Important Money Skills to Teach Your Children

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Welcome to My Personal Finance Journey! If you are new here, please read the “About” or “First-Time Visitor” pages to find out more about us. If you would like to receive free updates on articles like this by email, then sign up here or you can subscribe to the RSS feed. Also, check us out on Twitter or Facebook. Thanks for visiting! Keep on learning!
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Hi everyone! Jacob here! I just got back from New York City over the past weekend, where I had went to watch my girlfriend run the ING New York City Marathon. It was quite the experience! I’ll have some more updates on my trip in the coming days’ posts. 


The following is a guest post by Ashley over at Everything Finance and Money Talks Coaching. Everything Finance is a site about just that, everything related to finance. You can get information about investing, saving money, shopping, blogging, and making money online. If you like what you see here, make sure to stop by or better yet subscribe to their feed so you don’t miss a thing.

There is no better time for a person to develop strong skills on how to handle money than when they are young and don’t have too much of it. It’s better to make your mistakes before there is a lot of money on the line. Some of these skills for handling money include, saving, proper spending and budgeting, weighing cost vs. benefits, and price comparison. Let’s take a look at each of these one by one.

Saving

Saving is one of the most basic elements of society, and it is one of the defining characteristics of the haves and the have-nots. Many times, the have-nots are have-nots because they save-not. Saving is the basic building block of wealth creation, and if you want your children to become wealthy you need to instill the importance of saving.

Some parents have their kids save a percentage of the money they receive. Others encourage their kids to save a certain dollar amount. Saving for goals is another great way to instill a love and respect of saving money. Who knows, maybe you can get them to start saving for college.

Getting kids saving early will have two positive effects. First, they will learn to save at a very early age. Second, when the time comes, they will have an already established nest egg to tap when the need arises.

Proper Spending and Budgeting

Teaching your kids to properly plan out their spending and to budget for both the known and the unknown will save them an immeasurable amount of money in the future. As the saying goes, “Proper planning produces predictable results,” and that goes the same with proper spending and budgeting. The purpose of proper spending is to avoid overspending and breaking your budget. Teaching this principle to your child at an early age will ensure that they will make sound financial decisions later in life.

Don’t be afraid to share your household budget with your children in an age appropriate way. You don’t need to share struggles, but it’s a good introduction to the world if they have a realistic idea of how much things cost.

Price Comparison

It is always a good idea to do proper market research before making a large purchase. Including your children in your shopping decisions will teach them the value of shopping around. You will have opportunites to share when you want to buy the cheapest thing on the market and when you don’t. It will also provide chances to discuss martketing techinques and how to determine the quality of an item before you make the purchase. This skill will serve them well in life.

Children need guidance on financial matters just like anything else in life. The sooner you can get started the better. You can develop habits in your kids that will take care of them long after you are no longer able to.

How about you all? What financial skills do you feel are most important to in-grain in your children as soon as possible? What techniques do you use to teach them these skills? 


Share your experiences by commenting below!

Jacob’s Thoughts – Listed below are my random thoughts as I was reading this article.

• Very good post here Ashley! Teaching kids about money is a topic about which I feel very passionate, so I’m very glad to share this with the readers. And, I look forward to hearing everyone’s opinion on good ways to teach children essential financial skills. 
• @ Taking risk when you are younger –
• Along with being able to take more risk when one is younger because they don’t have much money, young folks are also able to take on more risk in regards to investing (i.e. can be more heavily invested in equities vs. fixed income securities) because of the longer investing time horizon they have. 
• For example, a young person at the age of 18 can recover quite nicely from a 70% drop in his or her portfolio, since they have almost 50 years of investing ahead of them to recoup this loss. However, if someone is 50 years old and will be retiring soon, recovering from this loss would be almost impossible, since they would need more than a 100% gain to recoup their money.
• @ Benefits of saving from an early age – 
• I just wanted to briefly echo the importance of saving at an early age. Why is this? Simple – it’s due to the “miracle of compound interest.” 
• If someone at the age of 18 were to invest $1000 in to a “boring” ETF or index mutual fund that tracks the entire US stock market (such as the ETF, VTI from Vanguard) and merely let it sit until they retired at the age of 65, it would be worth a little over $88,000 (assuming the historical annual average return of 10%). This is pretty awesome if you ask me! 
• @ Importance of instilling in kids a MINDSET of saving (not just the act of saving itself) –
• Along with teaching your children the importance of the action of saving and then getting them to do it, I believe it’s also equally as important to instill in them the mindset of being a saver. 
• If you can teach them to make savings a part of their life and to actually enjoy watching their balances grow over time, this can be much more important than simply getting them to invest some of their money during childhood.
• @ Teaching your children about proper spending – 
• In today’s credit-card-debt-laiden society, teaching children the proper way to view spending is critical (and also very difficult, I imagine). 
• However, I believe it’s important to make sure that they learn that they can only buy things if they already have the money to buy it. If they don’t have the money, they need to be taught that they cannot simply use their credit card to cover the rest and “make up for it later.”
• This point also goes back to instilling a mindset of good financial habits, not just getting them to do the actions once. 
• @ Other money skills to teach children and some of my favorite techniques – 
• I’ve discussed several other of my favorite ways for parents to give their children a good financial head-start in life previously on this site (since this is one of my favorite topics).
• Some of my favorites include buying your child 1 share of a stock in a company in which they would be interested to use as a springboard to teach them financial matters and also helping them to open up a small business (think lemonade stand!) to help them fund a desired purchase.

***Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/goodncrazy/4833445750/sizes/o/in/photostream/

Stop Being Cheap and Invest In Yourself

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The following guest post was written by Aloysa from My Broken Coin as part of a “Yakezie blog swap” where members of the Yakezie Personal Finance Blogging Network pair up and exchange guest postings on a common topic. The topic of this blog swap was to discuss a certain thing or category of things that we absolutely refuse to go cheap on in our lives. Hope you enjoy! You can view my guest post over at My Broken Coin today as well! My Broken Coin is a personal finance blog of a big spender and a shopping addict who is trying to save, budget, set up goals and still have fun along the way.

