Saving Money Archives - Page 2 of 3

Reasons you need an Emergency Fund

I released a gem of a post a few months back and it was all based on the good old emergency fund topic we all love. Now I will impart unto you a second rendition of the reasons you need an emergency fund.

This is a great topic that everyone can relate too, and I created with a semi-comedic twist to make all of you crack up literally while reading. Talking about money can be funny if you just try a different approach.

I wonder if everyone had an Emergency fund how much easier and simpler life can be. One of the basic foundations of money management is having a savings fund. If this is too hard for you, and you are employed in today’s world then something is seriously wrong. Now let’s get back to having a blast with this topic as I would like to keep things light.

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Do you want to Be Rich?

Do you want to be rich

There’s no secret sauce to becoming rich or maybe there is, and let me explain why below. Do you want to be rich? If the answer is yes, you may want to pay extreme attention as I’ll outline all the steps to getting the illusive first million. I’ve read many times in hundreds of websites, that in order to be rich you have to do these 3 things:

Pay yourself First

Spend Less than you Earn

Have and Maintain a High Income

While yes these three factors do matter to the average person who dreams of swimming in the dough like Scrooge Mc Duck, I will tell you becoming rich takes a deeper process and an involved plan. Many people seem to have the mentality that becoming rich is all about luck and or hitting some magical monetary jack pot.

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The Dividend Challenge

I am obsessed with growing dividends and seeing them compound every year. Well now I am doing a crush the dividend challenge. (#dividendchallenge) The purpose is to well increase the dividends in 2015 and surpass what was received in 2014.

If you make the gap bigger between last year and this year you will experience year over year growth. The benefit of dividends will not only give you a greater sense of return on your money, but it will also provide the opportunity to get even more shares going forward. If you do this, you will invest on purpose for increasing dividends aka icing on the cake in my opinion.

Imagine getting 10K a year from dividends in 2015 and letting things compound. By the year 2020 can you imagine how much you will get from dividends? Its safe to say it will be more than 15 thousand dollars of free money just for holding an asset.

What in life gives you free money for holding it? Nothing does and only investments do. Now are you ready to crush the dividend challenge?

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The Best Financial Scenario

Do you want to know what is the best financial scenario for your money? We all have our wants, needs and goals in life. The optimal route for the average person, is a road not heavily traveled and hopefully that route can skip over all the money trials and tribulations. For many folks including yourself the desire should always be to travel down the less friction induced monetary highway on the path to ultimate wealth prosperity.

If you agree with the thought provoking message above, it will be to your advantage to continue reading. Once you begin to implement the financial scenarios within this intricately worded post, the scenery will appear as if you are traveling on a Japanese bullet train going over 300 miles per hour, thanks to the financially supercharged decisions you will make. It will feel this way only when it comes to building wealth as the primary objective, as far as life goes. The rest of the time you can slowly enjoy the other pleasures of life one day at a time at the preferred pace.

The ultimate tactic any modern human can do is to begin the supersonic compounding as early as feasible. If your still in the cave man status I predict investing is not in your vocabulary, for the mere fact of fear or maybe ineptitude towards investing.

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The Last Hundred Dollars – Christmas Edition

A new series is born today, with the premise that now I will let you in to see the things that I spent my last hundred dollars on. Imagine if you had only a hundred dollars to your name, what would you spend it on?

The last hundred is a way to lighten up the financial blogosphere with something unique. Yeah I could give you a bunch of boring spreadsheets showing my monthly net worth, but that’s been done a thousand times over.

Also part of me is still hesitant to fully reveal my financial numbers in all its lowly soon to be very highly glory. What will this accomplish, maybe nothing. But it sure is exciting to see what people spend money on, don’t you think?

The spring is about 4 months away and I am very excited to shovel massive amounts of snow this winter. (Not really) We are gonna switch it up today and give you a snap shot of spending in the month of December for some Christmas gifts and random misc. things. (Obviously excluding Mrs. Rich Uncle EL’s gifts, as I don’t want to give away all my secrets)

See below for some spending based off the last hundred dollars – Christmas edition.

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Bullish Vs. Bearish: Clearing the Confusion for New Forex Investors

Are you a “bull” or a “bear?” Do you even know what these terms mean? It’s understandable and perfectly OK if you don’t. Many forex traders struggle with them. It’s a holdover from the stock market, and it defines your basic view of the marketplace at any one given time.

Contextually Important

It’s important to realise that the terms “bull” and “bear” are contextual. This means that a person who is “bullish” or a “bull” in one market environment may not be a bull in another. The same is true of a “bear.”

One of the many forex trading challenges is determining whether a “bull” or “bear” market exists and then what to do about it. Money can be made in either market, but some traders prefer to trade in one market over another.

So, being bullish isn’t necessarily an investment philosophy, but rather a view of the market itself – but only a view of the market as is currently exists.

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Pension Concerns are Alarming

Do you know that many municipalities in the US are filing for bankruptcy due to retirement pension default? A recent report released by Bridgewater states that 85% of them will fail in a specific time frame. How confident are you that your pension will last you the rest of your living years? This is why pension concerns are alarming for millions of people in the US. It is a frantic time for anybody who is dependent on that pension succeeding because most are hanging on a short financial string. A sharp scissor is ready to cut funding and politicians could care less. The problem in my opinion is that the people who manage the funds, are not doing enough to grow it, or are misusing the money for the municipality’s other budget shortfalls.

Private pensions are on the same boat as the public pensions. The corporation who was set up to help failing pensions is 34 billion in deficit. The numbers do not lie as it beckons anyone who believes pensions will be around to support them. As quoted in Forbes, “Over the past forty years the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation has assumed responsibility for thousands of failed plans. Traditional defined benefit pension plans offered by private employers are rapidly facing extinction and with the PBGC’s deficit recently hitting a record $34 billion, the future of private pensions looks grim.”

Now let’s focus on what can we do to avoid getting a heart attack due to worries that your pension might go under very soon. It all boils down to realizing you have to save more while in your working years. See the pension as gravy if you get it when you retire. Never be dependent on that income from day one and you will see things differently.

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What should you buy at Costco

Hey guys it’s me again giving you a few tips to help you stretch your dollar a bit further. I want your cash flow to go a long way and possibly reach the next month so that you can invest it or pay extra on debt. So if you like saving $$ on groceries and you have a Costco membership well you must pay attention to this post as you will most likely save with smart purchases. One thing I am good at is when I have to go to Costco, I tell myself to not deviate from the list of things I need to buy. If my list is small I remember them mentally, but if it is more than 10 items then I write them down and stick to them with conviction.

The number reason these warehouse clubs make money is from people making spontaneous purchases on high margin items that are not in the food category. So try to be the same way when you are trying to reach a new level of efficiency with your cash flow.

The products that you will save money by buying at Costco are normal food/ drink items for the house hold. Just pick and choose the things that pertain to your life. Obviously Costco has thousands of other products that can possibly save you money like LCD TV’s and computers, but for this post we will concentrate on grocery items only.

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