Category — Money Cents

…or 49 pages.

Came across this excellent guide written by Trent Hamm at his website simpledollar.com.  If you like what you see in this guide, it represents just a small portion of this great stuff he has on there.

What it all comes down to is:

1) Spend less than you earn

2) Live Frugal

3) Earn More

4) Manage Your Money

5) Control Your Own Destiny

FYI for the increasingly larger portion of the population that is looking for work.  Tomorrow (March 10, 2009) the FedEx Office / Kinkos stores are going to be offering up to 25 free copies of your resume when you bring in a paper or CD copy of it. See the full story at lifehacker.com.

In my other life as a Certified Financial Planner® I have certainly run into people who face this problem.  On the one hand they look at the hole they have dug themselves into from student loans to credit cards and on the other hand they realize the importance of a long and short-term savings plan for themselves.

Richard Paul Evans, who is releasing a new book entitled, “The Five Lessons a Millionaire Taught Me for Women” wrote about this on glennbeck.com today.  Always an interesting topic to me.  Read his opinion here.

You have to ask yourself a few questions:

Do I buy gas?

Do I buy groceries?

Do I pay bills?

If your answer is yes to any of those questions then you are probably a citizen of the global economy.  The next question you need to ask yourself is this:

If I am going to be paying for these things anyway and someone would offer me cash back, free vacation, airline tickets or gift cards why wouldn’t I take it?

What I am talking about are Reward Credit Card programs.  In a time when having a little something extra for vacation or the upcoming holidays this is something that (when done right) can really pay off.

My family and I enjoy a free vacation to Disneyland at least once a year because we literally use our Chase Disney Rewards credit card for every natural expense we have during the month.  We have found that outside of our mortgage just about everybody will accept a credit card for payment and when you start doing the math for how fast those points accumulate you can see why more people ought to be doing this.  Chase has a sample points calculator where you can get an idea of how the points accumulation system works here.

For as much of an advocate as I am of this idea I will put the disclaimer that I would not recommend this for everyone.  I would not recommend this if you:

1) Do not pay your credit card off at the end of every month and instead pay interest

2) Do not have a budget in place that you will stick to with this method and instead go overboard becuase its plastic.

3) Do not consider yourself responsible with money or anything plastic

Although it could be used for the finance of some one time larger purchases I have found that its better to keep the monthly expenses on one card and to go for a separate rewards card if you are going to buy a computer or furniture or something else like that.  The same could be said for you small business owners or those of us with expense accounts – keep it separate!

One last disclaimer I will put is that you really need to know the small print on these cards.  I almost always stay away from rewards cards that have annual fees.  Below you will find a list of some websites and online resources that will help you find the best card for you.

rewardscards.com

credit.com rewards card chooser

rewardscreditcards.net

Democrat or Republican – I don’t care (well actually I do, but I promised myself I would not get political on this website anymore).  The bottom line is that the great cornerstone of this country is free enterprise and capitalism.  When you go and cast your vote tomorrow make sure that you pick up your “I voted today” sticker because it will serve as your golden ticket for some nice offers around town.

Starbucks Corp. is offering a free tall-size brewed coffee Tuesday to voters across the nation. All they need is a proof of voting or, in some cases, their own honest word.

Free sandwich at Chik-Fil-A (at select locations)

Krispy Kreme is offering a star shaped doughnut with patriotic sprinkles

… and my personal favorite Ben and Jerry’s is offering a free scoop.