Archives for July 2010

Entrepreneur Resource Center In Utah

July 27, 2010 By Sherry Tingley

Small Business Entrepreneur Support Center — Roy W. & Elizabeth E. Simmons Entrepreneurial Center

There are some hidden treasures for business entrepreneurs in Kaysville, Utah. Entrepreneurs have access to a beautiful 16,000-square-foot building and a team of supportive staff to help them with their businesses.

Entrepreneurs are sometimes a disconnected group of people. Entrepreneurs need somewhere to go for support, networking and help without overspending. The Roy W. & Elizabeth E. Simmons Entrepreneurial Center center solves that problem.

The idea for creating this type of center came from the business teachers at the Davis Applied Technology College. They thought that it only made sense to build the center and have the staff supported by the proceeds of renting the building out to various companies and small entrepreneurs who need a small office arrangement without huge overhead fees.

Thanks to a generous donation from the Roy and Elizabeth Simmons, the $2 million dollar building itself is completely paid off and runs using that very business model.

History of Roy and Elizabeth Simmons

One may wonder how these people were able to offer such a generous contribution, so a little background history on this family is helpful. Roy Simmons began a career in banking in 1938. He worked for his father-in-law, L.E. Ellison, at the First National Bank of Layton, Utah. His career in banking skyrocketed and by 1952 he had organized the Bank of Utah. By 1955, he and his partners gained controlling interest in Zion’s First National Bank. Roy was named President and CEO of Zion’s and served until 1990.

This family was able to make significant contributions to the welfare of their community. They created The Simmons Family Foundation which contributed almost $3.5 million to the community. One of their contributions was the Roy W. and Elizabeth E. Simmons Trauma and Emergency Services Center at Intermountain Medical Center. It is a state of the art facility and one of the largest and best-equipped trauma centers in the area.

NorthFront Business Resource Center — Northfront Business Resource Center

Services Provided By The Center

One of the services that they provide is a private consultation for you about any aspect of your business you need help with. They have gone through training to counsel with you and have experience running their own businesses.

This is where the Davis County Chamber of Commerce has their headquarters.

The center provides office space for people to rent and rooms to use for making presentations. There is a beautiful meeting room that has a view of the valley below. It is large enough to hold a hundred people.

The meeting rooms can hold up to 30 people and people are using it all the time. Be sure to find their schedule of presentations. You may want to attend a meeting.

The administrative staff helps you get oriented to their building and services. They are completely supported by the revenues of the building and are very happy to be there.

For any entrepreneurs in the Utah area, be sure to take time visiting this incredible resource.

Treasure Hunting Pays Off For Amateur Metal Detector

July 9, 2010 By Sherry Tingley

Dave Crisp, an amateur metal detector from Britain uncovered 52,500 Roman coins, in Frome, Somerset England. This was one of the largest Roman coin hoards ever found in England. The coins, now in the British Museum, date back to the time of Emperor Carausius, who died in 293 AD.

pot-of-roman-coins — Roman Coins Found By Dave Crisp

In April of 2010, Dave Crisp was allowed to use his metal detector to search for metal on a neighbors land. He started to hear some odd noises from his metal detector and began digging in that area. As he dug down about a foot, he started to find small coins about the size of a dime.

“I put my hand in, pulled out a bit of clay and there was a little Radial, a little bronze Roman coin. Very, very small, about the size of my fingernail,” said Dave Crisp. “I’ve been detecting for twenty two years and I’ve never had a hoard before this weekend.” A hoard is two or more coins that are over 300 years old at the time of their discovery.

When he continued digging he could see some sort of pot and more coins. At this point that he made a critical decision to stop digging and notify professional excavators. He called archaeologists from the Somerset County Council to come out and take a look. Historians will be able to learn more because these coins were excavated by archaeologists. They were able to photograph and document the process of excavating these coins. When excavating was completed, they found approximately 350 pounds of Roman coins in a large clay pot.

coins-found-in-england — Roman Coins Found In England

So who owns the find? The land owner or Dave Crisp or England?

Generally, the landowner and the finder come to some sort of agreement as to what they will do with anything that is found before any metal detecting begins. The country’s laws need to be considered as well. England’s Treasure Act of 1996, states that anything found in the earth that is considered an artifact belongs to both the land owner and the finder. They must, however, offer the find for sale to the British Museum at a price determined by the Treasure Valuation Committee. The value of this particular find has been estimated at around $5 million. The proceeds will be shared by the land owner and Dave Crisp.

Worldwide interest in the historical find has inspired the creation of a documentary. The BBC TV is creating a movie called, “Digging for Britain,” which will be released in August of 2010.

Before you go out and buy yourself a metal detector, be sure to study the laws regulating your finds. There are Federal and State laws that help protect and preserve artifacts. You don’t want to find yourself in jail because you found something and inadvertently broke the law.

30-Year Fixed-Rate Mortgage Falls

July 8, 2010 By Sherry Tingley

Mortgage rates have fallen again to a near record low. You would think that people would be rushing out to refinance their mortgages and to some extent they have been. Applications for refinancing grew by 9.2 percent last week.

The dilemma is that people who would benefit by these lower rates are not the ones that are getting the new loans. With record unemployment rates, people have gotten into the situation where they now don’t qualify for these loans. Even if they have managed somehow to keep current on all payments due to lenders and credit card companies, their employment history knocks them out of the game.

If you have changed professions, which many people have been forced to do, you need a two year record of proven income to be considered for refinancing. Even with record-low mortgage rates, there just aren’t a lot of qualified borrowers.

In California, one homeowner has not made a mortgage payment for seven months and has not been subject to foreclosure yet. “We have 19 million vacant housing units in the United States, and I’m afraid it’s going to put some more of them on the market,” says Ted C. Jones, chief economist for Houston-based Stewart Title.

Financial analysts predict that mortgage rates will rise soon over the next week. Mostly because they feel it really can’t go much lower.