I am a spender. But even big spenders like me have their limits. Sometimes, I decide to make an effort to be frugal and save money. I start looking for bargains. I have to admit that my biggest mistakes were caused by me trying to save a buck or two on things that should not be settled for because of the price. Believe me or not, sometimes expensive means quality, style, and comfort and cheap means….crap. In the end, my attempts to save money cost me more.

I am not telling you to follow my excessive shopping habits and go shed unreasonable amounts of money on stuff. Think for yourself and be smart about your spending. But, I would advise to not look for bargains when it comes to the following:

Hair Stylists

My hair defines me. It gives me style and a distinct look. I never let anyone cut my hair using a razor, but for some unexplainable reason, hairstylists in cheap parlors are obsessed with razors. Maybe scissors are too expensive. Maybe they like to slice and dice people’s hair. I don’t care! I ran away from them a long time ago and never looked back. I settle for expensive salons for one reason only: I get what I pay for. In the end, I am not paying twice: once for a cheap color and cut, and later, for an expensive salon hairstylist who desperately tries to fix my mullet like, razor shaped haircut. I save money by choosing to pay more.

Shoes

Shoes are not all about the looks. I am a shoe snob who doesn’t believe in striking a balance between comfort, quality, and affordability with cheap footwear. Every time I go for a low price and breathtaking looks, I end up in pain, misery, and with a health issue. I walk a lot during the day, and if I don’t get the appropriate support, my feet and back hurt. I don’t want to be in pain every day. Do you? I consider shoes one of the best investments we can make. Good quality shoes won’t bring you any monetary gain. However, they will definitely benefit your health. Is there a better investment other than investing in your health?

Bed

I love to sleep. I love to rest. Preferably in the comfort of my big bed. Most of our waking hours are spent either flying above the pavement in our expensive and comfortable shoes (see above) or sleeping in our beds. I always ask myself how much is a good night’s rest worth to me. Believe me, it is worth a lot!  In fact, a good night’s sleep is priceless.

Work Clothes

This is very simple. If you work in a professional environment, do not settle for bargains and sales when choosing a suit for the following reasons:


 – You will look cheap in substandard quality fabric.
 – You won’t look professional.
 – You won’t look sophisticated.

Remember a saying “Dress to impress?” It applies in the office, especially if you want to move up the ladder one day. Invest in your professional looks. It will pay off, trust me.

How about you all? In what areas of your personal finances/life do you draw the line at being cheap? Why do you feel this way about these areas?  


Share your experiences by commenting below!

Jacob’s Thoughts – Listed below are my random thoughts as I was reading this article.

• Very good post here, Aloysa, and thanks for being my blog swap partner! You bring up some very interesting points and some good areas for where NOT to be cheap. 
• Personally, I would classify myself as a “saver,” so it’s interesting to read a “spender’s” take on the issue of where we draw the line of being cheap.
• @ Cheap sometimes meaning low quality – 
• It really resonated with me in particular when you mentioned above that some of your biggest money mistakes involved you buying something cheap, only to find out that quality of the product was very low.
• As someone who is VERY frugal myself, I frequently am tempted by cheap products and have fallen in to this trap as well. 
• What will happen with me is that I’ll find out that I need to buy something new, and upon investigating the full retail price of my “first choice” product, I’ll find out that the item is quite pricey. Being a very frugal person, I then start to look for ways to obtain the same sort of product at a cheaper price. Often, this has resulted in me buying stuff from eBay, Amazon, or other various discount-priced outlets that HAS been cheaper, but has also been of much lower quality. 
• Since the product is of lower quality, I will often have to either buy another one immediately to upgrade (wasting time and money), or the cheap product will break and will need to be replaced.
• I’ve decided to devote an upcoming post to this topic since there is only so much room in this comments section. However, listed below are some of the various “cheaper-version” products I’ve purchased over the years that have probably cost me more money in the long run than simply buying the more expensive version from the start:
• Hiking poles
• Road bike
• Laptop battery (the one I purchased on Amazon didn’t interface correctly with my Toshiba laptop and would switch my computer’s power on and off unexpectedly!)
• Heart rate monitors
• Sunglasses
• @ Investing in your self – 
• I am a big believer in not being cheap when it comes to investing in your self growth. 
• Each month, I set aside a small portion of my income to save to be used for one of the following ways to invest in myself: 1) continuing education classes at a local community college, 2) books, 3) seminars, and 4) conferences.
• @ Why hair salons use electric razors vs. scissors –
• I’ve also noticed the trend in recent years that hair salons have started to almost stubbornly use the electric razor to cut as much of your hair as possible. This is especially true at many of the discount hair cutting operations that you see in Wal-Marts and shopping malls.
• I’m pretty certain that the reason that this shift is occurring is because using the electric razor is 1) quicker, 2) easier, and 3) less awkward (they don’t have to grab your hair and cut it with scissors).
• Since my hair is VERY easy to cut, I actually started noticing back in 2009 that the hair salons were starting to only use the electric razor (on one length setting no less) to cut my hair. This simplicity prompted me to buy an electric razor kit at Wal-Mart and use it to cut my own hair, which I have done since and couldn’t be happier with! I’ve calculated that this has saved me $300-$400 so far!
• As a whole, I think that probably the majority of guys (at least the ones with fairly simple hairstyles) could in fact cut their hair at home using an electric razor. On the other hand, women have more complex hairstyles, and therefore, I think it still makes sense for them to visit a hair professional.
• @ Dress with high cost clothes
• I have to respectfully say that I somewhat disagree with the idea that you have to spend big money on fancy dress clothes for work. 
• Thus far in my working life, I’ve worked in multiple settings (casual manufacturing plant and semi-formal corporate headquarters) in multiple locations (big city and small farming community), and not once, was I ever looked down upon for not having fancy designer dress clothes. All of my dress clothes were either bought from Wal-Mart, JC Penney’s, or Target. 
• In fact, I often got compliments of how well/nicely I dressed for someone of my young-ish age in the workplace.
• Of course, I suppose that this attitude towards “level of style” all depends on the nature of your job. 
• All of the roles I’ve had involved working with other scientists, pharmacists, or engineers (even at the corporate level). And, as a whole, I’d posit that these people place less importance on style, provided that someone looks presentable to some degree. 
• If you worked somewhere such as a fashion firm or as an investment banker, it might be different.

***Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/katerha/4354618648/sizes/l/in/photostream/

Easy Like Sunday Morning Weekly Roundup – # 3 – October 30th, 2011

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Welcome to My Personal Finance Journey! If you are new here, please read the “About” or “First-Time Visitor” pages to find out more about us. If you would like to receive free updates on articles like this by email, then sign up here or you can subscribe to the RSS feed. Also, check us out on Twitter or Facebook. Thanks for visiting! Keep on learning!
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Click here to enter my free $205 giveaway for a chance to win 5% of My Personal Finance Journey blog income and give another 5% to a charity of your choosing! Deadline to enter is October 31st, 2011 (tomorrow!).

Each week (even though I missed last week! – Oops!), the purpose of the Easy Like Sunday Morning Weekly Roundup is the same – for me to be able to connect with you, the readers, on a more personal (non personal finance informational transmission only) level, encourage community, and also to give back to the other bloggers around the blogosphere who have mentioned My Personal Finance Journey throughout the past week.

As far as the theme goes, the title of the roundup gives it away. The roundup theme is named after the Lionel Richie song, Easy Like Sunday Morning (which I play once a week while putting this together), to remind us of the importance of slowing down at least once a week to take appreciation for that which transpired over the past few days.

So, without further ado, let’s get started with this week’s roundup!

Weekly Updates from Jacob’s Personal Finance Journey and Life

• I mentioned in the opening paragraph of this post that I missed doing a roundup last weekend. However, I did not mention why. 
• The big happening for My Personal Finance Journey over the past week has been that I spent about 20 hours (the majority of last weekend – hence why I missed the roundup) researching and putting together a historical analysis guest post of the passive investing strategy called The Permanent Portfolio. The late Harry Browne introduced this strategy in the 1980’s, and it has been garnering much press recently due to favorable performance by the actively managed Permanent Portfolio mutual fund.
• I won’t go in to the details of what The Permanent Portfolio is (you can read all about it in a good post by J.D. at Get Rich Slowly if you’re interested), but I submitted the post to Ramit at I Will Teach You to Be Rich to see if he’d be interested in featuring it as a guest post on his site. I hope to hear back from him this week about whether it’s a good fit or not. 
• One of my higher-priority blogging goals for the 2H2011 is to guest post more (at least once a month) in order to expand the audience reach of my site, so this was a good step in the right direction.
• As far as my personal finances go, this past week has been slightly atypical in that I’ve spent more money than normal on going out to eat and office/school supplies (had to purchase a new backpack and some office supplies aka blogging expense items!). However, I didn’t get too out of control, and the spending ended up being within allowable limits. This last week served as a good reminder of why I make sure to transfer a certain percentage of money as it is received to my savings accounts before having a chance to spend it.
• As far as my life in general, this past week, I have been continuing my graduate school research in Alzheimer’s disease in my lab. Myself and another co-worker are running a cytotoxicity assay this week to try to determine if the drug molecules we have discovered inhibit the toxicity of the protein aggregates implicated with the disease.
• In addition, last weekend, I did my first running race (a Fall 10k in my hometown) in MANY months. I felt pretty strong during the race and was very satisfied with my time. You can view some pictures of me at the start and finish lines of the race by clicking here. I would have pasted them in this post, but I didn’t want to get in trouble with the copyright laws. 
• Also, last night, my girlfriend and I went to a Halloween Party dressed as Star Trek officers from The Next Generation. Shown below is a picture of us all dressed it! ENGAGE!!!

My Favorite 10 Posts of the Past Week

Guest Posts from Personal Finance Bloggers on My Personal Finance Journey

Over the past week, there were no guest posts here at My Personal Finance Journey. Let’s change that, shall we?!

If you’re an individual PF blogger (not a company that has a blog) and would like to guest post on my site, please click here to read more details about how to kick off the guest posting process. I’d love to hear from you!

Blasts From the Past

For the first 6 months after I started this blog, I pretty much “blogged in a cave.” What I mean by this is that I cranked out over 200 very good blog articles in this time period, but since I didn’t know any better, I didn’t reach out to other bloggers, get involved with the online community through commenting on other sites, or do any kind of site promotion at all. As you can imagine, some of the articles written during this time period didn’t get the attention that I think they deserved corresponding to the content contained.

The Blast from the Past section will feature one old My Personal Finance Journey article each week that I feel is high quality, but was published prior to my blog having any sort of real readership. This week’s article is listed below:

Why Following Hot Mutual Fund Manager’s DOES NOT WORK! – This post discusses my foolish decision to invest in a “hot” mutual fund, The CGM Focus Fund, after hearing about its praises from a book written by Jim Cramer. Boy, was he wrong and did I make a mistake! Take a look at this article.

The winner this week is Sam from Financial Samurai for his work with building The Yakezie group (of which I’m a proud member). From what I’ve heard in my relatively short (1.75 years) stent with blogging, blog networks tend to only “come and go.” What’s meant by this is that they are not sustainable because members quit, or when member bloggers become more popular, they get too busy to participate. However, Sam has been able to craft Yakezie in such a way that nearly everyone that joined a year ago when I did STILL participates actively today. Pretty cool stuff. Nice work Sam!

If you know of someone in the PF blogging world that is really doing amazing things, feel free to send me an email for consideration in future roundups.

Giveaways

Blog Carnivals Featuring My Personal Finance Journey Articles

Top 10 Referring Sites to My Personal Finance Journey This Past Week

However, I have several other domain names purchased, and I am currently learning WordPress Self-Hosted to get these sites live as soon as time allows! I’ll be sure to keep you all updated on progress.

Well, that wraps up this week! If you have any suggestions or recommendations for things you’d like to see in this weekly roundup, just let me know by sending me an email!

As always, thanks to all the readers for creating such a great community here at My Personal Finance Journey. Your interaction is what keeps me going on this blog!

