required to start an advisory account is $25,000.

Because the minimum annual fee is  $1,000 JGAM recommends an initial deposit of minimum $50,000.

IRA accounts are managed accounts with more conservative investments than those in a normal  managed account.  IRA accounts require a minimum investment of $50,000.

Jyske Bank Private Bank offers the following services to non US investors.

Non US Clients can open accounts with minimum deposit of Euro 150,000 (approximately 220,000 USD), or equivalent in another currency.

JBPB works with six profiles:

Income profile. A low-risk profile, invested in currency accounts (cash) and/or traditional bonds.

Stable profile. A low-risk profile, invested in bonds (incl. high- yielding bonds), a small equity part.

Balanced profile. A medium-risk profile, invested in equities and bonds (main emphasis on bonds).

Dynamic profile. A medium-risk profile, invested in equities and bonds (main emphasis on equities).

Growth profile. A high-risk profile, invested mainly in equities and a lesser share in bonds.

Aggressive profile. A high-risk profile, invested almost exclusively in equities.

There are six managed strategy funds (available only in Euro) for investors who want managed services with minimum deposits of US$ 220,000. These six funds are based on the principles of asset allocation and match the investment profiles above so all investors can attain risk diversification, risk management with even a limited investment.

There is a full Discretionary Portfolio Management service for investors who want managed services with US$ 350,000 and above. This service is also based on the six strategies above. Jyske Bank will invest and manage the clients portfolio in close cooperation with the Bank´s experts and their network of international partners. These strategies are offered in EUR, USD, GBP, DKK and SEK.

Investors, who do not want managed services, and have accounts of US$ 220,000 or more, can wish to engage in an active dialogue with their advisers and be very involved in the decision-making process. based on the client’s investment profile. They can invest in currency accounts in a large number of currencies, all tradeable equities and bonds, mutual funds and commodities.

Here is one huge feature I like very much about both JBPB and JGAM…  No Jyske employees in  management, advisory services or any employee receives any kind of bonus pay. This eliminates any temptation for hidden agendas to exist.  Employees have no incentive give any advice or take any action that is not in the client’s best interest.

Technology has given great mobility to our wealth. This mobility is good for the individual and the global economy… but governments do not like this as they wish to control our finances.  The tension created by this struggle between the individual and the collective has created a never ending thrust and counter thrust of regulations and adaptions to these rules.  It is harder to maintain a diversified global portfolio than it used to be… but the effort is still worthwhile.

Gary

The greatest asset of all is the ability to earn wherever you live, which brings everlasting wealth.

This is why we offer our course Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business.

A clear mind and healthy body are also a vital assets… plus a second language is a powerful diversification tool.

This is why I am giving everyone who enrolls in our North Carolina or Ecuador International Business & Investing seminar in October or November our “Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business Course” (offered at $299) free.

Here are comments from a reader about the way we help:  Thank you for your inspiration and information outlining foreign banking and retirement.  Your comments and suggestions are welcome for planning the steps to evaluate the early stages of living abroad.

Sept. 17-21 Ecuador Super Thinking + Spanish Course

Sept. 23-24 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Sept. 25-28 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Join us with Jyske. Learn more about global investing, how to have an international business and diversification in Ecuador at the seminar.

Oct. 9-11 IBEZ North Carolina with our webmaster  David Cross & Thomas Fischer of JGAM

October 16-18 Ecuador Southern coastal tour (early sign up before Sept. 1, $499 per person).

Oct. 21-24 Ecuador Import Export Tour

Oct. 25-26 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 6-8 IBEZ Ecuador Seminar

Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Attend any two Ecuador seminar or tours in a calendar month…$949 for one.  $1,349 for two.

Attend any three Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$1,199 for one.  $1,799

Read the full articles:

Lloyds Bank hit by Obama tax purge

Some foreign banks drop U.S. clients because of UBS flap

Barclays bank rejects customers to comply with US terror law

Ecuador is the land of milk and honey for less… really.

In a moment we’ll look at some global investing ideas. Or you can skip Ecuador milk and go directly to Global Investment Thought.

First, how about some raw milk?

Our hotel Meson de las Flores makes its own ice cream with fresh raw milk from local diaries, plus they…

make and press their own fresh butter.

Our health is enhanced with raw milk and in Ecuador raw milk is easy to obtain. We get it for the hotel every day. The cost is about 45 cents a quart, delivered fresh daily from the local dairy.

In the US, it’s a task.  To get it in North Carolina, we have to buy it from a friend of a friend who will not say who produces the raw milk.

In Florida I noticed a health food store selling raw milk and raw organic yogurt labeled “for pet use only.”   We used to buy our French salt in a similar way “for deer licks only”!

How sad that informed adults have to play such games to get what is good that they want.

There is very little raw milk sold in America and this is sad as it’s a highly health-promoting food. The government story is that raw milk can carry disease. More to the point pasteurizing milk extends shelf life and makes it easier for big business to be more profitable.

One can become sick from any contaminated food as the nation has learned from meat, spinach and peanut butter all to well.

In California where raw milk can be sold, millions have consumed it without a single person getting sick. During the same period, there were many instances where people became so ill from pasteurized milk they died!

Raw milk provides minerals, beneficial bacteria such as lactobacillus acidolphilus, vitamins and enzymes and in Ayurved is considered one of the best foods there is. Pasteurized non organic milk is viewed as poison as the process changes the structure of the milk proteins and destroys the milk’s beneficial bacteria.

