Steadfast Finances

 Frugal Living,Good Eats,Personal Finance         No comments

My secret is out. Scratch that – I doubt I’m the only one who ever figured out this frugal hack on how to turn the tables of your local grocery store’s salad bar, but being that I usually see at least one person making the same mistake every time I go shopping, I’d wager more [...]

 Consumer Education,Personal Finance,Real Estate         No comments

Not quite sure how I feel about a Monopoly game where a computer does all of the financial math for you since my grandfather taught me the basics of financial transactions, and in a very elementary respect (for a 5-10 year old mind), the basics of personal finance and money management with a paper money [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Personal Finance,Politics         2 comments

Over the long haul, the gap between incomes doesn’t seem to be all that terrible. After nearly a century, one would expect income growth to be reasonably balanced after such a large data set. However, things get a little crazy in the early 80s. More friendly tax policies, aggressive lobbying for loopholes, insane levels of [...]

 Frugal Living,Good Eats,Personal Finance         No comments

Something tells me harvest time will be extra colorful this year. This years batch of seeds, mostly heirloom seeds (e.g. no genetically modified seeds) cost me ~$80, but the resulting produce will be worth a minimum of 10 times that. Even if you’re a farmer’s market novice, you’ll know the specialty heirlooms — the Orangeglo [...]

 Banking,Investor Psychology         10 comments

With the rise of web based and mobile financial tools, I’ve been something of a late adopter. Actually, I’m more of a “no” adopter. Sure, I trade a few stocks online or I’ll purchase a few gifts using a one time use only credit card number, but other than that, my trust in placing all [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Personal Finance         1 comment

I don’t like to name names, but I know a few of you out there have this going on. (Coughs: guy with the 2010 Corvette). Via: Credit Score Blog

 Consumer Education,Infographics & Chartology,Personal Finance,Politics         5 comments

Interesting infographic from The Atlantic… Unemployment rate –> DOUBLED Daily consumer spending –> DOWN 47% Taxes collected from firearms & ammo –> UP 57% Savings rate –> UP 171% Personal bankruptcies from 09/06 to 09/07 vs. 09/09 to 09/10 –> DOUBLED Percentage of 18 to 29 year olds that moved back in with parents –> [...]

 Banking,Personal Finance         2 comments

The problem I most often run into when talking basic personal finance metrics like FICO scores, credit reports, and overall creditworthiness is that many people fail to realize that your FICO score is based on pure statistical evidence with no consideration for judgment and does not allow for human emotion. So a recent “Come to [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Personal Finance,Real Estate         No comments

Some seriously scary underwater homeowner chartporn via Bloomberg Businessweek. Finance people and math geeks (like me) plot these types of XY graphs in their head without thinking about it, which is probably why we avoid debt like the plague, but if more people could close their eyes and visualize just how screwed they could potentially [...]

 Personal Finance,Saving Money         No comments

For those who like to get their financial media the old fashioned way — in print via snail mail — here’s some good news for ya… It’s hard to beat a $1 per issue offer in this day and age, especially if you’re the type that likes to hold a physical magazine or newspaper, but [...]

 Business Trends,Consumer Education,Personal Finance         2 comments

Being that I loath shopping, I’m among a growing trend of lazy busy Americans who are buying a majority of their Christmas gifts online. As a personal first for me, nearly all of my gifts will be purchased online from Amazon.com this Christmas, but without free shipping, this probably wouldn’t have happened. Here’s why. While [...]

 Business Trends,Consumer Education,Personal Finance         No comments

When times are tough, it would appear that cable TV subscribers are cutting the cord/cable. Recent data from 2007 to 2009 suggests that Americans are making due with less, so it’s not surprising that an elastic commodity (e.g. things we don’t absolutely need: chocolate, diamond rings, etc.) like cable TV providers are taking an overall [...]