Blueprint For Financial Prosperity has an excellent write up about his prior addictions - from soda to bottled water, and how it’s important to not get hooked on “the higher end items.”
This is one of those areas that my wife and I are often at odds about - she prefers bottled water, expensive meats, and Jif peanut butter, along with other items that are more expensive (but are they necessarily worth it?) I, for one, enjoy eating the leaner cuts of beef, and made the mistake of buying cheap peanut butter once. I can’t recall the brand, or where it was from, but it was the most disgusting peanut butter I’ve ever tasted (and I’ve tasted military peanut butter, which isn’t half bad!) Water, on the other hand, I prefer to drink cheap. Until my last apartment…
Where we once lived, the tap water tasted like chlorinated pool water. We made spaghetti with it, and it tasted like chlorinated noodles. Brita water filters did nothing, so we took up to buying bottled water (.59 cents a gallon from Kroger’s). We drank a ton of water at the time (we were on Weight Watchers), so this caused a huge dent in our budget, up until we moved.
Thankfully, our current water off the tap (ran through Brita) tastes excellent - although my wife swears by country water, which makes me think of Homer Simpson - and in honor of bottled water “If it’s brown, drink it down, if it’s black, send it back!” - and in honor of Smashing Pumpkin’s new Album, Zeitgeist, here’s one of my favorite clips.
I don’t know about you, but I fell into the interest of personal finance from getting into reading blogs. The more I read, the more it intrigued me. It reminded me of the past experiences and money mistakes. Perhaps most people are put off by their lack of understanding terms - meaning they need to improve their financial literacy (the knowledge of facts, concepts, principles, and technological tools that are fundamental to being smart about money). This leads to most people learning about personal financial planning and developing and implementing a coordinated and integrated long-range plans to achieve financial success.
In planning, we hold ourselves responsible for our own success, happiness, and establishment of our security and standard of living (in the present and the future). It’s a huge part of our life that many people ignore until it’s too late - and then they learn from their mistakes, but it costs them (potentially) thousands of dollars, or wrecks their credit rating (which can potentially effect your employment, your mortgage, your car purchase… every financial aspect of your life). It’s my goal as I continue my education to get a better understanding and establish a better budget and mind set - I don’t mean miserly, I don’t mean “living like no other today so you can live like no other tomorrow” - I mean being able to save up for vacations without putting it all on credit, buying a car with cash, and using credit card arbitrage to its full potential. It’s a difficult premise, but then again, life isn’t easy.
Financial planning, focusing on establishing and achieving long-term goals through planning and budgeting,
Money management, centering on minimizing income taxes and efficient utilization of cash and credit,
Managing expenditures, especially for “big ticket” items such as vehicles and housing,
Income and asset protection through insurance, so that hard-earned resources and assets are not placed at undue risk,
Investment planning, with its focus on selecting the appropriate investment vehicles based on the objectives at hand and the relative levels of investment risk, and
Retirement and estate planning, with the ultimate goal of being able to live off of one’s financial nest egg and plan for transfer of assets to heirs.
It’s never just a simple process - fortunately we have trained professionals to assist. Certified Financial Planners can help you plan with these six steps, and Certified Public Accountants can help you get your finances together and straightened out. Over the next few months I’m planning on elaborating on these six points - from an educational stand point, as I am not a CFP, CPA, or any other TLA.
Off and on again I follow the Motley Fool. It tends to have some interesting articles (when they aren’t pitching their own services) - and this one I had to laugh at:
Warren Buffet Issues Death Threat: “We show below our common stock investments. With two exceptions, those that had a market value of more than $700 million at the end of 2006 are itemized. We don’t itemize the two securities referred to, which have a market value of $1.9 billion, because we continue to buy them. I could, of course, tell you their names. But then I would have to kill you.“
Basically, this is smart investing - something Roger Blackwell is not accustomed to doing (which is a shame, I hear he was an excellent and awesome teacher). By identifying that you made some wise choices - and keeping them private - it keeps the stock price from being manipulated, and it keeps you where you want to be - on top. Like The Fools point out, letting slip those winning picks would lead to termination.