Until next time – Jacob

10 Tips to Save Energy and Money This Winter

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Welcome to My Personal Finance Journey! If you are new here, please read the “About” or “First-Time Visitor” pages to find out more about us. If you would like to receive free updates on articles like this by email, then sign up here or you can subscribe to the RSS feed. Also, check us out on Twitter or Facebook. Thanks for visiting! Keep on learning!
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Click here to enter my free $205 giveaway for a chance to win 5% of My Personal Finance Journey blog income and give another 5% to a charity of your choosing! Deadline to enter is October 31st, 2011.

The following is a guest post. Enjoy!

Let’s get right to it, shall we? Saving money is arguably the most talked about subject at the water cooler, over dinner, and in the grocery store lines. You name the subject, and people are talking about it everywhere.

Where to find the cheapest gas and electricity is always a conversation starter. Mention to a friend you found cheap gas and someone you don’t even know will chime in on your conversation. What once would have been considered rude is now acceptable. Eavesdropping on a stranger’s conversation at the table next to yours in a diner would have been unheard of several years ago. However, with the price at the pump and the cost of heating oil rising, etiquette seems to have gone by the wayside. Sometimes, a little less etiquette and a little more sharing is not a bad thing. Learning where you can get the best deal and other money saving tips for lowering winter heating bills is highly valued knowledge these days!

Shown below are ten tips on how you can save both your wallet and the planet on energy consumption this winter:

1. Develop an energy plan for your house – Make a list of the energy hogging appliances you can eliminate or replace in the coming months.

2. Evaluate your electric bill – Ask for detailed information from your energy supplier. Figure out when your energy is peaking. Look for ways to decrease usage.

3. Turn televisions off or unplug them if they will not be used for extended periods of time.

4. Turn computers off when not in use; this includes printers and monitors.

5. Use lower wattage bulbs whenever possible, replacing burned out bulbs with newer long life energy efficient (sometimes called CFL – Compact Fluorescent Light) bulbs. Although more costly for the initial purchase, they last substantially longer and use less energy while providing the same level of illumination.

6. Insulate your water heater and put it on a timer – Organize your family so everyone is taking showers at the same time of day. Maintaining instant access, hot water 24 hours per day can be expensive. If the family plans on showering in the morning, set the water heater to turn on 1-2 hours before the first person will shower. Run the dishwasher when no one is home, using the last of the hot water from that morning’s heating cycle to run the dishwasher before the timer turns the water heater off for the day.

7. Wash all clothes in cold water – Although hot water may be needed for some bedding items, most clothes will not only be just as clean, but will last longer if washed consistently in cold water.

8. Use hand sanitizer instead of water for post bathroom clean-up – Not only do you save on the water bill, but you also won’t place a demand on the water heater for quick hand washing.

9. Use a heating blanket to combat chilly nights in the fall and spring – Taking the edge off cold sheets with a heating blanket is often more than enough to avoid firing up your heating system for a chilly evening.

10. Open southerly and westerly curtains on sunny days – Even on the chilliest of winter afternoons, the sun’s rays will provide added warmth to rooms without increasing the thermostat temperature settings.

How about you all? What strategies do you use to save money on heating/energy usage during the winter months? Have you tried any of the techniques on this list? 


Share your experiences by commenting below!

Jacob’s Thoughts – Listed below are my random thoughts as I was reading this article.

• @ Putting your water heater on a timer – This is actually a VERY good idea! I’ve never really looked at my water heater in great detail, let alone evaluate whether or not it had timer ability on it. But, it’s very true that you really don’t need hot water AT ALL HOURS of the day. As such, this item is going on my lists of things to evaluate! 
• @ Washing clothes in cold vs. hot water – 
• Personally, I’ve never understood why people bother washing clothes in hot water. Along with costing more as far as water heating purposes go, if you use hot water, you also have to be vigilant in separating your white clothes from your colored clothes. As a guy in my mid-20’s, this is too much work for me! haha I ALWAYS use cold water to wash.
• Even if some of my clothes call for washing them in hot water, I figure that my clothes are inexpensive enough that if they last 10% shorter (as a result of me using the wrong temperature water while washing them), replacing them wouldn’t be that big of a deal. 
• Nevertheless, whenever I enter the laundry room at ANY of the apartment complexes I’ve lived in, the washing machine is ALWAYS set on hot water from the previous user. I really just cannot figure out why this is. 
• I could understand using hot water to wash clothes if your clothes have been soiled by one of your animals or what-not. However, this is somewhat of a rarity.
• How about you all out there? Can anyone educate me on why so many people wash their clothes with warm or hot water?!

***Photo courtesy of http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3038/2724803437_030a4f42d0.jpg

Smart Choices Save Money on Life Insurance

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Welcome to My Personal Finance Journey! If you are new here, please read the “About” or “First-Time Visitor” pages to find out more about us. If you would like to receive free updates on articles like this by email, then sign up here or you can subscribe to the RSS feed. Also, check us out on Twitter or Facebook. Thanks for visiting! Keep on learning!
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Click here to enter my free $205 giveaway for a chance to win 5% of My Personal Finance Journey blog income and give another 5% to a charity of your choosing! Deadline to enter is October 31st, 2011.

The following is a guest post by Jessica Bosari. Enjoy!

Life insurance benefits those who are left behind when you pass away, so you want to make sure there is enough money to replace your income each year once you are gone. You want to ensure that your loved ones can maintain their current lifestyle if you pass away prematurely. You don’t want to place them in the lap of luxury (in other words, have too much life insurance) , except in the rare situation where that is indeed the current situation.

Purchasing Term Life Insurance

Permanent (sometimes called whole) life insurance has a cash value, and the premiums are much more expensive because a portion of it goes toward an investment portfolio that can include mutual funds. By passing up the permanent/whole life insurance policies, you can afford term life insurance rates that offer just life insurance without the investment portfolio.

The purpose of purchasing life insurance isn’t to invest money in the various financial markets (you have your retirement accounts for that, after all, and shooting for maxing those accounts out is a perfectly reasonable goal for most people); it is to leave behind enough money that will take care of your family when you aren’t there to provide for them yourself. You can do this for inexpensive rates with term life insurance, and in the process, you will keep the money you would have given to the insurance agent in commissions.

