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Biz Brain takes your business questions

• Ask the Biz Brain
Since oil prices have fallen off recently, why haven't airfares fallen, too?

• Ask the Biz Brain
If you put $29,000 into the bank 18 years ago, either in a CD or a savings account, how much is it worth now?

• Ask the Biz Brain
I'm a 47-year-old female who considers herself an average investor. I have SEP and Roth retirement accounts with a brokerage firm. I'm very confused with the terminology of investing. I'm not sure if I'm positioned right for retirement. I feel like I'm being taken advantage of and need help understanding investments at a very basic level.

• Ask the Biz Brain
My computer has gotten slower and slower at doing basic things such as booting up and running multiple programs at once. How do I improve its performance without spending any money?

• Ask the Biz Brain
I own Lehman Brothers preferred H shares purchased at $25 per share. What are the chances, if any, of getting some value back in their bank ruptcy?

• Thawing out the frozen credit markets
All the talk about government bailouts and the credit crunch is worrying consumers, but many haven't felt it first-hand -- yet.

• Ask the Biz Brain
I applied for a new credit card and was looking to do a balance transfer from my old credit card, which had a high annual percentage rate. The new credit card was approved, but the balance transfer was not. I have not activated my new card and am thinking of canceling it. Will this affect my credit score?

• Ask the Biz Brain
How can I cash savings bonds to pay for my daughter's college tuition? It is my understanding that I will not have to pay taxes on the interest if they are used to pay for education. Or am I better off saving them for retirement? They were purchased between 1985 and 2004, the majority in 1999 or earlier.

• Ask the Biz Brain
Most of the news has been focused on the troubles of the stock market. What is the status of the bond market and the forecast for its future?

• Ask the Biz Brain
My aunt, an 80-year-old widow, gets about $38,000 a year in retirement and Social Security benefits. Her expenses are about $40,000 a year. She has $1.4 million in vested with Morgan Stanley and $600,000 with UBS. Both firms have about 80 percent of her assets in stocks, with annual fees run ning about 1.5 percent. Both brokerage firms have lost close to $60,000 each during the 2008 year. Are they overly risking her as sets? Wouldn't the interest on a 4 percent CD plus her retirement income generate more than enough income?

• Ask the Biz Brain
I'm semi-retired and flip houses to make ends meet. I own three rental properties that have first position lines of credit on them with low balances. I use the lines of credit to pay expenses between sales on the flips. My worry is all my lines of credit are with Washington Mutual. If WaMu fails, what happens to my lines of credit? Are they frozen until someone buys WaMu? Are they called due?

• Ask the Biz Brain
Does insurance from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. cover the accrued interest on a CD (as well as the principal) if the CD plus interest is less than $100,000?

• Ask the Biz Brain
As a retiree, a considerable portion of my IRA was invested in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for security reasons. Will I get any part of this money back as a result of the U.S. takeover?

• Ask the Biz Brain
What is the difference between a living trust and an irrevocable trust? Are the tax consequences different?