Article: Mortgage payments can be easily found using your chosen spreadsheet program. This function, in all major spreadsheet programs (Microsoft Excel, Google Spreadsheet, and Apple Numbers), is known as PMT, or the payment function. It combines information like your interest rate, number of periods, and principal to arrive at an amount for each monthly payment. For simplicity, we will be focusing on Microsoft Excel's PMT function here. The process and inputs will likely be identical or very similar for any other program you are using. Consult the help tab or customer service if you have any problems using these functions. Start using the PMT function by typing =PMT( into your spreadsheet. The program will then prompt you for the proper entries into each part of the function by showing the following: PMT(rate, nper, pv, [fv], [type]). The first three represent required inputs, while the last two are optional.   rate stands for the monthly interest rate. Note that this will be your annual interest rate (the quoted rate on your loan agreement, like 4 or 5 percent) divided by 12. It should also be expressed as a decimal.  For example, if your annual interest rate is 6%, you would divide this number by twelve to get your monthly interest rate. This would be 6%/12, or 0.5%. However, this number must be input in the equation as decimal, so we divide again by 100. So we have 0.5%/100, which equals 0.005. This will be your monthly interest you will use to calculate mortgage payments. These calculations can also be done in a different order (6%/100 = 0.06, 0.03/12 = 0.005).    nper is short for "number of periods" and simply represents how many payments you will make on your loan. For a monthly payment, this would be 12 times the number of years on your loan. Imagine for this example that you have a 15-year mortgage. So, your "nper" value, or your number of payments, would be 12*15, or 180.   pv stands for "present value" but here it simply means the principal of your loan. For this example, imagine you have a $100,000 loan. This will be your "pv".  Don't worry about the other two values; leaving them blank will make the program assume their correct value of 0. The program will display your monthly payment amount in the same cell you entered the formula into. Note that this number will be negative, this is simply the program expressing it as a payment (or expense). In the example above, this information would be entered as =PMT(0.005, 180, 100000). The PMT function will return an amount that represents the total amount you will pay on the loan each month. Know that this number will be expressed as a negative number. This doesn't mean you entered your information incorrectly, but simply that the program represents payments as an expense and therefore, a negative number. Multiply by -1 if this helps you understand and use the figure. The spreadsheet should return -$843.86 when you enter your function as described above. Multiply this number by -1 to get your monthly payment of $843.86.
Question: What is a summary of what this article is about?
Understand the function used. Start using the PMT function. Enter this information and press enter. Analyze your result.

Problem: Article: The more you know about the specific make and model of boat that you’re planning to buy, the better you’ll be able to haggle over the price. In fact, you may find that the seller has over-priced the boat, in which case you can certainly talk them down.  Before you meet the seller, find out the selling price of used boats like the one you plan to buy. You can find the value of any boat model through the NADA Boat guide. Check the guide online at: http://www.nadaguides.com/Boats. Since you’re purchasing a used item, the price will be somewhat flexible. Try to talk the owner down from the listed price. If the seller refuses to lower their price, you can explain that you believe the boat is overpriced and that you can find a better deal somewhere else. This will often prompt the seller to lower the price.  For example, if the boat is listed as selling for $25,000, ask if the owner will take $20,000. They’ll likely decline, but may revise their offer to a more reasonable $22,500.  Be aware that boat owners may accept your lower rate for the boat itself, but then over-charge you for ancillary items like radios, safety items, or an engine. If you have the time and patience, negotiate over each individual item you’re buying. Once you’ve agreed on the purchase price, ask the boat’s current owner to give you the boat’s title and other legal documents. Just like when buying a car, this will conclude the purchasing process. Making sure that the current boat owner transfers all ownership papers to you will also confirm that the boat was not stolen.  Although laws vary by state, boats over 12 feet (3.7 m) typically have titles, while smaller boats do not. If you live in the U.S., you will also need to register your boat with your state’s Department of Motor Vehicles or Department of Natural Resources. Even if the previous owner registered the boat, you will need to re-register the boat with yourself as the given owner. For your state’s guidelines, look online at: https://www.dmv.org/boat-registration.php.
Summary: Research the boat you’re buying and competitive models. Negotiate the price with the boat owner. Transfer the legal ownership of the boat.

You can collect information from them in several ways: telephone or e-mail surveys, statistical reviews of customer order history, and market trends. Ask them about their purchasing plans and projected buying behavior. Use a large pool to help generalize results. Ask them how likely they are to buy your products and tally the results.  Customers are in the best position to know the demand for a product. The danger from surveys is that they often overestimate actual demand. While a customer may show interest in your product, actually buying it is a different thing altogether. Keep in mind that conducting surveys can be expensive, difficult, and time consuming. Surveys rarely form the base of a successful demand forecast. Use this during the early stages of your product development. Find a small, isolated, area that has your targeted demographic. Roll out every stage of your marketing plan including advertising, promotion, and distribution plans. Measure product awareness, penetration, market share and total sales. Fine tune your market strategy based on the information you receive so that you will run into fewer problems when you launch your product nationally. Gather a small group of potential customers in a room and let them use your product and discuss it. The customers are usually paid a small amount for participating. Panels are similar to surveys in that they are more useful to analyze the product rather than forming the basis for a demand forecast. Find a large set of household customers to agree to participate in an ongoing study of their buying habits at grocery stores, for example. Have these customers agree to submit information such as the size of their households, their ages, their household income, and any other information you find relevant to your product. Whenever they buy groceries, their purchases are recorded and analyzed. This data can be collected when they use their store grocery card. This creates a rich database to create statistical models and see relationships in data. As with other types of experimental approaches, it can be difficult to apply these results to demand forecasts.
++++++++++
One-sentence summary --
Survey your customers. Use test marketing. Host consumer panels. Use scanner panel data.