Dave Ramsey
Should I Save For Retirement While In Debt?
That’s a question that a lot of people ask while in debt. Dave Ramsey, possibly the most popular debt counselor, recommends that you stop ALL retirement saving while eliminating debt. He argues that it gives you a huge advantage because you have a lot more money for your debt snowball.
I am a little more liberal when it comes to this rule. I think that it should be based on some other factors as well. For example, our current pile of debt is so large that we will be missing out on 5+ years of retirement saving (the amount of time it’s going to take us to pay off this debt). When you add compound interest into the equation, it means that we would be missing out on a lot more money. Let me give you our situation as an example:
I currently work for the Government and am offered a 5% match for money I put into the Thrift Savings Plan (fancy government word for 401k). That means that for every dollar I put into the plan, they match me 100% up to a 5% of my income. That’s a guaranteed 100% return on my money and I can invest it in any of their funds. However, if I didn’t contribute to the plan, I would miss out on that free money. Plus, I would miss out on 5+ years of compound interest.
Now, I am going to put some numbers to the scenario. Let’s say I start putting 5% of my income (plus the match) into the plan starting today (age 25). By the time I reach age 70, I will have almost $2.5 million in the account assuming an 8% return. Now, if I wait 6 years (best case scenario for debt repayment) and start investing the same amount per year, I will only have $1.7 million in the account. Still not bad, but almost $800,000 less than if I would have started at 25. Here is a graph of this example:
So, as you can see, starting to save for retirement 6 years from now instead of today will cost me about $800,000 in retirement savings by age 70. Am I really going to pay that much more in interest by not stopping my contributions? I don’t think so!
So, I guess the question is, when should you stop contributing to retirement in order to clean up your debts? Should you do it if you can get the debts paid off in 2 years or less? 4 years or less? What is the magic number?
All I can say is, I am not missing out on almost $800,000 in retirement growth to save MAYBE a couple thousand in interest charges.
What are your thoughts on the subject? Can you think of any reasons why I should be STOPPING my contributions?
Post by Frugal Dad
What I Learned About Saving Money From Older Generations
You ever notice how there are older people that don’t know the first thing about the world of personal finance, yet they seem to be experts at saving money? These people have also not heard of personal finance gurus, such as, Dave Ramsey or Suze Orman, or even Frugal Dad. Yet they still save money. They don’t read personal finance blogs nor do they ever want to listen to a full personal finance podcast.
Photo by eyg2158
Many of us twenty-somethings are completely lost sometimes when it comes to personal finance, yet we have all the information about money management available to us within a few clicks. We have a lot to learn from older generations when it comes to saving money.
How do these old school people manage to save money? What are their money saving tips?
They follow the “pay yourself first” mentality.
Instead of waiting for the end of the pay cycle, these ambitious individuals put their money away as soon as their paycheck comes in.
Whether they choose to invest in CDs, mutual funds, risky stocks, online savings accounts, or keep it under their pillow is irrelevant. Savings come first. Bills come second. Third is the necessities of life. Whatever is left over is used to enjoy life a little.
The key takeaway is that savings are always done first. Before you buy that new cologne it’s imperative that you have reached your set savings target for that pay cycle or whatever deadline you have set for you financial goals. If not, then the new bottle of cologne is going to have to wait.
They live below their means.
Not a revolutionary concept but a getting rich slowly basic that needs to be reinforced into all of us. These people are usually the millionaire next door that drive the car you would never dare step foot in because it’s embarrassingly ugly. They will never be the nicest smelling person in the room nor will they wear the most expensive pair of shoes.
These old school money savers understand how much money they earn and their lifestyle is directly proportionate to their income. If they earn $50,000 a year before taxes, they will likely not go all out and buy a BMW. They simply don’t see the need to acquire debt for a car (or home for that matter) that doesn’t fit their lifestyle.
They avoid external influences.
