The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

18 The Canadian Statesman, Bowmanville, Wednesday, June 1,1994 Section Two GRAND OPENING OF T & C SMALL ENGINES - On Saturday, May 28th, Clarington Mayor Diane Hamre had the honor of cutting the ceremonial ribbon to mark the Grand Opening of T & C Small Engines in Hampton. The friendly operators repair and sell a wide variety of outdoor power equipment from lawn tractors to mowers to hedge trimmers. From left to right, above, are: owners Carlo and Tullio Rossi, Mayor Hamre, Gerhard Diefenbach, and Patti Rossi. DISCOUNTS FOR DOUBLE PARKING. Liberty Mutual Insurance Company 68 King St. E., Bowmanville, Ontario L1C 3X2 623-8914 Insure two or more cars with Liberty Mutual and we'll reduce your rates. Call us today for more information.' LIBERTY MUTUAL © 1994 Liberty Mutual Insurance Group/Unionville, Ontario Renovation Loans: ADDING VALUE TO YOUR HOME By Dennis Beere Manager, Bowmanville Branch Toronto Dominion Bank While Canada's real estate market has been depressed in the past few years, the home renovation and improvement market has been growing strongly. Increasing numbers of Canadians have recognized the advantage of renovating rather than devoting the time, trouble and expense to buying a new home, selling their existing one, paying for moving costs, and uprooting themselves from a familiar neighbourhood. Through renovation projects, you may be able to convert your house into your dream home, with additions and upgrades, modem kitchens and bathrooms, new windows and siding, fireplaces and landscaping ... and through renovation loans, you may be able to afford to convert your dream into a reality immediately. Borrowing makes sense for many people, because it can be much more cost effective to do several related renovation and improvement projects at once - rather than one at a time over a number of years - more cost-effective, and less disruptive to your household. Financing is widely available for home renovations and restoration projects, because they add value to your home, which may well be your family's principal asset. Feel free to call TD's Green Infoline at 1 -800-387-2092, if you need further information. Win Your Renovation Start With a Loan at Prime! The Toronto-Dominion Bank 39 Temperance Street Bowmanville, Ontario L1C 3K9 Tel: (905) 623-2514 Your Bank. Your Way. @ GM Credits 14% Jump in Sales to New Products and Happy Customers An increase of 14% in new sales for GM of Canada in the first four months of the 1994 calendar year is the result of a combination of great GM products and significant improvements improvements made by dealers in the area of customer satisfaction, Tom Mason, vice president of marketing at GM of Canada, said today. "Over the past several years our dealers have focused on making significant significant improvements to enhance the buying and ownership experience of their customers. Along with great products, this is another key reason for our strong sales showing since the beginning of this year" Mason said. In April 1994, General Motors of Canada truck sales continued to grow, up 11.6% from the same period period last year: Despite steady showroom showroom traffic, new car sales slipped 6.1% this month, compared to the extremely extremely strong sales of April 1993. Overall, new vehicle sales are up 14% for the 1994 calendar year to date. "One of the most significant initiatives initiatives our dealers have undertaken is training," said Bob Sowden, GM manager of retail training. "Our surveys surveys indicate that our customers want to deal with a knowledgeable sales staff. Likewise we want our sales people to be the best trained and most professional in the industry, so they can properly match our customers' needs and wants with the appropriate General Motors vehicle. A new vehicle vehicle purchase represents a significant expenditure, so we want to ensure that our customers are totally satisfied satisfied with all aspects of their vehicle purchase and ownership." "In the fall of 1992 GM instituted an extensive training program for our 4,700 retail sales professionals nationwide. nationwide. One facet of the program provides salespersons with "hands on" product training, at a site near their dealership. Five full-time instructors instructors travel to 35 locations across Canada, and conduct 510 training sessions annually, to keep sales personnel personnel abreast of the ongoing technological technological and design improvements being being incorporated into our GM vehicles. The result is approximately 10,500 person days of training yearly," yearly," said Sowden. Another initiative designed to enhance enhance on site training, provides dealers dealers with video tapes covering topics such as product comparisons and customer customer interaction. Add to this an extensive extensive salesperson's handbook, which explains the features and benefits benefits of each vehicle, and the result is a very comprehensive training program. program. "In order to provide more information information for our customers, GM developed developed two video presentations designed designed for use either at the customer's home or at the dealership. The tapes - "GM's Total Safety Systems" Systems" and "GM's Total Warranty" - deal with important issues for today's vehicle buyer, and both have received received very positive responses," Sowden said. New Bell Number Offers Improved Convenience Customers with questions about their business or home phone service, whether they live in Kenora or Cornwall, Cornwall, now have just one number to call: 310-BËLL. That's it - no area code, just a seven digit local call that can be placed from any part of Ontario. Ontario. Bell's new number "for service and solutions" is being