What I find most amusing is when they talk about Jim Cramer’s Mad Money - and how the returns tend to drop on his recommendations. The irony is of course, stocks shouldn’t be picked with short-term gains in mind. Actually, I followed a pick from the beginning of the year and once it took a dive (as I figured his recommendation would) I bought some up and saw a great return on it (and I am currently holding the stocks as they continue to climb!)
Picking stocks is a difficult thing - when you rely on someone on a show, or website, you are relying on the information that’s also being given to hundreds of thousand other people - so if everyone buys in, it’s going to screw with the prices, shooting them up or down depending on the situation. It’s like penny-stocks - they have the potential to make you a huge profit or screw you over horribly. Those emails you get, those “stock tips” from your friend about that new start-up/cable channel catering to a special group - they can make him rich and make you lose your investment.
Basically, stocks are a volatile area. You need to know people, recognize trends and be able to recognize the stats and probabilities of stocks before you buy (of course, in the area of Personal Finance - you really should have your monetary affairs in order before you start thinking about buying stocks).
This makes sense, doesn’t it? I think people are starting to realize that MONEY is NOT WORTH IT. Family time, friends time, play time are more important than work. Low stress, good pay - versus high stress and pay? Every is inticed at first by the “big bucks.” They can buy a benz or beamer, they can buy a bigger house, they can spend more money on meaningless crap and never enjoy it!
Honestly, this is why I miss working an hourly job - you got paid based on your output vs. a set amount no matter what. Salary means your performance is imperative to keep up so as not to be cut/down sized/let go/laid off. Hourly means you bust your ass and your work has a lot more meaning to it. You put in forty hours and do great work - or you put in 80 hours and do exceptional work, either way your pay is going to double. You may not always be able to, but those overtime opportunities will come up, though not always. There are always many pros and cons. This could almost be leveraged on a case by case basis, which would take us years to go through - the point is to leverage your current job, responsibilities, and pay vs. a different job with less pay and responsibilities. small town sleeper is totally different.
Of course, then comes in the education - it’s assumed you need to justify your degree. I know art majors that manage warehouses, and art majors that design websites. Doctorates that do lowly teaching positions, and liberal arts majors that start companies. It’s a mix of education, desire, and determination. Some people succeed with a GED. And of course, some people want to attribute it to luck, family, or faith. Often it’s who you know not what you know. Not always, but sometimes - and sometimes it works against you.
I’ve found the strangest thing about having a child is that everything in child size costs ten times what I’d pay for the same thing in my size, and I’d get longer use out of it!
Fortunately, there are a plethora of used children’s stores around (like Once Upon a Child) that rake in the dough by selling (and buying) gently used baby clothing, toys, and other needed baby items. A new crib? A couple hundred. A used crib? $60. Even better, is when friends (and friends friends) hear you’re having children, they pass on their old child’s clothing/toys/stuff to you!
We’ve saved a mint by buying used, and saved even more through the generosity of friends and family. A lady who knew we were having a baby contacted my wife’s parents and gave them a couple grand worth of baby stuff - including a real wooden bassinet, a car seat/stroller combo (one of the high end ones, to boot!). It’s nice that people still think of helping out other people and not just making a buck.
The biggest complaint I’ve had about baby items is people always want to make their money back. I’ve read a number of blogs where people talk about buying a crib for $300 and then have a garage sale and get offended by offers for less than $150 or even $200 - that’s just insane on the seller’s part. People go to garage sales for deals not to help you get your money back. What I also love is they are offended because “they take great care of their items - why shouldn’t they ask for more?” That’s fine when you’re selling to a friend or someone that knows you are meticulous with cleanliness - but to a stranger they’re going to assume you wiped it down once to make it look good on the sales floor - and that’s it. Unless they approach you while you are polishing it down with disinfectant, I’d say you might as well drop that card.
But then how do you get a good deal? Point out flaws (you missed the milk spot, the wood is chipped, it’s missing pieces/manuals). Of course, you won’t always be able to land a deal, but it never hurts to ask.
StoryPlace: The Children's Digital Library1969/12/31 I need this for future reference. I know this is something the Wife and I will probably play around with when our Son is of age....
small town sleeper
