The Federal Reserve cut the main US interest rate again.
Yesterday the Fed approved of a .5% cut. It’s now down to 3.0%. Why is this important to me and you?
This is good news or bad news depending on what your situation is right now.
Personally my saving account’s interest will be going down. That in turn inspires me to pay my car loan down quicker.
J.D at Get Rich Slowly has a list of high yield savings accounts. I expect many of them to lower their rates just a bit.
Photo Credit: The Marmot
Yesterday, I picked up Guitar Hero III for the Wii. Since Rock Band isn’t out for the Wii, I wanted to ‘rock’ out with this game. We actually wanted Guitar Hero for our wedding anniversary, but they were sold out due to the holiday demand. There were only a few of these at our Wal-Mart and 2 of the Wii version. I decided to go for the box that didn’t looked like it kicked for a block or so.
This might seem like frivolous spending, but this was a planned purchase. We saved the money ahead of time. We did not dip into the emergency funds or savings. The money came from our joint checking account, which has buffer money in it as well as leftovers from the month.
The idea with this post is that saving money can be fun when you spend it on things that you enjoy and you don’t go into debt for it.
Two people can make the same purchase, but due to their financial circumstances, it can be a good choice for one and a bad idea for the other.
How did we save up for this?
What do you like to save and spend your money on?
Photo Credit: fiskfisk
Green Panda has been out and about on the web. It’s great that three posts were included in some wonderful carnivals and a festival.
Carnival of Personal Finance is hosted by Dividend Guy. My post on how we pay our bills and budget was included in it.
Some of my favorite posts there are:
Mrs. Micah has the Festival of Frugality up and running and it has so much good information. In case you missed it, my post on brown bagging your lunch is in there. Go over and see what you can use to save some money and time.
Here’s what I’m taking home:
Speaking of taxes, the Tax Carnival is up. My husband’s post on ridiculous and funny state tax forms was included.
This is an exciting week so far and I look forward to seeing how it continues.
Photo Credit: aussiegall
Can you believe it’s almost the end of January? Well, I made some financial goals for this year and it’s a good time to see how I’m doing.
It’s good to review periodically your goals. As you can see some change and others need a reminder to work on them harder. How are your financial goals for 2008?
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Photo Credit: It’sGreg
Ryan is a guest author from Millionaire Money Habits, a personal finance site that discusses building wealth by developing the habits of self-made millionaires. I thought it was interesting how Ryan incorporated news into personal finace skills. Let me know what you think.
By now you it would be virtually impossible to not have heard of Dave Kori, the 17-year-old high-school student who called a Virginia school administrator, Dean Tistadt, at home. He left a message asking why a snow day had not been declared after a three-inch snowfall. The student apparently intended to speak to the Fairfax County chief operator, as he left his name and return phone number. If his goal was to get a return call, he certainly succeeded. Dean’s wife called back, leaving an angry message for the high-school student, which Dave posted online for the world to hear.
While there may be some privacy issues and potential school code violations, the actions Dave Kori took were arguably commendable. In fact, what he did exudes characteristics that I believe will make him very successful in life. Maybe it wasn’t the right thing to do, and I’m sure there was a better way to handle the situation, but to get what you want, you have to break the rules now and again. He believed strongly about something, and he went straight to the source to have his questions answered.
Photo Credit: Lida Rose
There are many Dave Kori’s in the world, and the one’s I know personally have translated those tenacious characteristics into wealth. Let’s examine:
While the public’s opinion on how the high-school student handled the situation is either criticized or hailed, I find his actions to be redeeming qualities that exemplify a highly successful person. Identify your objective, focus on the strategy to reach that objective and take no prisoners in reaching that objective.
Recently I wrote about our rough draft plans for our tax refund. I got some nice feedback and some interesting thoughts on it. The post also sparked another conversation between my husband and I.
I decided to share some information about how our accounts are set up and the idea behind our budgeting.
Curious to see what’s under our hood? Here are the accounts by ownership:
I think the key for us is keeping it easy to use and easy to change. We use a Google Spreadsheet for our joint budgeting. It lists our deposits and expenses for the month. We also add a buffer in case we go over. Using Google for our spreadsheet is great as we sharethis free spreadsheet and it notifies the other one of any changes.
