Personal Finance Advice

Weekend reading is a round-up of personal finance reading that has caught our eye that may be of interest to you: Blog Contest Winners Each month we run a fun blog contest among the savingadvice member bloggers. These are the three winners entries for March: What public school can teach you about money What a [...]

Last weekend a group of personal finance bloggers got together in San Francisco to discuss personal finance and Web 2.0. The event was sponsored by MyStrands, Inc. in conjunction with Networth IQ and Expensr and called the Personal Finance Leaders Workshop by The Bay. The event was an attempt to see how Web 2.0 can [...]

By Jennifer Derrick I recently returned from two weeks of traveling for both business and pleasure. As I was setting up the components of the trip (hotels, rental cars, etc.) I was disappointed to discover that there were virtually no deals to be had. This surprised me because there’s usually some sort of deal available [...]

By Jeffrey Strain When it comes to personal finances, most people concentrate on saving and investing money. This can be a problem because issues that may not first appear to have much to do with personal finances can often have a dramatic affect on them. Productivity is just one of these. The more productive you [...]

While I know you’re probably putting together a list of New Year’s resolutions if you haven’t done so yet, I would ask that you stop. Don’t even bother. Boycott the whole tradition. Refuse to get suckered into a yearly game that gives the impression that it will help, but actually does you more harm than [...]

No matter what your religious beliefs, Nate and I would like to take a moment to wish you and yours a very wonderful Holiday season. We’d also like to thank you for all your have done in helping the people that visit. Whether it is commenting on this blog, writing your own blog, participating in [...]

Probably the most difficult step in getting ones personal finances in order is the step to actually begin working on them. If you have a great adversion to looking at your personal finances, it makes it that much more difficult as this reader knows: I hate personal finance and my finances shows this. They are [...]

By David John Marotta and Beth Anderson Nedelisky Before reverse mortgages, pensioners wishing to tap into home equity were presented with two options: either sell the house or get a home equity loan. But since their humble beginnings in the late ’80s, reverse mortgages provided seniors with an additional tool for accessing home equity. The [...]

By Wixx, special contributor Recently, as I am sure you have noticed, retailers have begun to move Christmas to an earlier timeslot. No longer is it the White Christmas in the middle of the winter. This year Christmas moved into a tie with Halloween for space in retail stores and card shops in October. It [...]

This is a question that often comes up — the difference between being frugal and being cheap. This reader asks for help in trying to remain frugal without becoming cheap: I have a huge problem with my husband’s family. They don’t understand there is a difference between being frugal and being cheap. They constantly complain [...]

By David John Marotta For the past seven years US markets have experienced the ripple effects of the tech sector’s correction in 2000. The latest waves have been in the slow decline of the housing market and, now, in the weakening of the commercial real estate market. While economists can’t always explain the timing of [...]

When it comes to how much money the government keeps out of your paycheck, there are often a lot of questions. You don’t want to be giving the government a free loan of your hard earned money, but at the same time, you don’t want to owe a lot of taxes when April 15 rolls [...]

By David John Marotta and Beth Anderson Nedelisky Would you be willing to give a contractor a blank check and no time limit to build your dream home? Beware of doing the same thing with your finances. Without a financial plan, your investments are controlling your dreams, not the other way around. You need a [...]

With Christmas right around the corner, you should have started to make your Christmas budget as one reader is currently doing. In the process, she wonders what is the better alternative: a real Christmas tree or an artificial Christmas tree? I am trying to decide whether to purchase a real Christmas tree or an artificial [...]

By David John Marotta I don’t favor stock-picking as the best way to meet your financial goals. But even if you favor index funds, as I do, that doesn’t mean you have to use them exclusively. You have probably heard the statistic that most actively managed funds fail to beat their indexes. Here’s why. Most [...]

By David John Marotta As Americans try to spend less and go on a budget, this provides an opportunity to teach the next generation financial principles they may never have seen in the prosperous years they have been alive. Here are ten principles for teaching children about money: Talk about money. Every time money is [...]

By David John Marotta and Beth Anderson Nedelisky Many seniors look forward to saving on medical insurance costs by enrolling in Medicare at age sixty-five. However, navigating the Medicare system is not for the faint of heart. Medicare is an alphabet soup of plan choices. Currently Medicare is organized as parts A through D. Medicare [...]

By David John Marotta With the end of the year quickly approaching, how do things look? Specifically, are you on track to meet your goals? Have you measured? What gets measured is more likely to be accomplished. Computing your net worth once a year is the first and most important step toward financial security. Net [...]

By David John Marotta In 1985, an MIT professor won the Nobel Prize for a simple technique that squirrels have known intuitively from birth — you have to “squirrel” away some nuts during times of plenty so you can survive during times of scarcity. Economist Franco Modigliani won his Nobel Prize for modeling how humans [...]

By David John Marotta Financial planning is important, but it is never urgent. Most people fail to establish a financial plan because they fail to start planning. Some resolutions can be postponed, but for every six years that you delay saving and investing, you cut your retirement lifestyle in half. So, act on your resolution [...]