Advertising does have an affect on everyone. However, it is more severe on certain individuals. The old school money savers are less susceptible to fall victim to new age marketing techniques. How come? Because they have everything they need in life and don’t go looking for more. Sure they may occasionally splurge and buy something they really don’t need all that much. At the end of the day these scenarios are few and far in between.
Impulse purchases are kept to a minimum.
You have to work for their money.
It is fairly easy to extract money from most of us. The old school crowd feels that everything is a scam. They do not want to hear your sales pitch. They will not even humor you by pretending to listen to the sales pitch. You have to work your butt off to get your hands in their pockets.
You will have to sell something really good at a bargain price to get into their wallets.
At the end of the day we have a lot to learn from these old school folks (don’t worry guys I’m not calling you old, just old school).
Are there any other old school money saving tips that I missed?
What have you learned from older generations about saving money?
Post by Frugal Dad
What I Learn About Saving Money From Older Generations
You ever notice how there are older people that don’t know the first thing about the world of personal finance, yet they seem to be experts at saving money? These people have also not heard of personal finance gurus, such as, Dave Ramsey or Suze Orman, or even Frugal Dad. Yet they still save money. They don’t read personal finance blogs nor do they ever want to listen to a full personal finance podcast.
Photo by eyg2158
Many of us twenty-somethings are completely lost sometimes when it comes to personal finance, yet we have all the information about money management available to us within a few clicks. We have a lot to learn from older generations when it comes to saving money.
How do these old school people manage to save money? What are their money saving tips?
They follow the “pay yourself first” mentality.
Instead of waiting for the end of the pay cycle, these ambitious individuals put their money away as soon as their paycheck comes in.
Whether they choose to invest in CDs, mutual funds, risky stocks, online savings accounts, or keep it under their pillow is irrelevant. Savings come first. Bills come second. Third is the necessities of life. Whatever is left over is used to enjoy life a little.
The key takeaway is that savings are always done first. Before you buy that new cologne it’s imperative that you have reached your set savings target for that pay cycle or whatever deadline you have set for you financial goals. If not, then the new bottle of cologne is going to have to wait.
They live below their means.
Not a revolutionary concept but a getting rich slowly basic that needs to be reinforced into all of us. These people are usually the millionaire next door that drive the car you would never dare step foot in because it’s embarrassingly ugly. They will never be the nicest smelling person in the room nor will they wear the most expensive pair of shoes.
These old school money savers understand how much money they earn and their lifestyle is directly proportionate to their income. If they earn $50,000 a year before taxes, they will likely not go all out and buy a BMW. They simply don’t see the need to acquire debt for a car (or home for that matter) that doesn’t fit their lifestyle.
They avoid external influences.
Advertising does have an affect on everyone. However, it is more severe on certain individuals. The old school money savers are less susceptible to fall victim to new age marketing techniques. How come? Because they have everything they need in life and don’t go looking for more. Sure they may occasionally splurge and buy something they really don’t need all that much. At the end of the day these scenarios are few and far in between.
Impulse purchases are kept to a minimum.
You have to work for their money.
It is fairly easy to extract money from most of us. The old school crowd feels that everything is a scam. They do not want to hear your sales pitch. They will not even humor you by pretending to listen to the sales pitch. You have to work your butt off to get your hands in their pockets.
You will have to sell something really good at a bargain price to get into their wallets.
At the end of the day we have a lot to learn from these old school folks (don’t worry guys I’m not calling you old, just old school).
Are there any other old school money saving tips that I missed?
What have you learned from older generations about saving money?
Post by Frugal Dad
Weekly Roundup: Last Day of 2009 Edition
Well folks, this is it. 2009 is just about in the books. Did you hit the financial goals you set back in December of last year? I accomplished a few of mine, but came up short in couple other areas. Just gives me something to shoot for this year!
Over the next couple days I’ll be sharing more about my goals for 2010, and reviewing how things went in 2009. Hope everyone enjoys a happy, safe introduction to the New Year.
