Home Warranties Companies Are Mostly Worthless and Realtors Are Part of the Problem + MORE

In 1971, the song “I Am Woman” quickly became an empowering anthem for women around the world. Its famous line “I am woman, hear me roar,” gave women the confidence and reassurance that no matter what life hands us, we can handle it. From managing a business and running a household to the myriad of other tasks women handle every day, if there’s a problem, we can fix it…

As you might imagine, it’s cold a lot here in Michigan. And people look at all sorts of ways to keep warm and heat their homes: oil, electricity, natural gas, wood, and on and on.
This Old House Magazine recently did a complete series on pellet stoves, a high-tech wood (pressed into pellets) burning option that many here use to heat their homes (either completely or in part…

It’s got a home warranty, but it isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.This is probably the one and only time I’ll write about home warranties, so I guess I better kill two birds with one stone. I’ll share my disappointing experience with American Home Shield so that you never have to deal with them, and then ask the larger question: are home warranties worth it?
A home warranty is what it sounds like…

Let’s say, hypothetically, that I figured out some ingenious way to predict the stock market so well that I would always significantly beat the annual returns of the S&P 500. Every year, year in and year out, I could get a 30% to 50% return in the stock market.
Assuming I’m not so altruistic as to just give away that knowledge, what would I do with it?
Logically, I’d use it to secure my family’s wealth…