Health

Insurance companies price life insurance by how healthy their clients are. If you are someone who has a weight problem, the insurance companies are going to see you as someone with a lower life expectancy, meaning large sums of money to your beneficiaries when you pass. Insurance companies want to avoid this, so if you are healthy and not susceptible to diseases, the insurance companies can charge you lower rates. If you are overweight, consider taking on a healthier lifestyle to reduce your life insurance costs. Because people who smoke also have lower life expectancies, they get charged more for life insurance. If you quit smoking, your chance of dying early from a heart attack goes down, as will your premium rates. The lower the risk is for your death, the lower the risk is for the agency who insures your and covers your cost of living.

Employment

Some professions are very dangerous, with employees who experience more injuries and deaths than most. If you were to leave your dangerous job and begin working in an office, then your insurance rates will decrease. It isn’t nearly as much fun sitting at a desk, but insurance companies like it better when you are safe inside rather than on high scaffolding that you can fall from.

The same activities that help you live a happier, more satisfying life help you to get affordable life insurance. Saving money on life insurance is great, but feeling good is even better.

How about you all? Do you currently have life insurance? If so, what type of policy do you have – term or whole life? Why did you go with the type you chose? 


When you’ve applied for life insurance in the past, what types of details/questions about your life did they inquire about?


Share your experiences by commenting below!

Jacob’s Thoughts – Listed below are my random thoughts as I was reading this article.

• @ Do you need life insurance?
• As we’ve discussed several times previously on this site, the first question in tackling the life insurance issue as a whole is to address whether or not you really need life insurance to begin with!
• Ultimately, if you don’t currently have any children or a spouse that depends on your income, then you’re probably better off waiting to get this form of coverage until such a time arises that it becomes needed.
• @ Deciding between whole and term life insurance policies –
• In my mind, deciding between whole and term life insurance is a no-brainer.
• In almost ALL cases, I would posit that people would be better off buying a competitive term life insurance policy rather than an expensive (often commission-filled) whole life insurance policy.
• What do you all think?
• @ How health factors affect your life insurance premiums and benefits –
• I definitely can imagine how life factors such as health, weight, and job safety could affect the level of premiums one would pay for life insurance.
• However, it’s interesting that in my experience, I’ve seen that if a person works for a fairly large company that has an established benefits package, you really aren’t asked any sort of health history or risk factor questions prior to signing up for the health insurance and life insurance benefits; they are simply bestowed upon you in a manner dictated by which policy you select.
• On the other hand, I could imagine that individual health and risk factors come much more significantly in to play if you were to pursue independent health or life insurance policies. 

***Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/jakecaptive/5343993880/sizes/l/in/photostream/

Recycle Your Old CDs to Help a Dog in Need

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The following is a guest post. Enjoy!

The next time you hear a magpie (an English bird, and one of only about 5 animals that have passed the self-awareness mirror test) chirping away outside your bedroom window, think music.

Many sites have partnered with the RSPCA (Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in the UK) to help support canine awareness through a recycling program for old CDs. A portion of the recycled proceeds of each CD turned in to companies will be used to support RSPCA programs. The spay and neuter programs, and care of pooches waiting for their forever homes are funded through donations to this worthy charity. Indeed, this is a great way to free up space and clear out drawers and closets in your home. It is very simple and is also a great community event to reuse, repurpose, and recycle unwanted or damaged CDs, while helping a loving companion dog.

Get Involved!

Organize a CD drive in your local community or with the visitors at a local dog park. Here are the simple steps to create community awareness and support the RSPCA:

1. Contact your local RSPCA office and reach out to the volunteer or fundraising coordinator.
2. Present your fundraising plan. They won’t turn you down, as they always need more money.
3. Initiate your awareness campaign.
4. Prepare for collection date(s).
5. Send your collected CDs to the company.
6. The RSPCA receives a check for all your efforts.

The Plan

Create a fun and innovative fundraising plan involving community leaders, local school students, veterinary offices, kennels, pet shops, and pet suppliers. Get everyone in on the action – the more, the merrier, right?! Decide if you want your campaign to include drop off locations that will accept CDs for a period of time or if you want to have a big one-day event. Call the local papers, television, and radio stations; they are generally pretty good about publicizing these types of non-profit community events. Using a word processor, create flyers for distribution at local businesses. Ask a printer within your community to donate their printing costs to the cause, in turn for free advertising.

When the big day arrives, ask a local television station if they would send a news reporter and camera operator to cover a few minutes of the event. This is great public relations for a community event. Consider partnering with a local recycling or environmental group for added support.

Contact several companies for mailer envelopes and assemble your small army of volunteers to count, scan and mail your collection. The company will do the rest. Once they receive your CDs and have tallied your donation value, they will forward a check directly to the RSPCA.

Pitfalls

Volunteers not showing up can be a big problem, so insure campaign success by checking in with them often. Remind your volunteers they are an integral part of the success of the campaign and that without them, it simply wouldn’t be the same.

Plan for bad weather if you scheduled for a single collection day and have a backup plan in the event of rain or snow. Coordinate with a local retailer to use a corner of their store for the big event. They will surely appreciate the extra traffic an event like this can drive into their store. Best choices are dog friendly locations, such as parks or pet shops.

Don’t get overwhelmed and assemble a great group of volunteers to assist with tasks such as emptying collection boxes, delivering mailer envelopes to the post, counting the collected CDs, and creating a record keeping system.

How about you all? Have you ever participated in a CD recycling program such as this? Have you participated in any other events that have benefits SPCA’s/animals? If so, which ones?


What other fundraising causes are you involved in throughout the year? Personally, my big one that I do each June is a 150 mile bike ride to raise money for Multiple Sclerosis. I’ve never personally heard of people recycling CDs in order to raise money for animals. However, it sounds like a good cause! It should be interesting to see how this program turns out!


Share your experiences by commenting below!

***Photo courtesy of http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2705/4455844306_b54edc3fd0.jpg

How You Can Obtain Long-Term Electricity Savings

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Click here to enter my free $205 giveaway for a chance to win 5% of My Personal Finance Journey blog income and give another 5% to a charity of your choosing! Deadline to enter is October 31st, 2011.