Oh, almost forgot…Frugal Dad celebrated its second birthday a couple days ago. I started writing here on December 29, 2007. Time flies when you are having fun!
The Frugal Roundup
2009 – A Year in Thanks. It was a rough year by most accounts, but I enjoyed this post which inspired me to remember the things I have to be thankful for, and the blessings from 2009. (@Do You Dave Ramsey)
It’s More Important to Be Happy Than to Be Rich. I think the title speaks for itself. (@Get Rich Slowly)
Top 135+ Personal Finance Posts for 2009. Jeff put together a great list of popular personal finance posts for the year. (@ Good Financial Cents)
5 Ways Guys Waste Money. Almost every guy can relate to a least a couple of these categories. (@ Studenomics)
My Call From a Debt Collector. If you ever get a call from a debt collector, don’t take their word for it. Do a little research and make sure they are right. (@ Money Relationship)
Best of the Rest
- Should I Tip or Not?
- Financial Planning for the Next Year: 10 Best Money Moves
- Five Foolproof Financial Strategies That Will Ensure You a Better 2010
- Good Riddance to All Unwanted Gifts
- 8 Financial Resolution Ideas for 2010
- The Best Car Deals for Your Money
- Holiday Hangover Cures
- Getting Ready to Create Your 2010 Budget
Post by Frugal Dad
Is A Compelling Testimony Required To Inspire Others?
The blogger behind Budgets are Sexy once asked if a you had to “have a story” to be a respected personal finance blogger. It was an interesting question on many different levels. I reflected on the number of times I’ve told pieces of my own story here at Frugal Dad, and in my personal life with friends and family, particularly my kids. While I don’t think a story is required to share inspiring thoughts with others, I do think it helps others relate to you.
Without a compelling story you might sound a little like the friend that likes to give marriage advice, but she’s never tied the knot. Or the couple that raise their eyebrows when you discipline your kids, but they never had children. Does that mean people who don’t have kids don’t have valuable things to say about how to raise children? Not necessarily, but it does make it difficult for parents to see them as a credible source of information.
Those examples might be a bit of a stretch. After all, personal finance is a bit of a different animal. One of my favorite writers, Jim Wang from Bargaineering, shares many excellent thoughts on managing money, including getting out of credit card debt. However, he admits that he has never had credit card debt. Does that mean I shouldn’t listen to his advice? Absolutely not. In fact, I’d be doing myself a disservice by not absorbing the information he shares on his blog.
Dave Ramsey is one of my favorite personal finance personalities, mostly because I find his life story compelling. He reached millionaire status early in life in leveraged real estate, lost it all through bankruptcy, and rebuilt his wealth by implementing the debt-free principles he lives by today. My guess is Dave Ramsey would not be as popular as he is without the fact he hit rock bottom at some point during his life. This helps him relate to others in similar situations, and provides them hope that they too can turn around their lives.
Does this mean if you hope to inspire others you should go bankrupt to be more credible? No. It means you should look at your own background, your own life story, to find your testimony. Everyone has some type of challenge in their life, and chances are they aren’t alone. Even those struggling with the rarest medical conditions find comfort in linking up with those dozen others in the world also diagnosed. Technology has made that possibility through applications such as Facebook, Twitter, and blogs.
If you have an interest in writing, or doing video blogs, or your own radio show, I would encourage you to give it a try even if you feel you have an inadequate testimony. Whatever you decide to share, be honest with people. You might just find an audience out there for people who have never really struggled with money, but are more interested in the advanced personal finance concepts beyond building savings and getting out of debt.
Post by Frugal Dad
The Proper Rate Of Savings
Fortunately for savers, banks and brokerages have made it much easier to put savings on auto-pilot than it used to be. Before the days of online savings accounts and ACH transfers people actually had to sit down and write a check to savings, or deposit cash into their savings accounts. Sounds archaic, I know, but it did separate the disciplined savers from the free-spirited spenders.
