Bargain Feeder: Bargaineering

Your Take: Do You Trust Financial Advisers?

Bargaineering — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 12:26:33 GMT

I don’t trust financial advisers. I’m not entirely sure why but I inherently do not trust experts in any non-science field and I have my fraud radar on red alert if it has anything to do with money. I separate financial advisers into two categories – those that help you plan and those that help [...]

Your Take: Do You Trust Financial Advisers? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Your Take: Do You Check Off $3 To The Presidential Fund?

Bargaineering — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 12:10:36 GMT

When you go to do your taxes this year, you will have the option to give three of your tax dollars to the Presidential Election Campaign Fund. $3 isn’t deducted from your refund or added to your tax bill, $3 from your taxes is simply allocated for the fund. The money is used to in [...]

Your Take: Do You Check Off $3 To The Presidential Fund? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Insider’s Look at Drug & Vitamin Expiration Dates

Bargaineering — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 17:06:36 GMT

After my last post on drugs, vitamins and expiration dates, I received an anonymous email from someone who claims to work in the pharmaceutical industry. They wanted to share some insider knowledge on how drug and vitamin expiration dates really work. A lot of it confirms and expands on what I wrote initially but includes [...]

Insider’s Look at Drug & Vitamin Expiration Dates from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Thousands of “Insider” Tips from Reddit

Bargaineering — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 12:05:34 GMT

If you have a few (dozen) hours to kill and want to learn some pretty insightful things, I have to recommend this fantastic thread on Reddit where users share all sorts of tips. There is a heavy dose of tips on how to buy electronics (warranties and how to abuse them), how to buy cars, [...]

Thousands of “Insider” Tips from Reddit from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Unemployment Benefits Are Taxable

Bargaineering — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 17:03:44 GMT

Last year was a year to forget, especially if you were one of the many millions to lose their job. Fortunately, through various stimulus packages and other laws, unemployment benefits were extended to help people through a difficult time. Unfortunately, some of those unemployment benefits are taxable as income. Fortunately, for the 2009 tax [...]

Unemployment Benefits Are Taxable from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Don’t Invest In The Stock Market

Bargaineering — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 14:57:59 GMT

We are led to believe that the best place to invest our money is in the stock market. Low barriers to entry, low barriers to exist, plenty of information, high probability of success in the long run and a lot of success stories. We also hear some of the horror stories of people who day [...]

Don’t Invest In The Stock Market from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

2010 Fortune’s 25 Top Paying Companies

Bargaineering — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 17:30:47 GMT

Every year, Forbes puts out it’s full list of the Top 100 companies to work for and every year I look for the two employers I’ve ever had… only really expecting to see one of them (and fairness, there aren’t any major defense contractors on the list). This year, my last company, Booz Allen Hamilton, [...]

2010 Fortune’s 25 Top Paying Companies from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Budgeting Is About Your System, Not Your Tools

Bargaineering — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 12:35:24 GMT

Yesteryday, I wrote a post about zero based budgeting, a type of budget that forces you to assign each dollar of income to an expense category. I think it’s a very good way of budgeting but one that can be difficult for nonbudgeters (I think envelope budgeting is the best way, of the five budgeting [...]

Budgeting Is About Your System, Not Your Tools from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Four Factors to Consider Before Roth IRA Conversion

Bargaineering — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 17:06:21 GMT

Now that the income limitations have been lifted and anyone can convert a tax-deferred Traditional or Rollover IRA into a tax free Roth IRA, a lot of blogs, gurus, and news sites have been celebrating the Roth IRA conversion. I have always held the Roth IRA in high regard because it’s a fantastic retirement investment [...]

Four Factors to Consider Before Roth IRA Conversion from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

How to Build a Zero-based Budget

Bargaineering — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 12:02:34 GMT

A zero based budget is a budget where every dollar you earn is assigned to a category in your budget. Your income minus your expenses equals zero – zero based budget. The idea sounds very simple, and it is, but the real value in creating and following a zero-based budget is that it requires you [...]