With the prices of nearly everything rising, it is important for consumers to find the best utility rates available. Though many utility companies offer websites to allow for rate comparisons, there are a few things that every consumer can do to make sure that they are receiving the best possible long-term electricity prices.

Finding a Provider

The first step in saving money on utility bills is finding the best rates available. Many companies have websites that allow potential customers to compare their current rates with rates offered by that company. Some companies may even guarantee rates for a specific amount of time, thereby reducing the amount of time consumers spend searching for the best rates and switching providers. Before changing providers, however, it is important to check if the current provider charges a cancellation fee to terminate a contract.

How about you all? How much do you currently pay per month in electricity? Is it more or less than what you would term as your “tolerance limit?”


What steps do you actively take each month to save money on electricity? Have you tried any of the steps shared above? 


Share your experiences by commenting below!

Jacob’s Thoughts – Listed below are my random thoughts as I was reading this article.

• Posts discussing methods to reduce electricity or utility bills are always very interesting. I think this stems from the fact that almost everyone does have to pay these types of bills in one form or another, so everyone can relate and share their thoughts.
• I also like posts such as the one above that discuss how the electricity “system” works in other countries (this one applies to the UK especially).
• My personal spending on electricity bills for my 781 sq. ft. two-bedroom condo (built in 1966 with a probably 30 year old A/C unit) over the past 5 months is shown below:
• September 2011 – $67
• August 2011 – $97
• July 2011 – $74
• June 2011 – $54
• May 2011 – $40
• As you can clearly see by these numbers, there is a sharp peak in the electricity usage during the hottest month of the year here in Virginia (August), with the totals decreasing on either side of this month. Quite interesting stuff!
• @ Finding or switching electricity suppliers in the US vs. the UK –
• One thing that is quite different here in the US compared to the UK (as is described by this post) is that an energy supplier in a certain area has a “necessary monopoly.” This means that this supplier will most likely be the sole source of electricity for a particular town/city/area. 
• Because of this “necessary monopoly,” it is actually difficult/impossible to do any price bargaining with a supplier or threaten to switch to a competitor. This is simply because there are no competitors (unfortunately). 
• Maybe, one day, this will change. But, this is the reality we’re stuck with right now.
• @ Home improvements to reduce electricity costs and usage – 
• First, I must admit that I do not always have the best habits when it comes to saving money by reducing my energy consumption.
• What I mean by this is that while I do the best I can to reduce my environmental impact, I refuse to have to work at my home in the 80 degree F heat during the summer. Instead, I have no shame in turning on the A/C to a comfortable temperature, at least while I am home.
• Having mentioned that I am by no means perfect, listed below are the things that I do do in order to save money on electricity usage:
• Have opaque curtains that stay closed during the day-time to block UV light and heat.
• Turn off the A/C or heat while I am gone at work during the day or out of town for the weekend.
• Turn off electronic appliances (stereos, VCR (do people besides me even have these these days?! haha), DVD players, TV’s, etc) when they are not in use.
• As I mentioned above, my A/C blower unit is MANY years old. In fact, I think that the home inspector for my condo mentioned to me that it was close to 30 years old. As such, I believe that it is not nearly as efficient as a newer unit. Therefore, replacing this will be on my radar if I stay in the condo for more than 5 years.
• For more sustainable living tips, I would recommend visiting Sustainable Personal Finance. They’re the real pros at this stuff!
• @ Replacing your energy meter with a “smart” one
• This is actually a great idea! I would love to have something I could analyze online that showed a breakdown of my energy use by appliance and/or room in my house. 
• However, my initial guess is that again, due to the way in which the electricity infrastructure is set up in the US, the energy companies would not allow you to change the meter from the one that they provide for reading the electricity from your house, since it is technically their property anyway.
• This is just my gut feeling. If someone knows more about this issue, please let me know or comment below to share. I’ve made a note to look in to this in more detail in a future post!
• Reading about the sorts of information that these “smart” meters provide sparked my curiosity to see what types of information my current energy supplier/meter (Dominion) provide me in my online account interface.
• What I found that was provided in the online interface is shown below:
• Monthly and daily overall usage in kilo-Watt-hours. A graph is also provided that enables me to compare my current month’s energy usage with previous years.
• Dominion also has a tool in their online system that claims that you’re able to “analyze your energy usage.” However, this tool was not working when I just logged in to check it, so I’ll have to check back at a later date to see what it offers.
• And, that’s about it…So, there was really nothing on the site (at the current time) that told me anything super-beneficial for how to better save energy.
• In addition, Dominion did offer several “green” energy programs. One was a Smart Cooling Rewards program, where you allow Dominion to cycle on and off your A/C during the hottest summer months to help them meet the energy demands. In exchange for this, they’ll give you $40 per summer. Some other cool programs they have are offering free in-home energy reduction assessments to low-income families and providing discounts at select retailers for customers buying energy-efficient light fixtures.
• Unfortunately, none of these programs facilitate the analysis of my current energy usage, but every initiative helps!

***Photo courtesy of http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3655/3338776771_22e2442958.jpg

My Current Asset Allocation and Net Worth Growth – July-October, 2011

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Click here to enter my free $205 giveaway for a chance to win 5% of My Personal Finance Journey blog income and give another 5% to a charity of your choosing! Deadline to enter is October 31st, 2011.

I have to apologize slightly in advance for this week being a little heavy in “progress” posts, as it has has been my “catch up” week in evaluating my financial goals (published Tuesday), net worth progress (this post), and blogging goals for 2011 (on the way soon). However, since I haven’t reported on these points in about 3 months, there’s definitely much to discuss! So, let’s get started.


As I’ve mentioned before, the goal of this running net worth progress series is twofold– 1) to share how I (as a fairly normal non-financial professional) approach various financial issues that come at me throughout life so that you can use my learnings to assist you in your financial decision making and 2) to make me more accountable in sticking to my various financial goals that I set forth by periodically evaluating my status and making adjustments. As always, if you have any questions, please ask!


Overall, the 2nd half of 2011 has started off sufficiently (not tremendously – I’ll explain why below).

