October 20th, 2009
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Credit Cards to start charging for not being in debt .
In an effort to increase fee income Bank of America announced, “Starting next year they will charge a small number of customers an annual fee, ranging from $29 to $99. The bank has characterized the fee as experimental. But card holders who have never carried a balance or paid late fees could be among those affected.”
Stop the credit card addiction!; use cash or a debit card. This is crazy. The mileage points and the cash back promises are just not worth it. A free debit card from you local bank can do all the good of a credit card and none of the bad.
Isn’t it time to give up the idea that credit cards are necessary?
October 15th, 2009
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If you think you are getting rich by getting 3% back on your credit card purchases think again.
This is directly from an article called “Why Get A Merchant Account” by a merchant processor named Approved Payments. See what those who sell credit card processing are saying about you.
- Consumers tend to spend more when using a credit card than when using cash. There is no imposed spending limit like there is with cash, so it’s easier to keep spending.
- Accepting credit cards help customers make faster buying decisions. Impulse buys are more likely with credit cards than with cash or checks.
It is common knowledge that consumers spend between 12% – 30% more when they use a credit cards Vs cash. The exact percentage cited varies depending on the purchase type, but the fact that you will spend more remains the same.
If you were getting $400 a year back on your cash back credit card, based upon 3% back on all purchases, that would mean you are charging roughly $13,333 dollars per year on your credit card. An overspend of even just 12% is $1600.
I don’t know about you, but I have no desire to unconsciously spend $1600 to get $400 of my own money back at the end of the year.
September 1st, 2009
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I consider myself to be a marketer. I love the study of marketing, I have a Masters Degree in International Marketing and I see everyday how marketing causes us to want what is not necessarily best for us.
My advice is to anchor yourself by finding a dream that means more to you than anything else you want. Then you can measure each want a marketer creates against the dream. Now you know what the want will cost you if you choose to buy it; the want costs you your dream.
Yes, I am a marketer and I am marketing financial independence and dreams. To have financial independence and attain your dreams means you’ll have to say no to other things like instant gratification, debt, interest payments, unconscious spending and buying stuff that does not bring you great joy.
I believe that your dreams are more important than the things you’ll have to give up. You get to decide; will it be what marketers want to sell you or your dreams?
This post was inspired by another simple and brilliant post by Seth Godin http://sethgodin.typepad.com/.
August 18th, 2009
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Suffering from Affluenza?
Answer the following questions to see how you are doing with your personal finances
- Do you have a written budget where you consciously and specifically allocate each dollar of income to spending, saving and investing before the month begins?
- Do you save money for irregular, annual, bi-annual or quarterly expenses like car repairs, gifts or insurance?
- Do you have medical insurance, short-term disability and long-term disability insurance and life insurance?
- Do you have an emergency fund equal to three to six months of your living expenses?
- Are you spending less than 35 percent of your take home pay on housing (rent, mortgage, property taxes, HOA fees)?
- Do you only pay for purchases with cash or debit cards?
- Are you investing 15 percent of your take home pay for the purpose of achieving financial independence?
- Are you saving for your children’s college fund at a rate that will allow them to attend a four-year institution without taking on student loans?
- Are you paying on your mortgage at a rate that will allow you to pay it off in 15 or fewer years?
- Do you work at your job because it is your passion?
- Has it been more than three months since have you worried about money?
- Do you have a dream toward which you are moving consciously and deliberately? If you have a partner, is it a shared dream?
If you answered “no” to one or more of these questions, you would benefit from some effective personal finance planning or coaching.
August 14th, 2009
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- Serve the wants and needs of others.
- Create happiness for others and yourself.
- Practice servant leadership*.
- Fulfill your needs and wants by helping others fulfill their own needs and wants.
- Participate only in Win-Win transactions.
- Focus all of your thoughts, words, emotions and actions on contributing to your personal success and the success of others.
*The term servant leadership was coined and defined by Robert Greenleaf, in his classic essay, The Servant as Leader, described the servant-leader in this manner:
The servant-leader is servant first… It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. That person is sharply different from one who is leader first, perhaps because of the need to assuage an unusual power drive or to acquire material possessions…The leader-first and the servant-first are two extreme types. Between them there are shadings and blends that are part of the infinite variety of human nature.
The difference manifests itself in the care taken by the servant-first to make sure that other people’s highest priority needs are being served. The best test, and difficult to administer, is: Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants? And, what is the effect on the least privileged in society? Will they benefit or at least not be further deprived?
August 14th, 2009
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Momentum: Creating True Financial Independence is a four-week personal finance program that meets one evening each week for two hours. Through Momentum most people can be debt-free, except for their mortgage, in 18 months or less. Read about my own experience of getting out of debt.
September Schedule: 6:00 – 8:00 pm Conf. Rm. 308 on 9/2, 9/9, 9/23 and 9/30
October Schedule: 6:00 – 8:00 pm Conf. Rm. 308 on 10/8, 10/15, 10/22 and 10/29
November Schedule: 6:00 – 8:00 pm Conf. Rm. 308 on 11/4, 11/11, 11/18 and 12/2
