Let me start off by saying that I am honored to host this week’s edition of the Festival of Frugality. Before doing a little research, I had no idea what May Day was. May Day (also known as International Workers’ Day) is a commemoration of the 1886 Haymarket Massacre in Chicago which was a movement to symbolize working class solidarity. This year Occupy Wall Street plans to demonstrate their own International Workers’ Day movement today. Occupy Wall Street’s message has been to call attention to what they say are abuses of power and wealth of the 1%. Here is my...
We just renewed our membership to BJ’s and I started thinking are discount clubs really worth the money that we pay to be part of them? I think it was $53 for the year to renew, which allows us to go into the club and purchase merchandise, it also allows us to book travel at discounted rates. Do they actually have better prices? There are some products that we buy just at BJ’s and some that we buy at the grocery store. If you like Olive Oil, it is definitely cheaper at BJ’s. I have also noticed that it has...
This has been a long week at work. I had a virus on my computer that I am still trying to rectify and I am posting this from my cell phone. So if there are any errors please email me. It gets me thinking; while cell phones are amazing running a blog from a phone is not practical. I can respond to emails and comments but a lengthy post is just not in the cards. I think in the subsequent weeks I am going to expand the Five For Friday. If you have any clever naming methodologies please shoot me...
The following is a guest post from Steph Medeiros with Californiamortgageblog.com. She covers trends in real estate, home financing, and jumbo mortgage loans. Comparing the Costs of Renting and Owning A Home To rent or to own…that is the question. Whether you’re thinking of ditching the renter’s lifestyle for a home you can call your own, or you’re tired of the financial and physical responsibilities that come with home ownership, you might be wondering which option is right for you. In today’s market, buyers can find some great bargains – but what about the overall cost to own a home?...
Ok not really about the naked put, but now that I have your attention we are going to talk about put options in general. Go ahead and check this post out on derivatives to get up to speed. Wait make sure that you come back. Are you up to speed now? Today I decided to take an in-depth look at the put option and try to explain it in layman’s terms. Sure I cannot cover every possible scenario in this post but I hope to explain it to you and give you a better understanding so next time you hear...
With Earth Day 2012 in the books, I hope you had a chance to get out there and make a difference. For me I will be helping to clean up this coming weekend! Taking a look at the shear amount of work the volunteers do in our community day in and day out is amazing. With the average hourly wage of a volunteer in 2011 close to $21.79 per hour, the dollar value is immense if you look at the amount of work that volunteers perform. Here is how my organization uses volunteers The organization that I work at relies...
Have you ever noticed the price of razor blades keeps going up and up? What is the deal with that? It is not World War II when we were rationing the use of metals. I am not sure how many blades Gillette is up to now but I have been using the Mach 3 as of recent. My wife went to the store to pick up a pack of them the other day and I was shell shocked at the price of a 5 pack it was close to $15. I checked out some of the other blades and saw...
It has been a long week. I went out of town on Wednesday night and made a rookie mistake in forgetting to set up a post for Thursday. Then thinking I could access it from my phone, I tried and remembered that my WordPress hardening tactics worked well as I was not able to access behind the scenes here! So as frustrating as that was I had a good night golfing afterward. I was not able to read too many sites this week as I was working hard to complete an audit before I went out of town. But the...
Today I am venturing to the doctors as I near my 30th birthday to get a tune-up. Last night we rushed out 1 year old to the doctor’s office after she broke out with a rash on her body from the MMR vaccine she just received. Sure I used my flex card to make the payments for the co pays while at the office but that is such a small fraction of the bill. I looked over the desk to see that for rushing the baby to the doctor’s office was going to set my insurance carrier back $150.00. I...
With so many people I know having children, this question comes up a lot. What is a smart investment that you can give a baby? As a parent it is essential to start saving for your child at a very young age. The power of compounding can work wonders! Today more than ever people are entering college to pursue advanced degrees. I think setting up a 529 plan for your child is a great decision for their future. Who knows what the future holds but you can be certain that saving for an education for them is a safe bet. ...
This post is a little different than the others on this site. On Friday I told some people at work that I had a personal finance website and thought that I should disclose some to you as well! To that I will let you into why I chose to pursue the finance path. I went to a liberal arts college in NY and initially had hopes and dreams of becoming a chemist. Well as I dove head first into Chemistry my freshman year of college I began to think more and more about a career path. Chemistry was great, I...
What an interesting week it has been. My Alexa rank dropped below 200,000 thanks to you, really I couldn’t have done it without you so I thank you!! I had a logo created for my site so take a look and let me know what you think! This weekend atleast where I live it supposed to be in the upper 60’s so that is making me feel anxious to get outside and do some yard work! So here they are in no particular order, the Five For Friday! J Money on how far would you go to pick up a...
What does national financial literacy month mean to you? Well for my wife and I, we have set up a plan to pay down some of our debt. We have accumulated some debt over the past few years. It was by choice so that she could stay home with our two beautiful children. I wrote a post the other day asking you to take a moment to review your situation because April is National Financial Literacy Month. Did you take a few moments to see where you stood? Are you going to do anything about your situation? Our goals are...