I spent the majority of the summer months getting started and learning how to do research in preventing the protein aggregation that is believed to be a cause of Alzheimer’s disease. I was able (surprisingly and with some luck) to successfully pass my PhD Qualifying Exam in early September. I am definitely glad that is over with and that I don’t have to retake the exam, as I spent many a late night preparing the research paper that was required! Overall, I have been very satisfied with my professional progress the past few months (both in my scientific research and growing the My Personal Finance Journey community, with your help of course).


As far as the overall stock market goes, things have been fairly disappointing (hence why I mentioned above that the start of the 2nd half of the year has not been spectacular by any stretch of the imagination) since the last net worth update in late June. However, since I am a passive investor and do not try to fool around with market timing, I try not to let this bother me and focus on things I can control. 

With all of the up and down that has occurred, let’s take a look and see how it affected my net worth progress…shall we?

How about you all? How did you progress with your net worth in July-October 2011? What are your thoughts about the strength of the market right now? Do you think it will rebound? Have you had to rebalance your portfolio recently (buying more equity shares) to account for the market downturn?


Share your experiences by commenting below!

***Photo courtesy of http://s0.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/01/47/83/1478338_1968fd81.jpg

Fixed Rate Mortgages vs. Adjustable Rate Mortgages – Which are Better for You?

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Click here to enter my free $205 giveaway for a chance to win 5% of My Personal Finance Journey blog income and give another 5% to a charity of your choosing! Deadline to enter is October 31st, 2011.

The following is a guest post. Enjoy!

Home ownership is one of the cornerstones of America, if not the cornerstone of American life. There is no other symbol that defines what it means to fully capture the American dream than that of home ownership.

The primary way that people chase their dream of home ownership is by means of a mortgage loan. A mortgage is a loan taken out from a bank based upon a person’s credit history and their level of income. There have been times when it has been very easy for a person to get a mortgage, and other times when it has been virtually impossible for the average person to get a mortgage to buy their dream home.

Mortgage Selection Tools

One of the best tools a person can have when it comes to buying a mortgage is a reliable, handy mortgage calculator. A mortgage calculator is one of the few tools a person can use to help them prepare for the process of attaining a mortgage. When taking on any new challenge, such as buying a home or purchasing any type of real estate, it is always worth it to do proper research and use due diligence when approaching the situation. There are many different types of mortgages, some more risky than other, but they all get the job done.

The Fixed Rate Mortgage

The fixed rate mortgage is the simple mortgage that many of us grew up knowing about. The fixed-rate mortgage can be very easily explained as a simple loan with a fixed, stable interest rate that determines what our monthly payment will be. The beauty of this type of mortgage is that for the entire life of the loan, you have the same mortgage payment, and it becomes a game of how many payments do you have left on your mortgage before you pay it off, rather than a game of what exactly will my mortgage payment be this month, as it is with many other types of mortgages. The fixed-rate mortgage usually has a life of 30 years or 15 years, and is pretty flexible for you to pay it off early.

The Adjustable Rate Mortgage

Adjustable rate mortgages are one of the more flexible mortgage options in good financial times. The adjustable rate fluctuates with the economy (more specifically, with the prime interest rate set by the Fed), and often leaves the homeowner in a financial situation they did not plan for.

The adjustable rate is both a beauty and a beast, all at the same time. In good times, the rate is often low, which in turns allows the person mortgage payment to be low and very bearable. But, in bad economic times, this rate often rises unexpectedly and puts the person who has the mortgage in a bad financial position. Adjustable rate mortgages are good for people who do not have any other option, but they should use a mortgage calculator before they sign the documents to make sure they are getting the best deal they can. It would also be a smart move to later move to a fixed-rate mortgage if possible for the security it provides.

How about you all? What strategies or tools do you use to obtain a mortgage that best suits your needs? Do you prefer fixed rate or adjustable rate mortgages? 


Share your experiences by commenting below!

Jacob’s Thoughts – Listed below are my random thoughts as I was reading this article.

• @ Deciding between fixed and adjustable rate mortgages – 
• Deciding between the two types of mortgages (fixed and adjustable rate) can be a fairly difficult proposition. 
• On one hand, it’s a little frightening to think about being “locked” in to a set mortgage for such a long period of time (30 years) with a fixed rate mortgage. 
• On the other hand, it’s also very tempting to get an adjustable rate mortgage since the rate is set enticingly low in the first few years of the loan.
• However, I believe that as a general rule of thumb, the majority of home buyers should be using a fixed rate mortgage. The primary reason for this is that it forces a home buyer to truly get their finances in order before committing to buying a house. In other words, a fixed rate mortgage makes sure he or she (the home buyer) truly has enough money to afford the true cost of the house, and not just some temporary low rate set forth by the adjustable rate mortgage.
• Even though I believe that most people can benefit more greatly from a fixed rate mortgage (this is what I would choose in buying a home as well), there are some times when I do believe that adjustable rate mortgages are beneficial. These are listed below:
• When you only plan on living in a house for 5 years – Since you’ll only be living in the house for a relatively short period of time before selling, you’ll likely only be paying mortgage payments during the low, introductory interest rate period. Thus, you don’t need to worry about the interest rate adjusting to something that you cannot afford. 
• A word of caution though with this tact – if you do not plan on living in a house for a minimum of 5 years, you would actually be better off renting instead of buying. 
• When the terms of the adjustable rate mortgage are such that it prevents huge jumps in interest rate over the life of the loan – In some special cases with adjustable rate mortgages, the amount that the interest rate on your loan can fluctuate is capped both at a per year and per-loan-lifetime basis. If current market fixed rate mortgages carry a 5% interest rate and your adjustable rate mortgage interest rate increase is capped at 2% for the lifetime of the loan (but starts at 3% interest), it will ultimately be cheaper to go with the adjustable mortgage. It’s all about reading the fine details VERY CAREFULLY though! 

***Photo courtesy of http://s0.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/01/86/72/1867282_cf82253b.jpg

October 2011 Financial Goals Update – Short Term, Mid-term, and Long Term

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Welcome to My Personal Finance Journey! If you are new here, please read the “About” or “First-Time Visitor” pages to find out more about us. If you would like to receive free updates on articles like this by email, then sign up here or you can subscribe to the RSS feed. Also, check us out on Twitter or Facebook. Thanks for visiting! Keep on learning!
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Click here to enter my free $205 giveaway for a chance to win 5% of My Personal Finance Journey blog income and give another 5% to a charity of your choosing! Deadline to enter is October 31st, 2011.