Pasteurized cow’s milk has been associated with intestinal distress, iron-deficiency anemia, allergies, osteoporosis, arthritis, heart disease, cancer and more.

With so much sun and plenty of rain, the grass is rich, even in Cotacachi at 7,500 feet altitude for…

these organic cows.

Raw Milk Delight

One great food made from raw milk was taught to Merri and me by a shaman here in Ecuador. I call it Sun Yogurt. Get raw milk. Boil it. Let it cool. Pour it in a green bottle. Add a bit of yogurt if you wish. Set it in the sun for the day. That night you will have a rich creamy almost custard yogurt! It’s rich and delicious.

In Ecuador we buy fresh, raw milk by the pail full… creamy to make our own butter, ice cream and yogurt.

There is great fresh, non fermented (queso fresco) cheese in the markets.

Nearby our hotel there is also organic dairy and Swiss cheese factory. Here is the barnyard and…

here are their cows.

Their equipment.

Their cave filled with great Swiss cheese.

We serve this Ecuador cheese at our hotel.

Ecuador also has really great honey that creates some export income opportunity… like this honey and Macadamia nuts offered by the Ecuador Honey Company. We”ll look at this in more detail in tomorrow’s message.

Learn more about our Oct. 21-24 Ecuador Import Export Tour here

Global Investment Thought

Jyske Global Asset Management’s recent update points out what is becoming obvious… the global economy is picking up.  JGAM said:

*  The Case-Shiller U.S. home price index rose for the second month in a row in June.

* The German IFO business confidence survey came in above expectations, rising for a fifth month in a row.

* Australia’s leading economic indicators continue to suggest a broad recovery over the coming months.

* BCA’s (Bank Credit Analyst) Global Inflation Diffusion Index highlights that most components are falling. Furthermore, inflation typically responds to fluctuations in growth with a 1-1½ year lag, and this time around there is greater slack in the global economy.

In other words, the economy is recovering and inflation is down.

The immediate risks are that traditionally September and October are the most dangerous months for the US stock market.   Signs of a double dip recession coinciding with the traditional market dip could create a new wave of self fulfilling fear.

This will create a good buying opportunity both in equities and real estate.

What’s a Double Dip?

I rarely allow myself to eat ice cream but recently while visiting grand kids, we took them to a Creamery and can attest to the fact that a Sweet Cream and Chocolate double dip on a waffle cone is,  taste wise, pretty darn good.

Double Dips in the global economy do not bode so well, however.

A recession is a time of economic contraction and have always been followed by a return to economic expansion.  However once in awhile when economic distortions that are being sorted out are severe, when the expansion finally starts, it does not continue.   The economy contracts and dips back into recession again.

Economies now are improving globally.  Yet unemployment and foreclosures remain a problem.  Later this year  a second “double dip” recession could return as it did in 1980, then again in  1981-82.

Current conditions are quite different now than in the early 1980s, the 1980-1983 downturn was eventually turned around with major federal spending and a major tax cut.

The period 2007-2010 cannot expect the tax cut which is a shame because Federal spending tends to be less efficient than tax cuts, Federal spending is usually inefficient. Tax cuts stimulate business and inroads into new forms of productivity.

Stock markets tend to do well (as they are now) in the middle of recessions. During the worst of all 1930s depression, the Dow rose 66.7 percent in 1933 and 38.5 percent in 1935. This is because big value oriented investors look ahead.  Eventually economies recover and  grow. This is when value investors cash in.

Yet the poor employment scenario suggests that the equity recovery could be modest.  If this fact teams up with the nervousness acquired in 2008 and the autumnal downward forces… the most likely time for a market set back will be September and October.

With this in mind… values are good now for investors who can afford to buy and ride through another downturn that could last a year or so.

Until next message, may all you life be rich and delicious.

Gary

The greatest asset of all is the ability to earn wherever you live, which brings everlasting wealth.

This is why we offer our course Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business.

A clear mind and healthy body are also a vital assets… plus a second language is a powerful diversification tool.

This is why if  you attend either our Ecuador Super Thinking plus Spanish seminar in September or our North Carolina International Business & Investing seminar in October I will email you our Tangled Web… How to Have an Internet Business Course (offered at $299) free. You save $299.

Here are comments from a reader about the way we help:  Hi Merri, I wanted to thank you once again for your recommendation
 that I try Sol de Vida. I have had time for thirteen treatments but 
now it’s time for me to return home. The people there are wonderful 
and I’m happy to say there has been a dramatic improvement in my
(used-to-be) “bum” leg.  I can now walk much longer distances and
 remain pain free!
 
FYI, Sol de Vida changed to a  new facility near Meson.  

I enjoyed my stay here at Meson and in Cotacachi and hope to return
 sometime soon… thanks again for your assistance!

Join us at a seminar and tour and have a pain reduction treatment at the same time.

Sept. 17-21 Ecuador Super Thinking + Spanish Course

Sept. 23-24 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Sept. 25-28 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Learn more about global investing, how to have an international business and diversification in Ecuador at the seminar.

Oct. 9-11 IBEZ North Carolina with our webmaster  David Cross & Thomas Fischer of JGAM

October 16-18 Ecuador Southern coastal tour (early sign up before Sept. 1, $499 per person).

Oct. 21-24 Ecuador Import Export Tour

Oct. 25-26 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 6-8 IBEZ Ecuador Seminar

Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Attend any two Ecuador seminar or tours in a calendar month…$949 for one.  $1,349 for two.

Attend any three Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$1,199 for one.  $1,799