Personal Finance Advice

The boxes were gone. My three-year-old was crestfallen. He had looked forward to his regular job of returning the plastic bags from last week’s grocery shopping trip to the recycling boxes just inside the store. But the boxes are no longer there; an employee told us that the store had discontinued its recycling. [...]

I went to the grocery store this morning. My list included four items. I returned with ten. It would seem I had a problem with the impulse buy. That’s not, however, the case. Four of the things I returned with were on sale, so maybe it was sale-blindness. That’s not the case either. I [...]

This weekend I was reading “You’re Broke Because You Want to Be: How to Stop Getting By and Start Getting Ahead” by Larry Winget. (A pretty good read, by the way. The advice is nothing groundbreaking, but his straight talk and no excuses approach is entertaining.) Anyway, in the book he states that most people [...]

The most expensive day of your week completely depends on your individual circumstances and spending habits, but I think for a lot of people, that day is Friday. There are many different factors that can influence why your spending would be more on Friday than on any other day of the week and here [...]

The other day someone mentioned to my husband something about the fact that I always find the best deals and I always have a coupon for something. That’s actually a pretty true statement. I can sniff out a coupon a mile away. It’s almost like a game for me — to see if I can [...]

When saving money, meals in restaurants are rightfully one of the first expenses to be cut, but if you hate to cook as much as I do, budgeting for a meal or two out each week may save enough of your sanity to be worth the expense. On the days you do choose to [...]

If you have a lot of storage space, warehouse clubs, such as BJ’s, Costco, and Sam’s Club, can help you save some money on products you use frequently. The one we visit does not offer the best deals on every product, but we depend on it for consistently low prices (usually about 30% less [...]

As a child, I went grocery shopping with my adult sister at a store that didn’t exist in my hometown. When she checked out, the cashier gave her a number of stamps based on how much she had spent, and she discovered that she had enough saved to treat me to a toy chosen [...]

Some people are “pound wise and penny foolish.” That is, they focus their savings efforts only on big items while letting small amounts of money slip through their fingers. Having tallied up my “penny savings” from last year, I can tell you that small amounts of money can quickly add up to big savings.
Last [...]

My son asked for some bananas for snack, and I started singing something I had a vague recollection of: “Yes, we have no bananas, we have no bananas today!” I got the melody all wrong, and as my husband and I tried to finagle the right tune, I offered banana spread I had made and [...]

“Silver Bells” and “Silver and Gold”, some budgets just don’t allow a gift to all who deserve something for the holidays. You know how hungry animals in cartoons see our hero as a roast bird or some other tasty morsel? Throw open your pantry and see a stack full of sparkling gifts in tidy bows, [...]

Dinner parties can be a lot of fun to attend, but not necessarily a lot of fun to host. From staying up late the night before preparing the meal to racing home after work to finish cooking the meal, it’s almost like a second job. Don’t even get me started on the costs [...]

Lately I’ve been trying to save more and spend less, all the while trying to exercise more and eat less. I’ve learned that even though I’m trying to accomplish two different goals, the principles to succeed are very similar. And these two goals are hard enough to take on during the year, but [...]

Do you want to know what I dislike more than grocery shopping? Coming home with more grocery bags. Plastic or paper, it doesn’t matter. I just don’t reuse all those bags, and the piles keep stacking up. So I started searching for some clever reusable and recycling grocery bag ideas, and I’m passing this information [...]

If you knew that a friend busted their budget in order to invite you over for dinner, would you enjoy the dinner? Probably not. Keep this thought in mind when you entertain.
When preparing for dinner guests, wondering, “What will they think about the water stains on the ceilings?” is normal. Hoping the [...]

By Keith Brainard from Brainard Brewing
Editor’s Note: This guest post came about from discussion of the article Life Is Far Too Short To Drink Cheap Beer - 10 Ways To Maximize Your Beer Value where several readers commented that brewing your own beer gives the best value for your money
I have to admit, I have [...]

My husband and I just returned from a 17 day, 5,500-mile road trip westward from our home in South Carolina. Even though 4.5 million visit the Grand Canyon every year, we still felt like bold adventurers because it was all new to us.
And, I have learned that as a white person, apparently I can [...]

Last week, I thought I had found a great deal on 12-packs of 7-Up and A & W root beer ($2 each) but my total grocery bill seemed high, and when I checked my receipt at home, I found I had paid $3.99 for each case of soda. When I remembered looking at the [...]

When money gets tight, one place that many people try to save money is on food. The problem is that this often means sacrificing healthy food. Therefore when the food budget is tight, a question that is often asked is whether it is possible to eat health food and still stay within budget? That is [...]

Leftovers used to make me gag. Unfortunately, I was too cheap to eat out frequently, and too lazy to cook a completely new meal every night. This caused internal conflicts. I had to find creative ways to enjoy eating at home more often. Here are some ideas I experimented with that finally convinced my [...]