Today we have a variety of ways to save for retirement, rainy days and big goals. But deciding just how much to save is the tough part. Financial gurus all have their own numbers - 15% for retirement, 10% of your overall income, half of your income - I could go on forever. However, deciding how much to save is a personal decision that looks more like a balancing act than a hard, fast rule. After all, there are many competing priorities for our money.
The 10% rule
One of the more established ideas is to simply save 10% of your income. If you earn $50,000 a year, under this plan you should be putting away about $5,000 a year into a variety of investments and cash savings accounts. 10% should not be enough to break your budget, but it doesn’t cause you to stretch very far either. I prefer to aim higher with my rate of savings, but how much higher?
Dave Says 15% For Retirement
Dave Ramsey, the popular radio and television talk show host, advocates putting aside 15% of your income towards retirement. Using our last example, that would be $7,500 a year on a $50,000 income, or $625 a month. Dropping $625 a month across your 401(k) and maybe a Roth IRA seems like a good idea, but it will be hard to pull off if you have an over-sized mortgage, credit card debt, or a couple car loans. That’s why Ramsey advises listeners to get out of debt and save a cash emergency fund first.
The 50% Plan
If I could go back in time and talk to my 20 year-old self, I would tell him to save 50% of his income from the first day on the job. For every year you save half your paycheck, and live on the other half, you buy one year of freedom from earning an income. Sure, saving half your income now seems ludicrous, but that’s because we’ve allocated our income to paying for our expensive possessions, like our house, our car and our hobbies. If we lived on half our income from the beginning, it would have forced us into a smaller home, a cheaper car and more frugal hobbies (and tastes).
What Percentage of My Income Is Going To Savings?
About 20%. That number should increase as we continue to pay off debt, but for now I’m content with an 80/20 split of paying off debt and slowly building our emergency fund. When the emergency fund is maxed, I’ll redirect the money going there to a Roth IRA. When that’s maxed I’ll begin investing in taxable investments to hopefully fund my early retirement. Somewhere in there I also have two kids’ college savings plans to fund. Like I said earlier, lots of competing priorities!
How about you? How much are you currently socking away in savings?
Post from: Frugal Dad
Paying Off Mortgage With Inheritance
Lisa writes in with the following question regarding mortgages and inheritance:
My father-in-law passed away recently, and we would like to pay off our 2nd mortgage with some of the inheritance money that we will be receiving. We have been in our home for 15 years and took out the 2nd mortgage in 2006. While the thought of reducing our debt and increasing our monthly savings is our first priority, my husband and I are not sure how this will affect our taxes next year. Also, we were planning to move sometime within the next 2 years after our daughter graduates from high school. How will this affect the price that we sell our home for?
Lisa, first of all, I’m sorry to hear of your father-in-law’s recent passing. I know this is a difficult time for both you and your husband. And what a blessing it was to receive an inheritance.
As you know, I’m not a big fan of mortgages (they are a necessary evil for most of us), and I like second mortgages even less! That said, it may or may not be the best time for your to clear that mortgage depending on the shape of the remainder of your family’s finances.
First, if you do not have an adequate emergency fund, I would park some of this money in an online savings account to cover several months of household expenses. If you have already established a solid emergency fund, I would use some of the remaining money to clear high-interest, non-deductible debt such as credit cards and high-interest loans.
With your emergency fund in place, and debt free except the house (and the second mortgage), it is time to evaluate the second mortgage. I like Dave Ramsey’s rule here: if the second mortgage exceeds half your annual income, I would simply include it as “house debt” and pay it down on schedule (or a little early as income allows). If the amount of your second is less than half your annual income, use inheritance funds to clear as much as possible.
