Weekly Round Up – April 25, 2014

Before we get to the good reads!

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A Few Good Reads

Here are a few of my favorite reads from the past week.

1. Students can avoid drowning in debt with student loans: 

Students should only borrow money they feel comfortable repaying, a representative of a local credit union said in a session on building or rebuilding credit.

David Rodriguez, financial education manager from Generations Federal Credit Union, spoke April 9 in observation of Financial Literacy Month in the health promotions office in Room 150 of Loftin Student Center.

The event, co-sponsored by student financial services and the credit union, drew 17 people.

Joining Rodriguez from the credit union were Kimberley Blohm, student brand manager, and Eric Sanchez, business development. Find more info

2. Government program to decrease student loan debt only encourages it: 

I am shocked — shocked, I tell you! — to learn a government program to make it easier for college graduates to handle their student-loan debts instead seems to be sparking more borrowing, higher tuition and a growing liability for taxpayers.

It’s almost as if removing disincentives for people to think about the money they borrow and its consequences has the effect of … making them borrow more money as if there aren’t as many consequences. From the Wall Street Journal:

Government officials are trying to rein in increasingly popular federal programs that forgive some student debt, amid rising concerns over the plans’ costs and the possibility they could encourage colleges to push tuition even higher. Find more info

3. Arizona’s Top 3 Debt Consolidation Loan Companies: 

The company BestDebtConsolidationLoans.org recently analyzed debt consolidation loan companies in Arizona. Its goal was to provide Arizonans with objective reviews of the options available to them for debt relief and to avoid being scammed.

The company independently reviewed the various debt consolidation loan programs available to Arizonans who are struggling with debt. It is now announcing the three debt consolidation loan companies that ranked highest based on BestDebtConsolidationLoans.org’s reviews. They are National Debt Relief, CuraDebt and American Debt Enders.

Many Arizonans are struggling with debt. There are several reasons for this, not the least of which is Arizona’s unemployment rate. As of November 2013, it was 7.8% ranking it 11th in the US for unemployment. The state’s largest city, Phoenix, has an unemployment rate of 7.5%. The city of Tucson is faring better with an unemployment rate of 6.2% but Flagstaff, the state’s third largest city, was worse at 7.2%. Find more info

4. Queensland government wants to hear from you on debt: 

If you’re not interested in raising taxes, reducing services or selling off assets, then the Queensland government doesn’t want to hear from you.

Queensland treasurer Tim Nicholls has declared the government’s “Strong Choices” campaign a success after the first week of operation, with more than 16,000 people making submissions through the Strong Choices website on how to reduce government debt.

Using an interactive questionnaire, people can suggest raising taxes, selling or leasing state assets, and reducing government services to reduce government debt.

In a statement on launching the site, which is part of a $6m campaign, Nicholls said the aim was to canvass Queenslanders’ views. Find more info

5. Oregon Couple Builds Tiny Homes to Ease Housing Debt, Carbon Footprint: 

A seemingly never-ending debt cycle has many Americans searching to take matters into their own hands and an innovative Oregon couple may have found a solution that also benefits the environment.

After buying their “dream-home,” Andrew and Gabriella Morrison found themselves enslaved to their large mortgage, so they decided to undergo a major downsize.

“It was gorgeous, everything that we could possibly want but then we realized how much it was costing us to live in,” Andrew Morrison said. “Tiny made that much more sense to us and so we built our own tiny house.” Find more info