Personal Finance Advice

It takes my neighbor hours to pay all her bills while being debt free keeps me from that onerous chore, saving me valuable time. The same neighbor taught me about another time saving aspect of being debt free. This neighbor requested her free credit report from AnnualCreditReport. I had mentioned it to her some time [...]

One of my friends became debt free about year ago. We were at lunch talking about how good it feels to be debt free, especially in the middle of a recession, when she uttered this gem: “It’s so great. I can pay all my bills and still have lots left over for fun stuff.”
I asked [...]

I went to visit a neighbor the other day and arrived as she was just beginning to pay her bills. It looked like quite a project, with all the papers spread and stacked on the kitchen table so I asked if I should come back later. She said no and invited me in to chat [...]

Some would say that we live a life of deprivation. We don’t indulge ourselves very often and we rarely buy things without giving them careful consideration. This is a deliberate choice on our part, born not from a lack of money, but from a desire to retain our ability to appreciate everything.
When you [...]

An acquaintance came to me the other day and told me a sad story. She has been unemployed since December and unable to find work. Her husband also lost his job around the same time and although he has since found another, they went four months with no income and his new job pays considerably [...]

Several financial experts (most notably Dave Ramsey) preach that, if you want to become and remain debt free, you must not use credit cards. Ever. Their reasoning is that, a) it is too easy to get into the debt trap when using cards and, b) that you spend more money (around 25% more) when you [...]

Oh, the joy of a high school reunion. The time when you get to see that most of your former classmates have done better than you, at least on the surface. My reunion was last week (let’s not discuss how many years it’s been) and I debated long and hard about going. Part of me [...]

I hear many people complain that they aren’t creative. “I can’t paint or write,” they say. They assume that creativity is only relevant if you are creating some piece of art, music, or design. But creativity isn’t limited only to the arts. Plenty of creativity is required in everything from manufacturing to accounting to the [...]

I see many people who set big financial goals for themselves. Get out of debt. Save up six months worth of expenses. Pay cash for a car. Save up a twenty-percent down payment for a house. Some goals are even bigger than that. Save two million dollars for retirement. Pay cash for a house. All [...]

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about our decision to remain child-free and how that decision (while not based on money) has made it easier for us to remain out of debt. Several respondents wondered who would take care of me in my old age if I didn’t have kids. Wasn’t I giving up [...]

We all remember fondly the games we played when we were children. There is a simple game that kept me entertained when I was young. It was called Barrel of Monkeys. My Barrel of Monkeys came in a bright yellow plastic barrel with twelve monkeys inside. The monkeys’ arms were sort of S curved and [...]

I know someone who was recently visited by the repo man. He lost his job several months ago and hasn’t been able to find work that pays anything close to what he needs to pay his bills. He’s in pretty serious debt, having bought two cars, a house, and a lot of “stuff” that he [...]

I was accused the other day on another financial site that I frequent of caring only about money. I was responding to a poster who was asking about the benefits of being debt free, because the person couldn’t see that so much could be gained by not owing anyone anything. So I listed some of [...]

One of the items that people most frequently go into debt to purchase is a car. That’s not surprising given that even the most basic brand new car begins around $12,000. And that’s for four wheels and a seat; no extras or room for many passengers. Most people don’t have that kind of money lying [...]

The other day I went to lunch with a friend who is working on becoming debt free and simplifying her life overall. I asked her how it was going.
“Ugh,” she said. “Well, I told you that Herman took a sabbatical so he could teach for six months, right?” Teaching was, her husband believed, his [...]

We are DINK’s (Dual Income No Kids). Many years ago we made the decision not to have kids. That decision didn’t have anything to do with money. On the contrary, we could have afforded kids quite easily. We just didn’t want kids. I’m the sort of person who likes to visit with my nieces and [...]

Last week, Sadie wrote about how debt free living means not being a slave to a FICO score. In the article, she pointed out that FICO has become such an integral part of our lives that even the debt free can’t ignore the score completely, which is annoying, at best. But I’ve been giving it [...]

I’ve mentioned before that I really like saving money. To me it’s like a game to find new ways to reduce my spending. Constantly finding new ways to lower spending keeps me on my toes and protects me from slipping into careless patterns that could lead to debt. It also frees up more cash that [...]

One of the benefits of a life without debt is (some) freedom from the gods at FICO. Because I don’t do debt, my FICO score is not as important to me as it is to some and that takes a lot of worry out of my life. I see many people freaking out about their [...]

Recently we got a bit of a shocker to our budget. The washing machine, out of nowhere, decided to give up on us. I can’t say I’m totally shocked; the poor thing was thirteen years old, after all. But still, it gave no warning before deciding to conk out completely. Turns out that the motor [...]