How to Build a Zero-based Budget from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Your Take: Your Favorite Board Game

Bargaineering — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 12:16:06 GMT

This week I wrote about how to maximize your entertainment dollar and all the comments seemed to center around our favorite board games. So it seemed like the perfect Friday Your Take post would be if everyone shared their favorite games! Our latest favorite is Dominion, as I mentioned in that post, because it’s a different [...]

Your Take: Your Favorite Board Game from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Ally Bank Offers 2-Year Bump Up CDs

Bargaineering — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 22:22:19 GMT

Until today, I don’t believe I’ve ever seen any online bank offer a bump up CD. A bump up CD is a certificate of deposit that gives you the option to increase the current rate of your CD to the published rate, “bumping” it up. If you remember my attempt at being cute with the [...]

Ally Bank Offers 2-Year Bump Up CDs from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

How Does the IRS Pick Tax Returns to Audit?

Bargaineering — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 17:19:47 GMT

Doing your taxes is never fun. Even if you ignore how you must spend a couple hours filling out boring forms, finding documents, researching deductions, blah blah, there’s always the fear that you’ll be audited. I remember having the most vanilla tax returns back when I was a teenager, the 1040-EZ, and even then I [...]

How Does the IRS Pick Tax Returns to Audit? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Ten Largest Banks in the U.S.

Bargaineering — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 12:35:51 GMT

The Move Your Money campaign peaked a few weeks ago but in our household we still haven’t yet made the change from a large bank to a local community bank or credit union. Part of the reason is inertia, the center spoke in our financial network map if our Bank of America account, but we’re [...]

Ten Largest Banks in the U.S. from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

The New Frugality by Chris Farrell

Bargaineering — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 17:02:06 GMT

The New Frugality by Chris Farrell is a new personal finance book that discusses a growing trend in America towards frugality. As we claw our way out of the Great Recession, American families are going back to smarter and safer spending after a near decade at the buffet table of cheap credit. This isn’t a [...]

The New Frugality by Chris Farrell from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Citi Introduces Credit Card & Banking iPhone App

Bargaineering — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 15:27:28 GMT

Citi is one of the first credit card companies to produce their own branded iPhone app – called Citi Mobile. It’s pretty much what you’d expect, all of the functionality of the Citi website packaged up in a nice little iPhone app. With the banking part of the app, you can look up ATMs and [...]

Citi Introduces Credit Card & Banking iPhone App from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Debt Collector Crusader Craig Cunningham in Dallas Observer

Bargaineering — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 14:36:10 GMT

When I wanted to run a series on fighting debt collectors, I knew I wanted an expert. I was fortunate to have little in the way of debt (just a mortgage and student loans) so I had no personal experience with combating with debt collectors, but I knew someone on Fatwallet, Codename47, was a debt [...]

Debt Collector Crusader Craig Cunningham in Dallas Observer from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

How to Maximize Your Entertainment Dollar

Bargaineering — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 12:41:26 GMT

Over the last few months, my wife and I have been doing a lot of traveling by car. To help pass the time on the road, we’ve been borrowing a lot of books on tape from our local library. On our most recent trip, we finished Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol (we weren’t big fans) [...]

How to Maximize Your Entertainment Dollar from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Overdraft Protection Is A Good Thing

Bargaineering — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 21:02:41 GMT

The NYT Bucks blog published a post today warning us that banks will start direct mail promotions to get customers to opt into their overdraft protection. While they don’t explicitly say overdraft protection is a bad thing, they do want to help protect against some fear mongering on the part of banks. I think that’s [...]

Overdraft Protection Is A Good Thing from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Claim Haiti Relief Donations on Your 2009 Tax Return

Bargaineering — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 17:01:26 GMT

This week, President Obama signed into law a bill that lets taxpayers claim donations made to earthquake relief in Haiti on their 2009 tax returns. If you make a cash contribution between January 11th, 2010 and March 1st, 2010 towards relief aid for earthquake victims in Haiti, you can claim it on your 2009 tax [...]

Claim Haiti Relief Donations on Your 2009 Tax Return from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

How to Save Time & Money at the Post Office (By Avoiding It!)