If you were deducting interest on the second mortgage at tax time this will affect taxes. However, I’ve never understood the argument to send a mortgage company $10,000 a year in payments to save $3,000 a year on taxes (rough example). My personal rant aside, if you have questions about the tax implications it might make sense to talk with a tax professional to determine what the bottom line impact of paying off the second mortgage would be.
As for selling the home in a couple years, by paying off the second mortgage you’ll increase the likelihood that you will get some equity out of the sale. Paying off mortgage debt also gives you more wiggle room when setting the sale price of your home. If the house was fully leveraged, you would be less likely to be in a position to reduce the price for a quick sale.
Whatever you decide, my best advice is to move slowly. When we lose family members emotions are raw, and rarely do we make sound financial decisions when emotions are driving us to make them. There’s nothing wrong with parking the money in a money market account, or CD, for a few months while you think over how best to use the inheritance. You only get one opportunity to use this inheritance wisely, so make it the blessing it was intended to be.
Ask the Readers: What advice do you have for Lisa and her husband?
Post from: Frugal Dad
Personal Finance Magazine Portfolio For Beginners
Growing up, I took little interest in the subject of money. I’ve had a job since the day I turned 16 years-old, and I spent nearly everything I earned those first ten years! Recognizing my lack of a solid financial education, I started to look for ways to learn about money without turning to what I call “textbook materials.” After all, I was good with numbers, but I wasn’t what I would consider a “numbers” person.
Advanced finance concepts bored me, and for the most part still do. However, the concepts of personal finance, or “family finance” as I like to call it, are of great interest to me. Fortunately, radio introduced me to these concepts and my interest took off from there.
While working a graveyard shift in a customer service call center I stumbled on this guy named Bruce Williams, host of The Bruce Williams show. Williams doled out advice from callers on subjects ranging from credit issues, retirement investing and small business dilemmas. His style reminded me of my grandfather, imagining he had his own radio talk show.
From there I started looking for other personal finance radio shows on the internet and found a website for this guy based out of Nashville, TN. His show was only broadcast on a handful of stations, but they did stream the show on the internet - which was still fairly new at the time. I started listening with great interest as this guy railed against the credit card companies (who I worked for at the time, oddly enough). That was how I found Dave Ramsey, and as they say, the rest is history.
Dave piqued my curiosity for family finances, and I began to take steps to create my own financial turnaround. I started hanging around the “business” section of bookstores and magazine stands. I subscribed to a number of personal finance magazines and newspapers, and soaked up all I could find on the subject.
Here were a few of my favorites that helped get me started:
Personal Finance Magazines/Newspapers
Kiplinger’s Personal Finance remains my favorite personal finance magazine. To me, it has just the right balance of “family finance” topics and more advanced investing advice. I particularly enjoy their “Living” section which often runs articles on how to save money on used cars, where to find the best CD rates, and a personal story feature. To me, Kiplinger’s is a true “personal finance” magazine.
Kiplinger’s is available at Amazon.com for $12.00 per year, or $1.00 per issue
Money is a close second favorite in the category of personal finance magazines. I think Money appeals to a wider group of people, including those not typically interested in finance. Like most anything, I don’t agree with their advice 100% of the time. Personally, I think their family profiles often feature too many suggestions involving turning to debt for answers (i.e. suggesting a reverse mortgage to an elderly person short on cash, tapping home equity to pay for kid’s college, etc.). I realize these are mainstream ideas, but I don’t necessarily agree with them.
Money magazine is available at Amazon.com for $19.95, or $$1.66 per issue
Smart Money was a magazine I added on after about a year of reading both Money and Kiplinger’s. Smart Money features more advanced columns on investing and they overall economy, and they typically follow some political trends as they relate to the world of finance. I particularly enjoy senior writer Anne Kadet’s contribution, which appears on the very last page, but is the first thing I read.
Smart Money is available at Amazon.com for $11.00 per year, or $0.92 an issue.
