Archive for the ‘advice’ Category
Preparing For Christmas
Every year I end up going on a big shopping trip to get all the gifts we are going to give to our friends and family. This happens because I always forget to get gifts throughout the year. Both my siblings and mother are good about shopping ahead of time (though my brother is only [...]
Capitalizing on the Lower Gas Prices
The good news is that gas prices have gone back down to normal levels. The even better news is that most people have not gotten used to having that extra cash back in their budgets. To get a good idea of how much money most people are looking at lets crunch some numbers. The only [...]
Tetris — Building with the Straight Pieces
Last week I made a comparison between the game of tetris and dealing with your personal finances. To understand the further use of this metaphor check out the previous post When playing tetris it is always nice to have an abundance of straight pieces. These pieces make building and completing lines very easy. These pieces [...]
Your Debt or Your Weight?
Asking a persons weight is considered impolite in most circles, but so is talking about money. So when I read that half of Americans would rather give up their wight than reveal how much credit card debt they have I was shocked. Half of Americans, the country where obesity is running rampant, were more ashamed [...]
Stay Away From Timing; Focus on Time-In
The stock market is a very fickle beast and people’s reaction to it is manytimes counter productive. Every time you hear someone talk about the market you will get the age old addage of “Buy low, sell high,” but so many people do not listent to the logic in that. Instead when the stock market [...]
Do Not Go Cheap on Your Server
A distressing part of people feeling the crunch of rising energy and food costs is that when they go out to eat they are not tipping as well as they were a couple of years ago. Servers are reporting a decline in tip income. This does not reflect the decline in traffic that many mid [...]
Teaching Kids about Money
It seems that almost no one is teaching their kids about money. Each year the Federal Reserve does a study to see how much high school and college students understand about money. The average high school student scored a 48 out of 100, while the average college student only got a 62. This means that [...]
Free Program to Protect Your Info
Did you ever mistype an address on your computer only to get some weird looking site? A common tactic by identity thieves is to register a domain name that is similar to that of a popular website, ex. googl.com instead of google.com. They then have a program on there called a key logger. A key [...]
Car Loans are a Bad Bet
The average car loan in America is now 70 months. That right 70!! What are we doing to ourselves? I cannot even look at the math involved in this. Here is my experience with car loans. I purchased a vehicle in 2004 and took out a loan for 75% of the value (25% down). It [...]
Ask and Ye Shall Receive
One of my biggest complaints with Americans is that they are afraid of asking for a deal. Many people just want to take the price that the store gives you and that is that. A big area where you should always ask is your credit card rates. Just by asking for a lower rate most [...]
