As promised, here is a post on how spending more money actually saved me money. Some of you might recall from my August Expense Check-up, that I spent $90 on a two month supply of contact lenses. In the post I said that I felt that it was too much and would try 1-800-Contacts the next time I ordered. Well “next time” turned out to be last week, so I tried it out. And am I ever glad I did! By going to 1-800 Contacts.com I was able to get a 6 month supply of contacts for $150. Or to [...]
Read MoreNovember 2008
That’s right, even someone who has a great 5 year track record with credit cards can occasionally make a mistake. This past weekend I submitted an electronic bill pay request for my credit card that was due on Monday. Normally I pay my bills well in advance, but rewards of financial simplicity have started to set in and I only have three bills to pay at the end the month which has dulled my watchfulness. I knew that the payment should take two days to get there, but I just overlooked that for some stupid reason. Other than carrying a [...]
Read MoreI haven’t done this often in the past, but I wanted to give a shout out to the top ten referers in October. Thanks for all the traffic. MSN Money Central Smart Money Blogs (Karen Datko) No Credit Needed (Recommended Reading) Budgets Are Sexy Political Calculations Frugal Babe Common Sense With Money Paid It Down All Financial Matters Pants In A Can Celtic Buffy Debt Slayer The top three October posts were : Checkout Credit Card Signups, Worth It or Not? Bankruptcy…an easy way out? 160th Carnival Of Debt Reduction – Bailout Edition
Read MoreHere is the latest installment of my family’s monthly expenses. Below are the results from October: $830.00 – Mortgage $771.00 – Daycare $675.00 – Life Insurance $499.75 – Groceries $170.00 – PPST Test (for school) $159.68 – Utilities (water, sewer, & garbage billed quarterly) $156.80 – Gas $152.77 – Household Misc $149.94 – Contacts $125.00 – Student Loan $115.75 – Phone & Internet $111.71 – Electricity $85.47 – Dining Out $51.93 – Dog Food $49.12 – Kid stuff $41.00 – Clothes $40.00 – Medical bills $15.00 – Donations $12.00 – Haircut For a grand total this month of $4211.94! Nuts, [...]
Read MoreThe Rock Garden has been planning a move back to Pennsylvania for a long time now and the wheels are finally in motion. The logistics of trying to sell our house, buy a new house, and deal with changing both our jobs is a bit scary at times, but it is something we both want(especially me). We have been talking about this move for years, so we have laid out some common sense principles that will help keep us on track when the house buying frenzy begins to cloud our thinking. It is easy to get caught up in the [...]
Read MoreMy wife love lists. She’s always making them: Grocery Lists To-Do Lists Christmas Lists You name it and she’ll make a list. She starts her week by making a list of projects that need to get done. Usually her lists are quite handy, unless they are the dreaded “Honey-Do List”. But there is one kind of list that we can agree on. The wish list. For as long as I’ve known her, my wife has always kept a list of things that she wants. Once we got married we started a couple’s “wish list”. In fact we keep it on [...]
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