In the wake of the CARD Act comes some belt-tightening by credit card issuers because they now have to treat their most profitable customers as children, rather than letting them suffer the consequences of their financial actions. As these customers are no longer as profitable, issuers need to find money elsewhere. Enter The Case of … Read more
I’ve talked about Swagbucks a number of times. It’s a fun site that gives you “Swag Bucks” for doing things like searching the web, doing surveys, shopping, and voting in polls. These Swag Bucks can be redeemed for all manner of swag: books, magazines, jewelry, movies, sports cards, music, gift cards, and lots more. I’ve … Read more
While other bloggers are setting people up for failure this Labor Day, I hope that I can set up people for success. Do you have a job today? If you do, please take a second to give thanks for it. For me, and many others, it’s by far the largest source of income. And, as … Read more
Beks over at Blogging Away Debt is now officially finished with a self-imposed 60-day-long moratorium on dining out. She had a few hiccups along the way but overall had great success with the program. Even as early as week three she was getting into full swing of the new meal regimen, wasn’t tempted much at … Read more
This post over at Basically Money (now a member of the new family of Stack Exchange sites) asks whether to refinance a mortgage. Here’s the question: I have a 5-year ARM at 4.5% APR. I can renew the rate at 3.25%. However, the cost of is going to be $800. The current loan value is … Read more
As of right now we’re looking at about 30 hours before Hurricane Earl blows past our latitude. It reminds me of something that happened during the aftermath of previous hurricanes: price gouging. Price gouging is a disparaging term given to the practice of hiking prices of demand items after some disruption has occurred that would … Read more
It’s a little embarrassing that I’ve seen so many advertisements and blogs for things related to “forex” and I never bothered to look up what the heck that meant. Thankfully, it turned out that I had heard of what it means, just not by that word. “Forex” is an abbreviation for the (huge) foreign exchange … Read more
(This is a guest post from ThinkingMoney.org. If you like what you’ve read, consider subscribing to their feed.) When going on holiday one of the biggest worries is money. Having a budget and overspending is done far too often as we get carried away. Traveling abroad has special challenges. It doesn’t help that for some … Read more