Knobby

Here is a recipe for cheese scones that I use when I do baking with my daughter.  It is simple to follow and keeps my 3 and a half year old daughter entertained.  Here are some I made earlier today with her:

Ingredients:

• 3 cups of plain flour
• 6 teaspoons of baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon of salt
• 75 grams of butter
• 3/4 cup of grated cheese
• Around 1-1.5 cups of milk

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 220 degrees Celsius.
2. Sift flour, baking powder and salt into a bowl.
3. Cut the butter into the flour mixture with fingers until the mixture resembles the consistency of fine breadcrumbs and there are no longer any chunks of butter left.
4. Add grated cheese to the bowl.
5. Slowly add milk little by little and mix quickly with a knife until the mixture resembles a soft dough.  Sometimes you will need a little more or less of the milk to get this consistency.
6. Kneed the dough a few times
   
7. Line an oven tray with baking powder.
8. Press scone dough down on oven tray and cut into 12 evenly sized pieces.  Leave around 2 cm between each scone.
9. Brush the top of each scone with milk.
10. Grate some cheese on top of each scone.
11. Bake at 220 degrees Celsius for around 10 minutes or until the scones are golden brown.

Back in December 2005 I bought a house in Turangi.  My long term plans were to tenant it and then do it up when the tenant moved out.  However, at the age of 21 I never envisaged having a wife and children. As a result my priorities have changed between then and now and I no longer have the time or will to do it up.  I have two children that are 3½ years old and 18 months old which keep my wife and I very busy.  It now means I no longer want to spend my weekends doing houses up.  When I am down in Taupo I would rather spend time with my family and go trout fishing with my father and daughter.

The house has loads of potential.  Most importantly, the land area is more or less around 733m2 and it is a 4 bedroom house.  It has two fireplaces, one in the living room. The other one is in the kitchen and is a wet back (connected to the hot water cylinder) so you can save on electricity for water heating.

I had an idea to open the living room up by removing the windows pictured below and putting in bifolding doors.  These would then open onto a deck that flows onto the backyard.  This would give excellent indoor/outdoor flow.

Exterior:

Living & Dining Room:

The Bedrooms:

Laundry:

Toilet and bathroom:

Once done up property managers have said this will attract around $280-$320 per week if you want to rent it.  Otherwise it is an affordable family bach.  My loss can be your gain!

Turangi is becoming a popular place to buy a house and use it as a holiday home.  In the general vicinity there is the best trout fly fishing in the world on the Tongariro river, skiing at Whakapapa is around 45 minutes drive, Taupo is around 40 minutes drive, and there are loads of Department of Conservation walks such as the Tongariro Crossing within one hours drive.

In any case I will be listing it on Trademe, I will post the link once I have completed this.  If you have any questions feel free to leave them in the comments section below.

International fraud awareness week is observed 11-17 November 2018.  Only the week prior I saw first hand a person who has fallen victim to an elaborate international scheme set up by dishonest individuals.  An elderly man popped into our office asking for advice on investing a large inheritance he was going to receive.

The AML/CFT rules now apply to accountants. So I asked him for some further details regarding the inheritance as well as some personal identification.  Apparently, the inheritance was coming from somebody the victim has never known but “shared the same last name.”  The inheritance (which was in the millions) was brought to his attention by a letter received unexpectedly in the post from overseas.  On top of that, the funds were frozen and required a court order to unfreeze them to make them available for distribution to him as the beneficiary of the estate.  In order to do this he was required to pay money by wire transfer to the lawyer who had contacted him to cover the legal costs to do this.  Unfortunately, the man happily obliged and parted with a significant sum of money.  This was done without seeking any advice from any professional in New Zealand such as a lawyer, accountant or financial planner.

I advised him that he had probably been a victim of a inheritance scam. Unfortunately, I am under the impression he didn’t believe me.  He didn’t come back with the details I needed so that I could act for him.  When he left the office he said was going to contact the “lawyers” to see if he could provide that information.  I did, however, offer some parting advice. This was to not pay any further money if requested unless he consulted a professional.

