The high price of gasoline has led travel industry analysts to coin a new term – the “staycation.” They believe lots of folks will vacation close to home this summer, opting for near-by, low-cost attractions. What are your summer vacation plans? Have they been impacted by high gas prices? We’re renting a house on Lake […]
Author Archive | Matt Bell
Mom’s Last Money Lesson
Anyone who has lost someone they love will tell you it’s the holidays that bring back their strongest memories of those people. So, with Mother’s Day fast approaching, I’ve been thinking about my mom who passed away in December of 2003. This year brought back a memory of a conversation we had about money just […]
How to Save for College
The go-to source for information about saving for college has been the aptly named Savingforcollege.com web site. But Morningstar is giving that site a run for its money with a new analysis of the best and worst 529 plans, along with a comprehensive set of articles about the pros and cons of such plans and […]
Overspend, Overspend-Me-Not
A recent Businessweek.com story mentioned a coupon site I had never heard of before that turns out to be unusually good: RetailMeNot.com. Enter the name of an online store where you’re planning to do some shopping and it’ll give you a coupon code, if available. I figured the site would have coupons for all of […]
The Stuff of Life
The next time you sip from a can of soda consider this: the average American will consume more than 43,000 cans of soda in his or her lifetime. Opting for something a bit healthier, like an orange? We’ll each consume nearly 13,000 of them in our lifetime. Those are among the facts and figures from […]
Remembering Who You Are
“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” – Genesis 1:27 Some people cry while watching love stories. I cried while watching a horse story. Seabiscuit is the true story of a Depression-era racehorse that, along with its owner, trainer, and […]
Click and Give
Did you know that just by performing Internet searches you could help support your favorite charity? As reported in the Wall Street Journal, each search through Search Kindly or Good Search generates a charitable contribution of about a penny. That may not sound like a lot, but with lots of people doing lots of searches […]
Multiplying Your Tax Rebate
With rebate checks soon to start showing up in people’s mailboxes, retailers are eager to see us spend the money in their stores. For a limited time, several are offering to add 10 percent to the value of your tax rebate if you use the full amount to purchase gift cards at their stores. The […]
The Right Way to Save on Gas
You’re doing all that you can to save on gas these days, right? You’ve made sure your tires are properly inflated; you’ve taken all the heavy stuff out of your trunk; you’ve even taken to turning off your engine while waiting for a train to pass by. Ah, but there’s one more step you can […]
Shades of Green
Green is in, and that means store shelves are lined with products claiming to be environmentally friendly. However, according to an article on Smartmoney.com, many supposedly eco-friendly products are more hype than environmentally helpful. The story reported on one study of over 1,000 products with eco-friendly claims, which found all but one containing claims that […]