16 - North Shore News — Wednesday, April 19, 2000 ——— BUSINESS After tax profits tell the true investment story TAX time provides a reality check on how your investments are performing. @ Earn five or six per cent on a GIC or strip bond in an RRSP or RRIF and that's your real return (at least until you withdraw your funds). But if you hold the GIC or strip outside such a plan, income tax cuts your yield to 2.5 to 4.5 per cent (because you paid between about 25% and 50% tax on the interest). @ Your broker proudly shows your stock portfolio is worth 20% more than it was a year ago. Bur does that figure take into account the tax you paid Pusuic Notice Dennis D. Robinson _of West Vancouver B.C.- Dennis D. Robinson of West Vancouver, 8.C. resigned his membership in the Institute of Chartered Accountants of British Columbia in September 1996 in the face of a hearing into his alleged professional misconduct. | Mr, Robinson is not entitled. to use the designation - Chartered Accountant within the province of British Columbia: » formation contact Brian Gardiner, C.A.,- C.F-E. at the Institute of hartered ‘Accountants of © British, Columbia at . (604) 681-3264 c or r1-800- , 663-2 677 * _ NV. 145 East 13th Street..: “wwwelendon-hais com. Chartered '* Accountants of British . » Columbia on interest, dividends and capital gains? Probably not— and if you did quite a bit of trading, the capital gains tax bite could be substantial. & You also pay tax on the interest, dividends and capital gains your mutual fund pro- duced. Subtract the total shown on the tax slip to work out how much you really earned betnveen Jan. 1 and Dec. 31, 1999 Bi After all expenses, your res- idential or commercial rental properties yielded perhaps three or eight per cent, respectively. But after tax, the true return is probably closer re 1-2% and 4-6%, respective- y. “I'm not familiar with the cost-benefit analysis you Mention in a recent column,” says A.S. “Could you explain further. I have investment property and f think this might be of some importance to me.” Very simply, are the bene- fits (mainly the return on your investment, after-tax income and growth) worth the costs (financial and per- sonal) involved? Some people might be pleased with the answer, Others might decide they could earn the same after-tax return with far less hassle by putting the money into a term deposit. You might lose money when you sell your principal residence, especially when you look at how much you spent on the place. But per- haps all the benefits you enjoyed from living there more than make up for the costs. On the other hand, perhaps you fixed up the place and earned a worth- while tax-free profit for your efforts. 1 always encourage people to develop a sideline or full- time business. But you should still do a regular cost- benefit analysis. Considering all the time you spent on the business, how much did you Whistler's MOUNTAINSIDE | G LODGE -Y April Special: From $29.00 Double or $135 Quad per night. Village location. Units have kitchen, F/P, whirl tub. . Outdoor pool, jacuzzi, 100 yards to gondolas. | Reservations: 664-5643 _Emalt: msi@whistierweb.com (and other family members) earn per hour after tax? Was this 2 reasonable return? Mike Grenby is a columnist and independent personal Financial adviser. He'll answer NORTH Vancouver- based SoftCare EC.Com Inc. recently announced the comple- tion of an agreement to acquire, subject to regulatory approval, the U.S.-based soft- ware development company Financial Management Group LLC (FMG). FMG provides software solutions to the credit coun- selling industry in the U.S. FMG’s proprietary software, Credisoly is used by credit counselling organizations to streamline their operations, simplify administrative tasks, generate cost savings, and improve productivity. The purchase of FMG will allow SoftCare to create a Net market maker to operate a credit counseiling portal. The portal will Se con- nected to SoftCare’s payment portal to produce value- added benefits ta customers of the OpenEC credit coun- selling portal. SoftCare develops busi- pair purchase cequiced. Ae for derail: Sale rds Apr 24100, Save 1/3 off: sunglassest.- Get:ready for spring with our amazing selection’ of brand name styles. (Some restrictions apply Ask for details. Expires May 7/00.) * : Park Royal South / 925-3470. 198 1-0400 eptioal questions in this column as space allows but canner reply personally. Contact him at P.O. Box 50029, South Siope R.P.O., Burnaby, B.C. V5] 5G3; or e- mail . ness relationship manage- ment software allowing com- panies to conduct business- to-business ¢-commerce and |. the creation of B2B industry. portals. WEST Vanconver resident Dr. Kal Toth, Ph.D, P-Eng is one of three key senior man- agers recently appointed .to Frontier Pacific (Frontier Pacific Mining Corporation). Toth is an associate profes: sor of information technol : gy at the Technical University «:.. of British Columbia and ‘a principal and: founder :. of Vancouver-based Inte! Systems, Internet/intranct based so! ware solutions. ‘company working with, wireless and voice-over IP technology. Frontier is in the process. ‘of becoming an investment : company for high technol start-u To will serve as technical advisor to Frontier: and will help the company in pened the merits of. technolo; investments and assist. su sidiary companies.