The Wall Street Journal is great for those that want daily insight into the markets, personal finances, and news on the global markets. I let my subscription run out when I was in frugal, cost-cutting mode, but there are plenty of places to look for great deals for new subscribers.
Get The Wall Street Journal for 75% off!
What is your favorite personal finance magazine or print news source?
Post from: Frugal Dad
Yes, We Paid Off The Tahoe
Fans of the Dave Ramsey Show probably recognized that line in the title. Dave’s got a few variations - pay off the Tahoe, amputate the Tahoe, etc. Over the last few weeks I’ve been hinting at how close we were to paying off my wife’s Tahoe (our family vehicle). My old van was paid off long ago, but our family ride has been dragging a debt payment behind it for the last four years. I’ve been personally dragging around car debt even longer, and I can’t tell you how good it felt to make the last payment on Friday.
It might not seem like a big deal to some, but for me it represents finally freeing ourselves of the bondage of car debt. It was a journey that’s taken over a decade. I’ve gone through the sordid history of my ill-conceived car purchases in the past in great detail, so I’ll simply summarize them here.
- My first car was a 1985 Buick Century, handed down from my grandparents. It was a nice car, but it wasn’t a “cool” car, so I didn’t fully appreciate it as a teenager. However, it didn’t have a payment, and the insurance was relatively cheap, which is a big bonus for teenagers. I drove that Buick until the wheels fell off, almost quite literally. It developed serious electrical problems, and one night while parked in my dorm room parking lot in college it caught fire under the hood. We tried to replace some of the wiring, but it was cooked…literally.
- At 21 years-old, and newly married, I leased a brand new Isuzu Rodeo. It was a stupid decision considering the annual salary I was earning at the time was only a fraction more than the lease amount!
- At 26 years-old I was still driving the Rodeo, having paid off the lease by taking out another loan, extending the payments another three years.
- At 27 years-old our family was growing, so we bought a used (the only thing smart about it) 2001 Chevy Tahoe. Since I still owed money on the Rodeo, the bank was nice enough to roll that into the loan for the Tahoe since the sellers were letting it go for far less than Kelly Blue Book.
- After a number of months of trying to sell the Rodeo via private sale, I made the mistake of stopping by a car lot and started stalking a beautiful, gently used Chevy Silverado pickup truck. The salesman worked his magic and talked me into trading in the Rodeo and driving off with the Silverado (and even more car debt).
- It only took a few months of making both payments for me to realize something had to give, and that something had to be my Silverado truck - as much as I loved that truck. I put a “For Sale” sign in the window, and advertised it in the local credit union bulletin. In two weeks she was being backed out of my driveway by the new owner for $1,000 less than what I paid. I wrote that $1,000 off as stupid tax.
We diligently kept up payments on the Tahoe, but at some point I just got downright tired of having a car payment. I told my wife in April that I wanted to move the Tahoe up in our debt snowball, following what I now know to be the Debt Tsunami style of debt snowballing. It didn’t make sense mathematically, as it was an incredibly low interest rate, and it wasn’t our lowest balance. It was personal. I had decided we had been dragging around a car payment long enough, and since we were within a few thousand dollars of paying it off, I wanted to make a final push and be done with it.
Last Friday we did just that, making a final payoff of about $700, which I scrounged up from freelance work, and from Friday’s paycheck from my full-time gig. The budget will be a tighter for the next two weeks because it was a stretch to pay it off, but I couldn’t wait another two weeks. The instant I pressed “submit” for the final loan payment online I felt the load of eleven years of car debt being lifted.
Now I look forward to receiving the title from our credit union, and for the first time in my adult life, being car debt free. Dave Ramsey’s right; they do drive better when they aren’t towing a car payment!
Post from: Frugal Dad
Debt Reduction Help Should Not Cost
I had read a question a while ago that asked if anyone had tried many of the debt reduction services that are sold via radio, tv and online.