We review this on an as needed basis, if someone gets a raise or works more hours, etc. To determine how much each deposits, we go by monthly income and come up with a percentage and then use that to calculate deposits. Here’s an example:
So here are the deposits:
It is a system that is a bit more fair then just splitting it 50/50. People do it differently. This is what works for us,so we’ll continue with it for now. Any other ways of managing deposits that you found work?
As for my personal accounts, I use spreadsheets mainly and I’m trying out Wesabe’s community feature and using Mint to keep track of my eating out spending (I’m trying to be more efficient in this area).
My husband has spreadsheets and GnuCash. He likes it (I thinkJ, I’m not a mind reader, I just see him using it). I find if you do what works for you, then it actually sticks. I don’t like to use GnuCash, but I’m addicted to spreadsheets.
Our bills are automated with the exception of the cell phone bill, which will change next month. When a bill is off, like when our power bill was higher than normal, I just log in and change the amount. It takes less than 5 minutes.
We like our little system and it’s working for us. It’s by no means perfect, but perfection is the enemy of good. It’s better to do something and improve it bit by bit.
How do you set up your account? Any tips, suggestions, thoughts?
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Photo Credit: massdistraction
This is a guest post by Green Panda’s husband.
It’s early in tax season and if you’re expecting a refund, then you’re probably looking forward to it. On the other hand, if you aren’t expecting a refund, then you still know you’ll have to fill out some very boring IRS forms and perhaps state forms.
One day, I happened to be looking at the individual tax form for Maine and I noticed that the form gives you a smiley face if you get a refund. Maine doesn’t do anything special if you owe money, of course. But, hey, that’s neat, there’s a bit of personality here.
After seeing this, I wondered if any other states put a little personality into their tax forms and went digging through tax forms for other states (some this year, some last year) to find out.
Well, Utah apparently didn’t want to be outdone, and decided to sympathize with you if you owe money.
As did Rhode Island.
But then Rhode Island apparently figured they could take it a step further, and added clip art to their tax form.
Illinois decided to add something like clip art. I guess they figured, “hey, as long they’re paying taxes, maybe they want to give more, too!” Well, at least they’re donations. But why is “giving” in quotes? Is there something I don’t know about?
North Carolina likes to make you fill in circles.
Interestingly, that example circle appears after the earlier circles. I hope you didn’t mess up in filling in the circles earlier, before they gave you that help!
Now, North Carolina isn’t much for clip art. Well, maybe a dollar sign sort of counts. Yes, I’m sure they want their money in dollars.
However, they don’t bother specifying that detail when you get a refund, though. Sneaky. (Either that, or they pay you in arrows? Tax forms can be so confusing at times…)
And, finally, Georgia has decided to help you out a bit if you failed basic math and are trying to figure out what percentage of your total income is taxable Georgia income. You’re on your own for all the other math on the form, though.
Anything I missed from the tax forms where you live?
Welcome to the Carnival of Personal Finance #136! The carnival is in town for this week only, so make the best of it. As you explore around I’ll highlight some great games that you might enjoy. This is not your usual carnival, as the games aren’t fixed and the rules are explained clearly.
Here are some of my favorites this week:
While a lion in the wild can eat you right up, carnival lions are not as dangerous. You have to stay away from the predators, kind of like credit cards and debt. You need to be in control of them.
Imagine how fair you can go if you not only cut your debt, but increased you finances income!
Real estate is a rough and tumble game, but if you plan ahead you can minimize some risk. Knowledge is power. Have all your ducks in a row.
Let me show you a wonderful race. Here the winner isn’t who finishes first, it’s who starts first! How is this possible? It’s the race for investing and retirement. (Psst..the secret is using compound interest in your favor.)
Everybody loves watching jugglers handle so many things at once! Our jugglers handle savings, reducing debt, retirement, and much more using proper money management skills.
Do like to find treasure, then explore our saving and frugality seekers games. The two go hand in hand.
Still anxious to look around? there are some great things off the beaten path that you should try out.
Come visit the carnival next week when it’s hosted by The Dividend Guy. Come back again and if you liked what you saw today, please subscribe to some of these wonderful sites, including mine!
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