Housing is right up there with groceries as a major household budget item for many families — not just in the raw amount of money shelled out, but also in importance. Food and shelter and all that. Since housing involves a commitment (either a lease or a mortgage) there’s less flexibility in adjusting housing costs … Read more
The Empowered Dollar had an enviable problem. She had enough cushion in savings for repayment of student loans. In the end, she decided to split the difference between paying off her student loans and depleting her savings. She “couldn’t bear to part with all” of her savings. For my two cents this was a very … Read more
My friend J Money heartily disagrees that budgets are boring. I think that budgeting can be made palatable, but fun? If anyone can hit on the magic formula that makes budgeting fun, they’ll be very rich indeed. A blogging colleague was asking around on Facebook about budgeting presentations that weren’t “boring and irrelevant for 18-22 … Read more
One of my Yakezie friends Fiscal Phoenix got some advice from a financial planner about paying off debt. The choice was between paying down student loans and paying down credit cards. The credit cards had a lower average balance and a higher average interest rate than the student loans. Given these pieces of information, it … Read more
I’ve been taking a Bible study offered by Crown Financial Ministries. It’s a well put-together study that involves scripture memorization, Bible verse study, group discussion, practical exercises, and more. This past week’s topic was debt, and not surprisingly, the Bible doesn’t have too many good things to say about debt 🙂 and encourages people to … Read more
I’ve posted on this more common debt clock before. It’s pretty scary. The national debt stands at $14.4 trillion. It was “only” $10 trillion as recently as October, 2008. This newer debt clock hasn’t gotten quite as gigantic as the other one, but it’s more directly troubling for many young Americans. Currently, $922 billion is … Read more
Although it’s not quite dinner conversation yet, talking about family finances with other people is getting to be less taboo. This is a good thing, because the forces at work that aim to part us from our money are more devious, stronger, and more numerous than they were fifty years ago. A big part of … Read more
As much as I follow football, I thought the Pittsbay Stackers and the Greenburgh Peelers were playing. (But seriously, congratulations to the Packers. Something needed to knock my rabid Steelers fan colleagues down a few notches.) I caught this tweet from @blondeonabudget regarding the outcome of Super Bowl XLV: “My only regret was that I … Read more