Back in January of this year, I laid out my short term, mid-term, and long term goals for the 2011 year. I do this once every year as part of my goal to create what author David Bach calls a Purpose Focused Financial Plan. The goal of this system is to employ money in your life in a way that matches your life values and dreams.

You can read more about my journey to create this system at the following links – Creating a Purpose Focused Financial Plan & My Personal Finance Journey’s Investment Strategy.

As part of making this system work, I wanted to give an update on how I’m doing so far this year with the goals I established. Overall, I’ve been very lucky in the regard that my progress to date has far exceeded the expectations I originally laid out at the beginning of the year. 


However, I’ve gotten pretty behind on these updates since the end of the summer with the PhD Qualifying Exam I had to take. As such, this post/update will serve to reflect new progress that has been made in the July 2011-October 2011 timeframe. Enjoy! I look forward to hearing your comments, thoughts, and progress on your own goals. 
 

Short Term (< 1 year) Goals:

• Contribute $5000 (or $420 per month) to my Roth IRA with Vanguard this year (maximum allowed) – Complete. Have now contributed $5,000 so far this year. 
• Because my graduate school employment doesn’t include the perk of a 401k, my tax-deferred investing options for 2011 are now exhausted. Because of this, I have begun pouring any extra money at the end of each month towards my condo home loan and washer/dryer installation savings. Nice! 
• Reach net worth target for this year (not displayed here) – Ongoing – the equity markets don’t seem to want to cooperate in allowing me to achieve this goal, as it requires an ~30% increase in net worth. This may not be possible to obtain, but will attempt.
• Maintain target 6-9 months of expenses in cash reserve fund in Dollar Savings Direct account – Complete – currently carrying 9 months worth of expenses in cash in my emergency fund account.
• Rebalance mutual fund portfolio to meet asset allocation target %’s (75% equity, 25% fixed income overall) – Correct for now, but ongoing.
• Obtain 15% ownership / equity in condominium – Complete – currently, I have 15.79% equity in my condo. I will be increasing this goal to 20% for the remainder of 2011.
• Put together a will and have it reviewed by a lawyer – Will completed. Not yet reviewed by lawyer.
• Continue to save money for trip to Grand Canyon – Ongoing – need to continue to evaluate when to take this. 
• Currently, I have $340 saved up for this trip. My gut feeling tells me that this won’t quite yet be enough (probably needs to be in the neighborhood of $1200-$1500). To verify this, I just looked up the prices for flights going to Las Vegas (a nearby airport to the Grand Canyon), and they are currently priced at around $700 round trip. 
• I am currently saving only $20 per month for this trip (and the associated life value that is assigned to it). I think I’m going to increase the monthly savings to $50 for the remainder of 2011 in order to slightly accelerate things. It would be nice to try to take this vacation in the late Spring time frame of 2012.
• Upgrade condominium with investment in stacked washer/dryer combo – $1000 for unit, $1000 for labor/installation – Currently saving $87.50 per month for home maintenance and upgrades – Ongoing, but on track. 
• As of September, I will have now officially accumulated 1% of my home value in my home maintenance savings account. From now on, I will be able to begin accumulating the $2000 that it will cost to get the washer/dryer in my condo. I’ve decided that since I have already maxed out my Roth IRA for the year and have no 401k available, I’m going to increase my monthly washer/dryer investment/savings to $200 per month to see if I can speed up the savings process for this. 
• Invest $500 in Microloans for Latin America in 2011 ($41.67 per month) –Ongoing – Have invested a total of $417 this year so far to a working poor fund in Peru and Nicaragua and a fund that supports environmental sustainability in Latin America. Both of these funds come with a pretty nice 3.5% interest rate per year for three years. 
• Note: I use Microplace.com to invest this money. It seems to work well and be dependable (my principal for some of my 2010 investments were paid back in September). I just logged in to my account, and it says that my money has been used to help 55 people down there! Pretty cool stuff if you ask me!
• Donate $1,300 to Multiple Sclerosis Foundation in 2011 (5% of income) – Done. In the 2011 Tour de Vine event, I raised approximately $5625 to support finding a cure for this disease (with the help of company matches). My bike ride happened on June 11-12 of this year and was a huge success. I’m definitely planning to do it again next year (I’ve already signed up, in fact!) 
• The other big donation thrust I’ll be doing for the remainder of 2011 and beyond is giving away 10% of my blog income each month, with 5% going to readers and another 5% going to charities that the readers select. If you’re interested in signing up for a chance to win, click here.
• Save 3% of take home pay each month (after taxes) for Dream Account. On target – Have an automatic transfer each month from my Bank of America checking account to my ING Direct high yield savings account.
• Save ~30% of blogging income (if any) in a high yield online savings account in preparation for 2010 taxes. I had been very bad at doing this until late this summer, but I finally have begun to put aside significant amounts of money for taxes. 
• The next step on my radar is to send quarterly tax payments in the government so that I don’t owe huge amounts in April 2012 and get penalized. 
• I will need to make sure to update my net worth calculation Excel spreadsheet so that these tax savings don’t get counted in my asset allocation percentages, thus skewing the numbers.
• Implement dollar value averaging for my 2012 Roth IRA contributions. This will be done in the beginning of 2012.

Mid-Term (3-5 years out) Goals:

• Continue contributing $5000 to Roth IRA each year and using dollar value averaging.
• Reach intermediate net worth target (not displayed here, but is 2X my current net worth)
• Own a rental property by 2016.

Long-Term (>5 years out) Goals:

• Obtain a net worth of $1,000,000
• Own a home free of mortgage payments
• Own a vacation home in the mountains somewhere remote
• Accumulate enough funds not have to work, but will probably anyways because I would get bored. 

How about you all? How have the months of July through October (thus far) been for achieving your goals? What are your next milestones? 

Share your experiences by commenting below!

***Photo courtesy of http://farm1.static.flickr.com/230/503335275_6150e07aed.jpg