Personal Finance Advice

“Anybody who finds it easy to make money on the horses is probably in the dog food business” – Franklin P Jones

My philosophy regarding the avian flu virus is not too panic, but to be prepared. Whether it’s a H5N1 virus or some other yet unknown strain, the world is overdue for another pandemic. It’s the same as being prepared for other possible emergencies such as earthquakes. I don’t live in fear of them everyday, but [...]

I decided that I would purchase some I-Bonds for my niece for her college investments with $1000 of her funds. Currently I’m investing her money in Japanese antiques (and where I have most of my money invested), but since I usually turn the items I purchase over fairly quickly, I don’t see a need for [...]

There is a good reason that I don’t keep my savings in a Japanese bank — the interest they pay. While you may think that the percent interest that your bank pays is low, it’s nothing compared to Japanese banks. As you can see, the Japanese post office pays a whopping 0.02% (note that isn’t [...]

“The safest way to double your money is to fold it over once and put it in your pocket.” – Kin Hubbard

If you have been speculating in real estate, there’s a good article to read over at Fortune.com about Tom Barrack,”The King of Real Estate.” Then Barrack launches into a parable. “I feel totally safe playing polo on a field full of pros,” says the bronzed 58-year-old. “But when amateurs are all over the field, someone [...]

I was interviewed by the Associated Press about gift cards the other day and my opinion on them. To be quite honest, I think they’re a terrible gift from a personal finance perspective, but I do understand why some people use them. It’s kind of like a convenience store. It’s not a place that I [...]

I was reading about American Standard and how its stock took a beating over at msnbc when I came across this paragraph: Furthermore — and I realize this is a strange thing to say — the toilets in most American homes are downright inferior to what you’ll find in the average Japanese home. We’re an [...]

“If a man has money, it is usually a sign, too, that he knows how to take care of it; don’t imagine his money is easy to get simply because he has plenty of it.” – Edgar Watson Howe

Today I had to go to the government office to re-register as a foreigner living in Japan. Since I had been talking about saving money being your best investment even though it is under appreciated, I figured this would be a good opportunity to show how you can save a significant amount if you take [...]

“If the rich could hire others to die for them, the poor could make a nice living.” – Yiddish Proverb

For those of you that have an online presence and are looking to earn a little extra money on top of google adsense revenue, you may want to check out Chikita eMiniMalls. Nate and I started using them a couple of weeks ago to compliment adsense (you can see how we placed them in the [...]

President Bush has asked for a simpler tax process and set up a panel to make recommendations. While the report is not final, the recommendations that the panel is considering have been reported and the panel’s final report will be delivered to Treasury Secretary John Snow in about two weeks. While it isn’t set in [...]

While it’s predicted this Wednesday’s Powerball lottery will be the largest cash prize ever at some $340 Million, remember the odds before you think you are going to win. From Probability Of Winning The Lottery – Don’t Waste Your Money: You are 6 to 45 times more likely to die from a lightning strike, 18 [...]

Fortune Magazine has an exclusive sit-down conversation with Bill Gates and Warren Buffet and a couple of “speak out” sessions. Some highlights Both predict the S&P 500 will perform below a 10% average per year over the next 7 years. From Gates: This desire to have high absolute returns–and seeing that places like Harvard University [...]

“That’s the American way. If little kids don’t aspire to make money like I did, what the hell good is this country?” – Lee Iacocca

The personal finance and debt reduction carnivals are both live. Frugal Underground is hosting the one on debt reduction and My Money Blog is hosting the one on personal finance. There are a wide variety of submissions this week that should make for good reading. My contributions this week were Cinderella Investing and Savings Assumptions.

As I mentioned before, when it comes to investments, saving money is usually the diamond in the rough that nobody recognizes. In fact, saving money is plain and simply the best investment you can make. It is, however, often difficult to convince others of this. I did a search for “The best investment you can [...]

Running a website about personal finance and saving money, I get some strange emails from time to time and yesterday was one of those times. I received an email from a person looking for help with her credit report: …I can’t do anything I want because my credit score is too low. I had to [...]

“Every morning I get up and look through the Forbes list of the richest people in America. If I’m not there, I go to work.” – Robert Orben