Bargaineering — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 12:03:02 GMT

You don’t have to ask too many of my friends, or my wife, to learn that I am not a fan of waiting. I hate sitting in traffic, especially if it’s just “congestion,” and I really hate waiting at the post office, where it seems as if there are always twice as many counters as [...]

How to Save Time & Money at the Post Office (By Avoiding It!) from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Roth IRA Contribution Limit Phaseout Calculator

Bargaineering — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 17:28:11 GMT

If you’re confused about how much you can contribute to your Roth IRA this year, this calculator can help! As you probably know, you have until tax day, April 15th, to make a contribution to your Roth IRA for 2009. What you might not know is how much you are able to contribute, if your [...]

Roth IRA Contribution Limit Phaseout Calculator from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Five Psychological Money Tricks That Work

Bargaineering — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 12:43:40 GMT

For being such a dollars and cents type of issue, personal finance sure has a lot of psychology involved, doesn’t it? If it weren’t for psychology, ideas like Dave Ramsey’s debt snowball method would be dead on arrival. The debt snowball works because it taps into human psychology, not mathematics. Paying off your smallest debt [...]

Five Psychological Money Tricks That Work from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Your Take: What Do You Look For in a Bank or Credit Union?

Bargaineering — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 12:15:50 GMT

This week Liz Weston wrote about how to shop for a new bank and it made me think about how we chose the banks we work with now. For us, the criteria for judging a checking account differed from the criteria for judging a savings account. We use the two different types of accounts for [...]

Your Take: What Do You Look For in a Bank or Credit Union? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

How to Check the Status of Your Tax Refund

Bargaineering — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 17:32:10 GMT

It seems a little early but I’ve been getting a lot of “where is my refund?”-type of emails lately. While I won’t know the answer to that question (and I shouldn’t, the IRS should be that loose with your personal information!), the IRS will. While not usually known for tech savviness, the IRS does have [...]

How to Check the Status of Your Tax Refund from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

How to Measure and Track Your Net Worth

Bargaineering — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 12:25:12 GMT

When you were in school, chances are you knew what you needed on each test to get an A, a B, or a C (or avoid an F!). At work, you have project deadlines to meet and performance criteria to fulfill. When it comes to your finances, there isn’t a convenient, single number you can [...]

How to Measure and Track Your Net Worth from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Get Financially Naked by Manisha Thakor and Sharon Kedar

Bargaineering — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 17:47:15 GMT

Get Financially Naked by Manisha Thakor and Sharon Kedar is a book that helps couples discuss financial issues before they become Issues. The two collaborated on On My Own Two Feet: A Modern Girl’s Guide to Personal Finance and while they traveled the United States to promote it, they were frequently asked questions about how [...]

Get Financially Naked by Manisha Thakor and Sharon Kedar from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Help Me Represent PF Blogging in the Shorty Awards!

Bargaineering — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 13:53:22 GMT

The Shorty Awards is an awards ceremony for the “best producers of short real-time content.” At the moment, in the Finance category, there are investing gurus, forex gurus, and stock trading gurus all over the top 20 list. There isn’t a single regular personal finance blogger on the entire list… that just isn’t right! If you [...]

Help Me Represent PF Blogging in the Shorty Awards! from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

How to Report Tax Fraud & Tax Cheats

Bargaineering — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 12:06:49 GMT

One of the largest tax fraud schemes was blown wide open last year when ex-UBS AG banker Bradley Birkenfeld blew the whistle on a $20 billion tax evasion scheme at UBS. His testimony played a “key role” in showing US investigators how UBS was helping Americans hide assets. As a result, UBS agreed to hand [...]

How to Report Tax Fraud & Tax Cheats from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Surprise! Peer to Peer Lending is Risky

Bargaineering — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 20:34:54 GMT

Earlier this week, Mark Gimein wrote a great article on TheBigMoney.com detailing, statistically, how risky person-to-person lending really is. I’ve always known it to be peer to peer lending or social lending, but the article calls out the riskiness of Prosper.com, the first and one of the largest of the peer lending networks. To look at [...]

