Personal Finance Advice

It’s hard to believe that I have been writing here for the past year. I thank you for visiting these pages and reading my thoughts on money and saving. I hope you have enjoyed what I have had to offer as much as I have enjoyed sharing it with you.
Over the past year, I [...]

Many times, when I help someone with their finances, I discover that their biggest obstacle is that they don’t understand opportunity cost and the impact it has on personal finance. In order to take advantage of an opportunity, something else must always be given up. Opportunity cost is basically what you lose by choosing one [...]

This video from the Daily Show with Jon Stewart is funny and great entertainment:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart
M – Th 11p / 10c

CNBC Financial Advice

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But it’s also an important lesson in financial management. The lesson to be learned from this video is that you should never trust one source [...]

Why are you here? I am not asking for your take on the meaning of life or your grand purpose in life (although I am always happy to listen if you want to tell me). Rather, I want to know why you are reading this article at this very moment.
Are you here [...]

Have you ever thought about how much money people waste in a given day? Today, I tried to keep track of all of the waste that I witnessed and I was rather surprised, given our economy, how cavalierly people will still waste their financial resources. It made me think back to a time, [...]

A couple that we are friendly with recently asked us to go to a play with them. We were interested because the play was one we’d been wanting to see for some time. However, tickets for this production were $60 for the nosebleed section. Add on $12 per ticket in service fees, plus sales tax [...]

I hang out on a lot of finance/frugality related message forums and websites and I’m noticing a disturbing rise in the number of people being mean to those who ask for help. There have always been people who get their shorts in a wad over this or that hot button issue; that’s nothing new. And [...]

A coworker is currently getting her financial house in order for the first time. She is paying off a heap of debt, setting up insurance policies and wills, and generally doing all the things she knew that she should have been doing all along. I’m proud of her. But she came to me the other [...]

It is almost comical the trouble I am running into saving money lately.
For instance, I was shopping at a favorite second-hand store when I found a great purse. I was so excited to find something that was the right size, reasonably priced and in fairly good shape that I quickly paid for it and moved [...]

If you watch the news or read many magazines or newspapers, you’ve probably heard about “lifestyle diseases.” These are diseases and ailments that we get because our lifestyle and/or environment are unhealthy. Some examples:

Obesity
Alcoholism
Diseases associated with smoking such as lung cancer, asthma or emphysema
Drug abuse
Depression/anxiety
Some forms of cancer related [...]

I get tickled when people tell me that they read a certain book or listened to a certain guru and followed the plan to the letter, but still have financial trouble or they can’t meet their goals. They seem stymied as to why the plan didn’t work. I often ask them if the plan was [...]

There are a lot of ways that you can save significant amounts of money by prudently marshalling your resources and spending wisely. Many of our topics suggest ways that savvy consumers can save tremendous amounts of money over time, whether by going without certain products or services, or by cutting back on certain purchases. [...]

Earlier today I had to buy a backpack. I had to buy a backpack because my high school aged son managed to break his current backpack. Now, I am not really sure how one breaks a backpack. Indeed, until today, I did not believe that one could actually break a backpack. [...]

In 2008 you worried and logged every cent you made. You made out a budget and tried to stick to it. Every month you failed. Something came up and you overspent. It caused a great deal of tension and maybe even some arguments between you and your beloved spouse. It even made the kids feel [...]

Weekend reading is a round-up of personal finance and money related stories that caught the eye of our forum members this week:

Circuit City to liquidate remaining U.S. stores
Congress considers ‘cash for clunkers’ proposal
This is why you continue to get those Nigerian scam emails
Chef Amanda Freitag Tries To Prep Family-Friendly Dinner On [...]

Weekend reading is a round-up of personal finance and money related stories that caught the eye of our forum members this week:

WSJ Tries Blaming Economic Woes on People Being Frugal
Porn industry seeks federal bailout
If You Don’t Need It, It’s Not A Bargain At All
Lenders digging up more than your credit score [...]

Weekend reading is a round-up of personal finance and money related stories that caught the eye of our forum members this week:

How we went from $42,000 to $6,500 and lived to tell about it
The difference between a recession and a depression
The Worst Financial Predictions About 2008
The Credit Card & College Link
[...]

In my youth, I liked to live life well and, admittedly, to excess. My friends and I ate out often and we did not limit ourselves to salad and sparkling water. We enjoyed fine meals that we could not afford and the full range of alcoholic beverages that the world’s distilleries, wineries and [...]

Weekend reading is a round-up of personal finance and money related stories that caught the eye of our forum members this week:

The Obama economic stimulus: Everybody gets to refinance their house at 4.5%
Meet the family who live on $44K a year — debt-free
Bush: “I’ve abandoned free-market principles to save the free-market system”
[...]

I recently finished reading Thomas Friedman’s Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution and How It Can Empower America. It’s a very good book if you’re interested in the environment, but it’s also a good read if you ever wonder what a “green economy” might look like. He covers a lot of [...]