My Money Blog

The Intangible Advantages And Disadvantages Of Owning A Home

Posted on April 4, 2007 // 63 Comments

Many times you hear people say "Owning your home is not an investment." It may not be an investment, but it does involve spending money that could be better used elsewhere. Still, I do admit that there are intangible benefits that you can't easily … [Read the rest]

Cost Comparison Tool For Comparing Vanguard ETFs and Mutual Funds

Posted on April 4, 2007 // 27 Comments

While on Vanguard's website I recently ran across a new and useful tool that help helps you calculate and compare costs for similar Vanguard ETFs and mutual funds. The tool takes into account trade commissions, the difference in expense ratio, … [Read the rest]

April 2007 Financial Status / Net Worth Update

Posted on April 3, 2007 // 15 Comments

About My Credit Card Debt Newer readers may be alarmed by my high levels of credit card debt. In short, I'm borrowing money for free and keeping it in safe investments while earning me 5-6% interest. Along with other things, this helps me earn … [Read the rest]

Emigrant Direct No Longer Allows 3rd Party Transfers

Posted on April 2, 2007 // 44 Comments

Thanks to everyone who let me know about this. I just confirmed with Emigrant Direct that as of about a week ago, they are no longer allowing you to make transfers between their savings account and other external accounts other than the "official" … [Read the rest]

Moving Servers: Pardon The Dust

Posted on April 2, 2007 // Leave a Comment

Due to the increasing needs of this site, I have been upgrading to a new server over the weekend. It has been taking longer than expected. Because of the way the internet works, there are currently two copies of my site on the internet right now - … [Read the rest]

The Many Paths Toward Simplicity

Posted on April 2, 2007 // 21 Comments

I have never been a very neat person. Having a bigger house is not a good thing for me. I swear the amount of junk we have has doubled since we started living in a house with a basement!! Given that we are also doing an inter-state move in less … [Read the rest]

Free eBook Downloads From Wowio, Plus Refer 10 Friends For A Free iPod Shuffle

Posted on April 1, 2007 //

Wowio is a website that lets you download eBooks from their library for free. They are in Adobe Acrobat format, so don't need any special software to read them. There's also no annoying DRM, so you can move them between computers and PDAs with … [Read the rest]

Family Emergency / Bereavement Airfares: Worth A Try

Posted on March 31, 2007 // 6 Comments

I recently learned that if you have to fly on short notice due to a medical emergency or a funeral, there is something called a "bereavement fare" or "compassion fare". The rules differ between all the airlines, but basically if you qualify you get … [Read the rest]

Confessions Of A Car Salesman: Beware Of The Four Square!

Posted on March 30, 2007 // 21 Comments

The Consumerist has a very enlightening article from a former used car salesman about the tricks that he used on customers, and how to recognize them. It's a long article that contains a lot of common sense advice, but I found the carefully planned … [Read the rest]

Have You Checked Out Your Local Public Library Recently?

Posted on March 30, 2007 // 16 Comments

As a kid, I went to the library weekly, grabbing new books and getting yelled at for misplacing overdue ones. Even now, I remember feverishly looking for the next book in the Boxcar Children series, or re-reading How To Eat Fried Worms for the 86th … [Read the rest]

Possible Free FICO Score w/ 15-Minute Lesson

Posted on March 29, 2007 // 23 Comments

Here is a potentially free FICO score and report for students that are willing to endure a 15-minute spiel, but it appears to be limited to the first 5,000 people. I'm running behind on a project, so let me know if it works :) Thanks TK. We've … [Read the rest]

How Good People Make Bad Investments

Posted on March 29, 2007 // 10 Comments

Here's another article by Jonathan Clements that I enjoyed - How Good People Make Bad Investments from the Wall Street Journal. It points that some traits that help us success in other parts of our lives actually hurt our investing … [Read the rest]