So after seeing this first hand I thought I would point out some warning signs of an inheritance scam.  Remember to stay safe out there!

Warning signs:

• You are contacted out of the blue by a scammer posing as a lawyer or banker and offering you a large inheritance from a distant relative or wealthy individual.
• There may be requests to pose as next of kin to an unclaimed inheritance.
• The offer comes on official looking letterhead, however, contains spelling and grammatical mistakes.
• The size of the inheritance is large.
• You are provided with fake bank statements, birth certificates and other documents if you question the legitimacy.
• You are asked to provide your bank account details, copies of identity documents as verification.
• You are asked to pay a series of fees, charges or taxes to help release or transfer the money.
• The fees may initially be for small amounts, however, you are then asked for further larger payments.
• The scammer offers to meet you in person to verify the proposal, but this rarely eventuates.

How to protect yourself:

• Never send money or give credit card, account details, copies of personal documents to anyone you don’t know or trust.
• Avoid any arrangement with a stranger that asks for up front payment by money order, wire transfer, pre-loaded card or bitcoin. It is very difficult to recover money this way.
• Seek advise immediately from an independent professional such as a lawyer, accountant or financial planner if in doubt.
• Do an internet search using the names, contact details or exact wording of the letter/email to check for any references to a scam.
• If you think it’s a scam, don’t respond.
• Remember if it sounds too good to be true it probably is.

What to do if you have been scammed:

• Contact your bank immediately and see whether they can cancel or reverse the transaction.
• Report it to the police.

I recently installed the Yoast SEO Plugin for WordPress. The plugin has provided me with an interesting analysis on how I write content.  I have noticed that I use the passive voice far too much in my posts. Also my sentences and paragraphs are too long, and I use far too many consecutive sentences.  It would also help me if I use more transition words.  Wow! I knew that my English was not great but from the analysis it sounds that my writing is terrible!

This sounds like an opportunity to look at how to write better.  But, as far as this post is concerned it says I don’t have too much to be worried about!

Welcome to my blog.  I am writing this sitting in my office waiting for a manual backup to complete so I can complete a practice management software upgrade.  In the past I wanted to get into blogging to teach myself how to set up and use WordPress as a content management system.  Also it is an opportunity to provide comment on the things that interest me.

I’ve had plans to set up a personal blog for some time. However, over the last 3-4 years time constraints due to work and my family life have been prevented from doing this.

I wanted to register knobby.co.nz or knobby.nz as a domain name.  However, an Australian underwear club managed to register all those domains in tharlt time as part of their “intellectual property.”  Therefore I have settled for a Belorussian domain name.

You are probably wondering why I want a domain name with knobby in it.  Firstly, it was the nickname I was called at school and through the sports I played. Secondly, my wife hates the nickname for some reason and has never called me by it :).

New Zealand tax residents are generally taxed on their world-wide income you derive. This includes foreign income even if it is simply funding an offshore credit card or is deposited in an offshore bank account. The types of funds that are deposited into these bank accounts vary and include income paid by a non-resident employer, overseas life insurance policies, superannuation schemes, or equity investments held in portfolio accounts. The fact that foreign withholding tax may have been deducted on foreign income does not mean that this income is no longer taxable in New Zealand.

The income is calculated under the New Zealand rules and must be returned as offshore income. In most circumstances, this calculation is conducted on a cash basis. However, if it exceeds certain thresholds as set out in the Income Tax Act 2007, the income might have to be accounted for under financial arrangement rules on an accrual basis.

If interest is being paid to an offshore lender withholding tax might be payable in New Zealand. This does not apply if the offshore lender has a branch in New Zealand.

Be aware that IRD are looking at undeclared offshore income.

As these are complex areas, you may wish to seek professional advice if you have offshore bank accounts.