Surprise! Peer to Peer Lending is Risky from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Converting Old European Currency to New Euros

Bargaineering — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 17:06:25 GMT

Can you believe the euro has been around for almost eight years? I didn’t realize it’s been that long until I read a Bankrate question about options for converting old European currency (there aren’t many). That page referenced a University of British Columbia’s Sauder School of Business page that has anything and everything you could [...]

Converting Old European Currency to New Euros from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Do Expiration Dates on Drugs or Vitamins Matter?

Bargaineering — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 12:33:40 GMT

My lovely wife got a little under the weather last week, so she reached into our medicine cabinet to find some NyQuil or Robitussin to help her beat back the cold. To her surprise, the Robitussin had expired about six months ago and she wasn’t sure how effective it was going to be. We had [...]

Do Expiration Dates on Drugs or Vitamins Matter? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Request Your CLUE Report

Bargaineering — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 17:02:09 GMT

Have you requested your CLUE report lately? It’s one of several specialty reports you should be reviewing annually and today I requested mine. CLUE stands for Comprehensive Loss Underwriting Exchange and your CLUE report details your seven year claims history with your insurance company. You have two CLUE reports, both of which come from ChoicePoint: CLUE Personal [...]

Request Your CLUE Report from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

How to Improve a Good Credit Score

Bargaineering — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 12:06:41 GMT

In the last few years, the importance of credit scores and the publicity of that importance has shot up tremendously. With the loose credit era behind us, and banks fearful of taking on more under and non-performing loans (ie. loans not being paid on time and in full), your credit score and your credit report [...]

How to Improve a Good Credit Score from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Wisdom on Value Investing by Gabriel Wisdom

Bargaineering — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 17:02:47 GMT

Wisdom on Value Investing by Gabriel Wisdom is based on Wisdom’s professional experience and his Fallen Angels investment strategy, a way to identify good companies that have been punished by the stock market. Value investing is an investment strategy made popular by Benjamin Graham and brought to the forefront with the successes of Warren Buffett. The [...]

Wisdom on Value Investing by Gabriel Wisdom from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Your Take: How Do You Prepare Your Taxes?

Bargaineering — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 14:29:20 GMT

Last night I had to pleasure to finally meet some of the DC personal finance bloggers and some PR folks at a happy hour (or three) hosted by TurboTax at Busboys and Poets at 5th and K Street. It was a fun event that was really casual and it was nice to meet people I’d [...]

Your Take: How Do You Prepare Your Taxes? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Don’t Pay to File the 1040-EZ

Bargaineering — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 17:35:56 GMT

Did you know that millions of Americans pay a tax preparer to file their 1040EZ? It’s a single page with ten blanks! According to the Department of Education’s National Assessment of Adult Literacy, 20 million Americans pay someone to file their 1040EZ (courtesy of Red Tape Chronicles). It’s pretty amazing right? There’s no reason why you [...]

Don’t Pay to File the 1040-EZ from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Avoid EMail Bankruptcy with Inbox 0.5

Bargaineering — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 13:15:29 GMT

As someone who makes their living off the Internet, I get a lot of email every day and some days it’s very difficult to keep up. While I’ve never gotten to the point of declaring email bankruptcy, there are times when I’ve forgotten about emails because they’ve fallen off the page in Gmail. Lately, I’ve [...]

Avoid EMail Bankruptcy with Inbox 0.5 from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

BVC #24 – How to Pick A Stock Broker

Bargaineering — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 17:31:44 GMT

Every week or two, I get an email from a reader wanting to know who I think is the best stock broker. I usually tell them that when it comes to my retirement, I use Vanguard because I like their mutual funds and because I can invest in those mutual funds for free. For my [...]

BVC #24 – How to Pick A Stock Broker from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Are Prepaid Legal Plans Worth It?

Bargaineering — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 12:20:55 GMT

A few years ago, my former company began offering prepaid legal plans as an employee benefit. I forget the exact terms of the deal but it worked a lot like medical insurance. You pay a set amount each month and you had access to the plan’s pool of lawyers. The pool could prepare certain documents [...]