phased in throughout the province starting today. today. The new 310-BELL number will ensure customers easy access to their local Bell Customer Service Centre. "It will replace more than 100 numbers currently listed in many Bell directories in Ontario," said Tony Davy, the Bell director in charge of developing and providing the single number to all of Bell's customers in Ontario. "Our surveys were showing that many of our customers were having difficulty in finding the right number to call, and getting the right department department the first time. We decided to do something about it, and after looking at different ways to improve the situation, situation, settled on this Single Number Service. It stood out as the solution to our goal of providing customers with one-step service wherever possible." When customers dial 310-BELL, a Voice System Node routes their calls to the Bell Customer Service Centre nearest them. For customers served by analogue technology (less than one per cent in Ontario), the number to call to get the same one- stop service will be: 1-800-668-6878. USE CAPITAL GAINS EXEMPTION Beware of coming changes to the $500,000 tax free capital gains deduction for small businesses and farmers. At the same time make sure you take advantage of changes to the $100,000 capital gains deduction. Sound confusing? Well, it is. But, understanding how each works is more important than ever as one has been cancelled and I suspect the other is on its last legs. Most of us are aware of what's happened with the cancellation of the $100,000 deduction for things like stocks, mutual funds and real estate. However, talks coming out of Ottawa suggest that the $500,000 variety for small business and farmers is also on its last legs. This could be a very important time to talk with your financial advisor or lawyer about what can be done. Nothing need be done immediately. But, you should be positioning yourself to take advantage of the existing rules or new ones that will come in later this year or next. v. Remember the February federal budget? That's when the. Liberals killed the $100,000 deduction. There was a short line mentioning that they would like to look at whether some other program would satisfy the $500,000 variety. The plan was to make an announcement this fall. The problem with the $500,000 deduction is that you get whacked with the alternative minimum tax when you use it. And, the odds are that you are going to wipe out any social benefits others receive. You worked your life to build this operation only to be penalized in other ways when you sell. Others work all their lives for somebody else and earn a lifetime pension plus a lifetime df social benefits. In addition, many families find that their children can't afford to take over their businesses so they have to sell to outsiders to reap this benefit. ; . On the small business side where there is substantial documented job creation Ottawa wonders whether they couldn't accomplish more by lowering normal tax rates while removing the small business capital gains break. On a day to day basis more entrepreneurs and business people would be encouraged to expand their operations, creating more jobs. Will the $500,000 deduction be grandfathered so that only those in operation now will benefit? Will their be a period of time when you can sell your shares? Or, will there be a way to crystallize your gains like we saw in the last federal budget? Either way, I'd want to position myself properly as soon as possible. It's a bit of a guessing game at best but it's almost always better to take a position of some sort. Should you sell the shares of your company, into a family trust. Should you sell your farm to your children and take back a non interest bearing loan? You trigger the capital gain but your family can still afford to buy the farm or business. Should you enter into an estate freeze? These are only some of the questions you should be asking your professional. Those who are mourning the-loss of the $100, 000 deduction are all of a sudden learning the value of looking at their portfolios on a regular basis. The first thing you have to determine is whether or not to crystallize your gains under the new rules. Some are finding that it isn't worth their while. For example if you bought some investments for $60,000 several years ago that were worth $80,000 on budget day you have the right to crystallize a $20,000 capital gain that can be used as part of your $100,000 tax free limit. Let's say you do. Next year the investment falls to only $50,000. You sell looking for a $30,000 capital loss. You will only be entitled to a $10,000 loss ($60,000 less $50,000). As a result, some investors are looking at crystallizing and selling at the same time. If the new investment they purchase falls in value they get a full capital loss from $80,000 to whatever price they eventually sell at. Capital losses are going to be a much more important tax planning consideration now that the $100,000 deduction is gone. If you are sitting on a few clunkers this might be a good time to unload them and re-invest the money into something else that has some real potential. The capital loss will allow you to sell something else at a profit that looks like it isn't going to go that much higher. You may have been reluctant to sell and pay capital gains taxes but if you have losses that will wipe out those gains you will see a lot of crisscrossing. Before the introduction of tax free capital gains we used to see a lot of tax loss selling near the year end as investors tried to wipe out profit taxes they were going to have to pay at year end. That's bound to come back. So, tuck that little bit of information for use late ■jn the year. Markets could dip near year end.