Weekly list of curated personal finance articles from around the web. Are you TOO cheap? 4 ways cheaping out could cost you in the long run (MoneyNing). When frugality crosses a line. See also, The case against frugality. The airline industry’s biggest winners are betting you’ll pay to fly in style (Wall Street Journal). I […]
Archive | Investing
Getting Started With Investing
For help determining how much you may need for your retirement, figuring out your optimal asset allocation, adopting the best process for choosing investments, and choosing among your IRA and 401(K) options, read The Essentials of Investing. For college funding, read How to Help Your Kids Pay for College.
Profitable Ideas: Avoid Driving a Wealth Killer, Fail-Proof Your Budget, and More
Weekly list of curated personal finance articles from around the web. Cars were once a financial engine of America’s middle class. Now they’re a ‘wealth killer.’ (MarketWatch via Yahoo Finance). I’ve run the numbers five ways and sideways — a car payment just doesn’t fit on a cash flow plan. Not if you want to […]
Profitable Ideas: Boomer Money Secrets, Nothing Average About the Market, and More
Weekly list of curated personal finance articles from around the web. How boomers’ money secrets are a ticking time bomb for their kids (Sherwood). Parents, talk with your adult children about your finances—for their sake. Here’s the science behind our stupid money mistakes (Fast Company). How to retrain your brain to do better. How to […]
How’s Your Financial Health?
If you were to take your financial life in for an annual check-up, how would it look? To put it in cholesterol terms, would your LDL (debt) be too high? Would your HDL (savings) be too low? Each year, researchers at the University of Southern California and a group called The Financial Health Network use […]
Profitable Ideas: The High Cost of Changing Jobs, College Rankings That Matter, and More
Weekly list of curated personal finance articles from around the web. Changing jobs can put a $300,000 dent in your retirement (Wall Street Journal). Auto-enrollment retirement plans can give you a very costly false sense of confidence. See also, Financial automation: when helping hurts. Overcoming the emotional impulse to spend (FaithFi). The lies of our […]
Profitable Ideas: The Boring Path to $1 Million, Money Lessons to Teach Your Teens, and More
Weekly list of curated personal finance articles from around the web. The number one way Americans are becoming millionaires (Morningstar). It isn’t very exciting, but it does have the advantage of being effective. The most reliable car brands, according to Consumer Reports (Visual Capitalist). Not a ton of surprises here, except perhaps Porsche and BMW […]
How Successful Investors Talk, or Not
I had conversations with two investors recently that were very telling. The first conversation was with a guy in his 40s who invests his own money—for a living. That’s what he does. It’s how he provides for his family. It’s very unusual, and probably conjures up images of a day-trader, someone trying to sell positions […]
An Investor’s Got to Know His (or Her) Limitations
Fear finally caused me to stop. I was in Colorado, reconnecting with some long-time friends, one of whom is an experienced mountain climber. He had slowly driven us up a perilous-looking, narrow and rocky path cut along the side of a mountain. There were no guardrails to protect us from the sheer drop-off. Bouncing around […]
Profitable Ideas: Learning to Let Go, The Pros and Cons of Allowances, and More
Weekly list of curated personal finance articles from around the web. Helicopter money (The Contessa Counts). Letting go isn’t easy, but it’s so important. 31 years of stock market returns (A Wealth of Common Sense). To succeed as an investor, you have to stay with it. Do you spend money more like a millennial or […]
Profitable Ideas: Yet Another (Big) Data Breach, Beware the Wealth Effect, and More
Weekly list of curated personal finance articles from around the web. Hackers may have stolen the Social Security numbers of every American. Here’s how to protect yourself (LA Times). A security freeze at the three national credit bureaus is your strongest line of defense. So much about real estate commissions just changed. Here’s what to […]