Are Prepaid Legal Plans Worth It? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Two Huge Blog Giveaways

Bargaineering — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 19:16:09 GMT

I don’t normally write about blog giveaways but when I’m going to make an exception today because the giveaway prizes are all pretty rich. The first is from Kelly at The Centsible Life – she’s giving away $600 of stuff as part of her site’s one year anniversary. You can win all sorts of gift [...]

Two Huge Blog Giveaways from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Revive the Personal Boycott

Bargaineering — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 16:58:23 GMT

When I first watched the Move Your Money video, I was surprised with how much it resonated with me. The Move Your Money movement has really caught on, at least on the web, and it taps into an instinct we’ve taught ourselves to suppress. When it comes to money, we try to suppress emotion as a [...]

Revive the Personal Boycott from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

The S&P500 Dividend Aristocrats

Bargaineering — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 12:21:37 GMT

The S&P Dividend Aristocrats are companies in the S&P500 index that have increased their dividends every year for at least 25 consecutive years. Companies on the list have been increasing their dividends since 1984 – meaning they’ve increased it through the economic malaise of the early 90’s, the dot com bubble of the early 2000s, [...]

The S&P500 Dividend Aristocrats from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Don’t Pay Taxes with American Express Points

Bargaineering — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 22:59:47 GMT

American Express announced today that you could pay your tax bill using Membership Reward points. For every 200 points, you could pay $1 in taxes through Pay1040.com or OfficialPayments.com. You’d be assessed transaction fee but you could pay for that fee with points as well. While it may sound appealing, 200 points for every $1 values [...]

Don’t Pay Taxes with American Express Points from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

NASDAQ Government Relief Index – One Year Later

Bargaineering — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 17:02:12 GMT

About a year ago, NASDAQ announced a new index called the NASDAQ OMX Government Relief Index (QGRI) that would track the performances of companies that participated in any government sponsored relief program, such as the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). It wasn’t limited to just TARP participants, it would also include companies that received government [...]

NASDAQ Government Relief Index – One Year Later from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

How to Optimize Your Computer

Bargaineering — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 12:28:30 GMT

The Consumerist did a great job exposing Best Buy’s Optimization services scam last week but the real gem, besides having another reason not to buy computers there, was in the end where they listed free tools you could use to optimize your computer. First, before you download or run any tools, use the ones that come [...]

How to Optimize Your Computer from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Your Take: How Do You Evaluate Brokers?

Bargaineering — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 12:35:22 GMT

Charles Schwab announced today that they would be charging a flat $8.95 per online equity trade regardless of the customer’s account size or the number of shares traded, down from $12.95. Schwab has been marketing itself as the broker of the average Joe, with their “Talk to Chuck” marketing, and moving to $8.95 a trade [...]

Your Take: How Do You Evaluate Brokers? from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

Life Insurance Benefits Aren’t Taxed (Usually)

Bargaineering — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 17:04:48 GMT

I was poking around on the internet the other day when I saw one of those morbid life insurance policy ads. You’ve probably seen them before too. They usually have someone kneeling at a grave or a kid wearing all black at a funeral. They ask you the pointed question of – “If you died [...]

Life Insurance Benefits Aren’t Taxed (Usually) from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

SmartyPig Review

Bargaineering — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 13:13:40 GMT

Not too long ago, when SmartyPig first debuted, I complained about how high SmartyPig’s fees were. I wasn’t the only one and shortly thereafter, they dropped many of those fees and restructured their program a bit. I think it’s a testament to their openness to feedback and willingness to adapt to their customer’s needs. So what [...]

SmartyPig Review from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.

4 Eco-Tips For A Wonderful New Year

Bargaineering — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 17:37:02 GMT

As the New Year kicks off to a start many of us are taking the opportunity to take stock, examine and make changes. For many this can be somewhat of a painful process. Even though change is truly a part of our lives on a daily basis and on a larger scale, there is still [...]

4 Eco-Tips For A Wonderful New Year from personal finance blog Bargaineering.com.