Over the years I find that most gurus end up advocating the following debt reduction steps:
1. Stop using credit cards
2. Write down your debt, what you owe and what you bring in
3. Live below your means
4. Sell stuff to make extra money and help pay down debt
5. Get a second job if you have run out of things to sell
6. Save money for emergencies
The thing about this debt reduction plan is that it is provided out there in the library (in the 332.0 section) or online for free. Not only that, to get out of debt and move into a wealthier life is mostly about common sense and turning what we already know into action.
One thing I don’t like about debt reduction seminars are that what they sell for 80-300 dollars can be learned for free over time; the same amount of time you would put into reading the programs you purchased. It isn’t about some quick-fix pill, but about your own drive to get debt paid off. Inspiration is out there if you are lacking, there are radio and tv shows by Dave Ramsey, Suze Orman and Clark Howard.
I ordered John Cummuta’s Transforming Debt into Wealth free promo that I heard on the radio and this is my personal experience.
First I was a bit disgusted that when I called to get the free promo I was grilled ab
out how much debt I had, how soon I wanted to pay debt off and so on. All I wanted was the free promo. The reason they ask you questions is to get you to buy the system straight up because, as I learned later, the promo CD is simply a repeat of what is said in the advertising material that comes along with it and on the radio.
Again, you can save your money and borrow his books at the library in the personal finance section (332.xx). Even the items that I could buy through this promotion were available at the library for free when I looked it up. So save that money and apply it toward your debt.
One of the inserts gave teasers for items you will learn through his system and I have put my own 2¢ in and you can have this debt reduction information for free.
How to save thousands of dollars when you buy insurance - First, not everyone is going to save thousands, but it does add up. The main way to save money on your insurance is to call around or check online sites like insurance.com. You would want to do this every 6-12 months to make sure you are getting the best deal and sometimes, you can also mention that some other insurance company is offering a lower amount and find out if they will beat it - also find out if they bundle services to get discounts.
How to stop car dealers from picking your pocket - This is about picking out a car and getting as close to the book price as possible. The best way to stay out of debt is to buy a car after you have saved for it, one that is second-hand and preferably has one owner. I would also suggest that you get your loan approved first with a bank or credit union and then find the car. But there are many other support networks through Bankrate, American Consumer News, eHow and MSN Money.
How to calculate exactly when you will be completely out of debt - This is the art of a debt snowball, in which you take one debt and pay it off, then roll that payment into the next one. There is a handy Snowball calculator that allows you to figure this out. You can pay off either the smaller debt first or the the one with the highest interest.
Specific ways to cut daily shopping expenses without sacrificing - The many ways to cut back are out there and the information is free. Basically, plan ahead and don’t impulse buy. Reheat your left-overs. Cut down on the amount of food you eat and when possible, grow it yourself.
Why mortgage interest deductibles are the ‘tax shelter’ lie - This goes along the idea that if you owe anyone (bank included) then they own you. It is about whether the tax deduction for a house payment has a value that is better than holding onto the debt of the house. There are two different viewpoints on this: Free Money Matters vs. Becoming and Staying Debt Free
As you can see by just a few of the teasers above, there is a flood of information online (not counting the library) that is free and doesn’t require that you plunk down any money to learn all it takes is a desire and time to learn and understand. If you want more to read online, Mint has a great list of 30 free ebooks on personal finance.
Don't Miss This Offer!
Search
Categories
Recent Posts
- ENDS MONDAY (3/15/10!): Stella and Dot: 25% off and NO tax on your ENTIRE order, plus FREE shipping when you spend $150+ (shipping is only a flat $5.95 when you spend less than $150)! Ends 3/15/10.
- 6pm: Naturalizer, PF Flyers, Converse, Vans, Via Spiga and Franco Sarto! Ends 3/14/10 or 3/21/10.
- $5 off your $25 Purchase At Payless (in store or online)
- 80% off Restaurant.com- $2 for a $25 Certificate
- Hungry Hungry Hippos Travel Game for $.99