I was sitting there having a mind freeze on what to write and I looked over to my wife and asked her for a topic. She said, “gas.” Sitting there thinking that was out of left field, I pretended not to hear and said huh. Gas prices, Ahh gotcha! Well if you haven’t noticed gas has been creeping up, it seems as though every time I drive past a gas station it is 10 cents higher than it was an hour ago. I read an article the other day that crude prices over $100 a barrel are going to be...
In case you are not aware of what Storage Wars is, it is a television show on A&E where people bid on lockers at storage facilities. They get 5 minutes to look inside from the doorway and they cannot open or touch anything in the units. The show follows 4 personalities as they go from facility to facility, each one having their own style and persona. One of the lead personalities is David Hester who owns Hester Auctions. He did not always own the thrift shop and auction house; in fact in 2005 the shop was a furniture store. Hester...
You are not seeing double, this is my new logo. Well last night I broke the infamous 200,000 Alexa mark. I can hear the crowd roaring….like when Bubba Watson won the Master’s yesterday! If you haven’t noticed by a few mentions in the posts I am an avid golfer or should I say hacker. The timing couldn’t be more perfect. A few weeks back I was scouring the Craigslist ads looking for a graphic designer to design me a professional logo. If you would like to see the old one click here. What do you think? If you are anything...
The Five for Friday is tough to decide on just five, but here they are in no particular order: Jeremy at Modest Money talks about the outsourcing, good read and a few sites mentioned if you are looking to go the outsourcing route. Karunesh’s Chase A Dream site is great, he is very creative just go take a look you will not be disappointed. For those looking to decorate their house or apartment check this out by Katie @ Along For the Journey, did I mention it is budget conscious too! Here is a good lesson of you have to look...
That’s right I would like to buy your site. Last night as I was doing my usual musings I received an email soliciting to buy my site. Of course, I responded to hear them out, but as I sent off the response I sat there imagining myself a lottery millionaire. The longer I sat there the greater the manifestations in my head. Then it hit me back to reality, how are they going to value my site? I began to think of a way on how to value my site. There were a few ways that popped into my head....
I love this time of the year, it is April which means the start of the golf season in Central NY and also for the past few years it has meant that Deadliest Catch is on. It starts April 10 this year on the Discovery Channel. It’s all the same, only the names will change Everyday it seems we’re wasting away Another place where the faces are so cold I’d drive all night just to get back home. I’m a cowboy, on a steel horse I ride I’m wanted dead or alive Wanted dead or alive Sorry, I was a...
What happened to Groupon? This has been a terrible past week for deal of the day website. The stock plunged 17% as the potential for an SEC probe rattled the share prices. Groupon had the largest IPO since 2004, when our buddies at Google had a $1.7billion dollar initial public offering. So what happened, well first let us hope that this is not another Enron or another episode of corporate malfeasance. Initially the company came under scrutiny when before their IPO they revised their financials with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company came recently under scrutiny when an auditor...
Interest rates are at all-time lows but does any of it really matter if you cannot secure the loan that you need? Take an inventory of your accounts before you go out to secure the loan. Here are 5 tips that you need to take notice of to ensure that you are credit worthy. Do not close accounts that you do not use This is a big no-no you do not want to close accounts that you have had open for a long time. One of the factors in determining your credit score is the length of time the accounts...
Wow the weekend is finally here!!! I am so thankful for that, hopefully our 2 little ladies let me sleep a little this weekend. Anyone have anything exciting going on this weekend you care to share? My wife has a baby shower for my brother’s fiancé. It will be their first child and I am so excited! Take a look at the five sites that I thought added some value to my brain this week, in no random order. Corbett Barr over at Expert Enough kept my interest this week. Be sure to check out Corbett’s sites if you...
Sure I know what you are thinking, Christopher has gone off the deep end, but hear me out on this one. Pocket dialing – we all have done this at one time or another, being on the other end of the pocket dial all you can hear is some chatter and noise but not really what is going on. Well, this is the same as in business you need to have clear defined goals. There is a lot of “noise” that can knock you off course and derail your efforts. Define your goals and go for it! Apps – give us...
What a great success the Roth IRA Movement was. In a few days we are going to enter National Financial Literacy Month, what a great month to celebrate it, ohhhh the coincidence it also happens to be my birthday in April too! National Financial Literacy Month came about in 2004 when the Senate passed Resolution 316 which officially recognized April as my birthday National Financial Literacy Month. Originally started as youth financial literacy, it was realized that we all need to be well versed money and personal finance. For my Canadian friends sorry we will have to wait until November...
Shhhhhhhh…..can you hear that….that’s right baby it’s the Roth IRA Movement. So here is how the movement got started; Jeff Rose went to speak at his alma mater and polled the soon-to-be graduating seniors, and not a single one of them raised their hand when he asked if they heard of the Roth IRA. Here we are today a group of about 150 bloggers preaching to the nation and hoping they listen. For my friends following along on twitter it’s: #RothIRAMovement In case you were one of the ones polled, here is what a Roth IRA is: The Roth IRA...
