Money Reasons

Smart Reasons to Save, Use and Invest Money

Archive for April, 2010

Spring Break Vacation

April 7th, 2010

Destination: Backyardville

Backyardville

My kids are on vacation for spring break this week. Because of some poor planning on my part, I got the same time off too, but at the last minute. Since my son started school, in previous years we only went on short 2 or 3 day vacations. Had I planned better, we could have gone on a bigger longer vacation.

But since I’m stuck in backyardville, I’m going to do the following exciting action packed activities:

Do Income Taxes (yes this is a rare year that I’ve procrastinated).

Personal Finance Ninja is have a free Turbo Tax Deluxe giveway

Change my car battery (I hate to spend the money!!!)
Change my car’s squeaky brakes.
Mow my lawn (Nooooo)
Spread organic weed and feed on my lawn (this is the first year I’m trying this).
Prepare to host the Yakezie Carnival this week.
Golf, some more (or at least a trip to the driving range)

If all goes well, next year I think I’ll plan something a little more extravagent! At least a trip to a major beach, or maybe a 5 day Disney Vacation (but probably not, I’m sure it’s super crowded during spring break). Most likely it will be a quick trip to the beach!

We’ll make the best of this vacation, but it sure chould have been better!

Reader: What did you do for vacation this spring break?

-MR

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Posted in Vacation

Tags: backyardville

Saving By Paying Attention – Conclusion Part 4 of 4

April 5th, 2010

Thinking money matters through

The “Saving By Paying Attention” series has been about focusing and not making rash decisions.

Too often, smart people don’t take the time to weigh all options when making an important decisions.

By paying attention, I’ve been able to buy a lot of things for free, like routers for my computers, DVDs, etc. With rebates, you can save substantial amount of money too. There are some huge coupon savings out there if you know where to look.

Another great tool for buying things at a huge discount is the internet. Sometimes you can find some great deals on Ebay.com. I’ve been able to buy old CD/DVDs from ebay for a great price, not to mention the unique, one of a kind items that can be found. For instance, I’ve been able to buy a firefighter nightlight from my son when he was younger.

Another great site for good prices on products is www.woot.com, I’ve been able to buy merchandise that has been refurbished at great prices. Both of my kid’s mp3 players were bought online at www.woot.com!

I’ve recently learned of a site called: http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/, but I haven’t researched it enough yet to feel comfortable recommending it. Still you might want to check it out, mainly they offer free software downloads.

Another great way save money is to go to blogger sites that are offering giveaways. Every so often, you’ll see a $100 dollar giveaway from the blogger sites!

I know people that use the radio contests to win money to. In fact, this is how one of my friends won a free house. Another friend continually calls the sites trying to win money and prizes. Often time she succeeds! It’s amazing the opportunities out there to either win money or prizes.

It you concentrate and think outside of the box, there are plenty of money saving or winning opportunities out there!

-MR

Previous Articles in this Series:

4 comments »

Posted in Costs, Savings

Tags: money attention Money thinking saving money

MoneyReasons Weekly Cache 2010, April 04

April 4th, 2010

Weekly Cache – 2010, April 04

Random Thoughts:

Today my son, dad, bother-in-law and I went to play golf for the first time this year. It was great! My son started play as he did last year, but by the end of the 9 holes, he ended up playing better than I was.

That said, today, I shot my first birdie, which was really cool! It was a par 5 hole, and my swings were practically perfect. I’m a beginner, so for me it was pretty exciting!

This was a good time for me, and one of the first ways that I’ve started spending more money on myself and my son. In the recent past, I would have skipped going to play golf with my dad and brother-in law because of the cost, but now I’ll going to go more often with my son. Both my dad and brother-in-law are great people for my son to hang with. I guess I’m kind of doing this for my son’s benefit mainly, but also, a smaller extend for me too. This is one of those win-win scenarios!

My Favorite Top 3 PF Blogger Posts For The Week:

PlantingDollars.com – Where Do You Store Your Financial Records? - Wise advice for your financial records in the technological age.

WellHeeledBlog.com – Getting a New Job: Next Step of Career Confirmed - A real example of getting a job and negotiating for a better salary! Kudos to WellHeeledBlog!!!

MyJourneytoMillions - Using Dividend Stocks to Get Free Coffee (a guest post by Ending The Rat Race) – A technique that is currently of great interest to me! I’ve currently own a few dividend yielding stocks in my primary brokerage account, and I’m running a lunch experiment where I’m basically doing the same thing that “The Rat” is doing. Except with dividends providing lunch instead of Coffee (Too much coffee isn’t all that good for you!).

My Favorite Post from Money Reasons This Week:

Spending More Money For a Better Life, Part 1 of 2 - this is basically my declaration that I’m going to introduce a little bit of lifestyle creep in my life, but in a controlled, positive manner.

Closing Thoughts:

Your Financial Life is about balance. Something not much talked about is the scale itself. Some scales are small, while some scales are very large. Warren Buffett’s scale is monstrously big, while mine is average.

This week, I had a serious eye opener when I realized that that my financial scale is out of balanced, but in a way that’s not typical. I realized that my imbalance was because I wasn’t spending enough! After all, life is short and if you have control over your debt, you should reap the rewards of being frugal and financially savvy. I’m going to continue this thought in Part 2 on my 2 part series called: Spending More Money For a Better Life.

Have a great festive weekend!

-MR

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Posted in Uncategorized

Spending More Money For a Better Life, Part 1 of 2

April 2nd, 2010

Increasing spending

I’ve noticed a trend with my blog and the comments I leave on other blogs… My typical response to financial questions and topics is: “It’s all about balance and maintaining that balance”.

But, after continually preaching the “Balance, it’s all about being balanced” mantra… I started to wonder how I have done with that viewpoint?

Unfortunately, I’ve concluded that I haven’t done a good job of following the mantra! But unlikely most, I’m slightly to the other extreme… I haven’t spent enough money, especially on myself.

For years, I’ve deprived myself of new clothes and other needs and wants, living much like I lived when I was in college (or close to it) and I was much poorer.

You might be thinking, that would mean that my entire family lives the way I live, but they don’t. In fact, there are many times when I suggest that the kids need new shoes, or sports equipment… My wife, though frugal like me, does buy new clothes and goes out to eat with her friends occasionally (at least a few times a month). I’ve been neglecting my friends, too worried about the cost of gas, or of a boy’s night out.

Okay, I identified the problem, but what am I going to do about it? Hmmm, good question! I have a few ideas, but I haven’t decided on the final one yet.

Some of my favorite options are:

Expansion of Stocks Dividends to Fund my “It’s all about Me! Fun Fund” (lol). I call these my Dividend Funds.
a Spending Budget, where I’ll create a special spot budget that centers around spending for just me and to a lesser extent the family.
Go hog wild, trips to Vegas and other exotic locations. leaving the family behind (don’t laugh, I have old friends that do this)
Possible a hybrid approach of Stock Dividends (Dividend Funds), and a Spending Budget.
Get a side hustle that could fund my “It’s all about Me! Fun Fund“, or just directly spend all of the side hustle money on me!

Of course, I will spend more money on the family too, but in an indirect way. For instance, I’m trying to work out how we can all go to Hawaii within the next 2 years…

I definitely won’t decrease the amount I spend on my family, to spend more on me. Most likely, I’ll just increase the amount of money I spend on myself my a small amount, perhaps an addtional $100 to $200 a month.

This is a work in process, I’ll follow up with a later post about what I decided to do and how I’m going to go about it.

-MR

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Posted in Entertainment, lifestyle