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Posted
Jun 24 2008, 05:45 AM
by
Karen Datko
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This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity: Do you want to know how I shaved nearly 13% off my college costs? I took Advanced Placement classes. I graduated college a semester early in part because I had loaded up on AP classes while I was in high school. Someone got it into my head that I could take AP classes for free (not counting the nominal fee for the exam) and get college credit for getting high marks on the AP tests. At the time, my brain wasn't thinking, "Oh, I can save money on college," but rather, "I can spend time now and have it count twice -- once in high school and once in college," so it was in part the bit of hustle inside of me that spurred me to action.
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Posted
Jun 02 2008, 08:44 PM
by
Karen Datko
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This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. Cut out the morning coffee at Starbucks! Bring a bag lunch! Stop drinking alcoholic beverages! If you've been trying to find areas to trim in your budget, those are likely the first three things you'll hear suggested, right? The Latte Factor! It's horrible that you're wasting money on coffee you can brew at home. It's a travesty! OK, except you don't have a coffee maker at home, have hardly any time in the morning to brew it, and if you don't have it -- oh boy, your office had better watch out because you'll be one cranky man/woman/beast.
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Posted
May 27 2008, 06:27 AM
by
Karen Datko
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This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not your enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle. -- Sun Tzu's "Art of War" In this post, I'm going to try to identify a salesperson's tools, why they work, and what you can do to defend against them whenever you're going to make a purchase.
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Posted
May 20 2008, 06:39 AM
by
Karen Datko
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This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. Plenty of articles discuss the importance of emergency funds and how to set one up, so this is not going to be one of those. I assume that you already understand all that good stuff. (If not, check out these great articles at a Money Blog Network writing project.) Here I'll discuss a strategy to maximize your emergency fund's interest earnings so you can lessen the pain of not having the funds in an investment account.
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Posted
May 13 2008, 06:52 AM
by
Karen Datko
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This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. When I was young, I used to write a fake company name on all sorts of papers to make it look like my company stationery, as if I were a big-swinging successful entrepreneur like Andrew Carnegie. We'd play football in the streets and pretend to be Joe Montana throwing yet another touchdown pass to Jerry Rice. We'd tackle each other in the field and pretend we were LT (no, not Ladainian Tomlinson -- the real LT, Mr. Lawrence Taylor) getting Joe Theisman, minus the snapping leg.
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Posted
May 06 2008, 07:06 AM
by
Karen Datko
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This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. Having grown up on Long Island, I didn't have many opportunities to watch NASCAR on television, so I never truly understood the intricacies of the sport. Since college, I've come to appreciate the difficulty of NASCAR and the skill it requires. Last weekend I was watching a few laps of the Goody's Cool Orange 500 at Martinsville Speedway, and I finally understood why NASCAR fans love the sport.
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Posted
Apr 22 2008, 06:30 AM
by
Karen Datko
This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. Have you ever gone to the mall and impulsively bought something you hadn't intended to buy? Have you ever gone to the grocery store and walked out with a couple things you didn't plan on getting? Sure, we all have.
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Posted
Apr 01 2008, 05:34 AM
by
Karen Datko
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This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. It's been said that we Americans live in a world of instant gratification. We want the coolest gadgets and gizmos, the best food, the best cars, the best everything -- right this very second. We are impulsive, we are impatient and, most important of all, we fund our impulsiveness and impatience with lots and lots of spending. You know who else knows this? Stores. There's a very good and profitable reason why tabloids and candy bars are at the checkout aisles. (One of the reasons self-checkout kiosks haven't become ubiquitous is that you can't sell someone high-margin items like magazines and candy if they're busy checking themselves out. Plus, the machines always break for some reason.) Anywhere you go, you'll also likely see small items by the register like trinkets or votive candles or whatever. You know who else knows this? Salespeople. If you get a quote from someone to do work on your house, you'll often get a special one-day deal. You'll get an "awesome deal" that will be good only for the next three days. If you go into a store that sells furniture or other big-ticket items, you'll be offered six or 12 months of 0% financing if you buy today.
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Posted
Mar 25 2008, 07:07 AM
by
Karen Datko
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This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. I try to do as much shopping as I can online. Nothing beats comparing a bunch of locations all at once to get the best price or taking advantage of a vendor's price-matching policy. What's also awesome about buying online is that you get to avoid malls, parking and dealing with people who are grumpy or had a bad day. Here are eight reasons why I prefer to shop online: Better prices. While not always true, in general you can find better prices online because online vendors have lower overhead costs. They don't need to rent a physical store location, staff it with people, and support all the other overhead costs associated with a brick-and-mortar store. Online stores have warehousing infrastructure and distribution costs, but they save on the overhead associated with storefronts.
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Posted
Mar 18 2008, 07:50 AM
by
Karen Datko
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This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. Having an emergency fund is one of the cornerstones of a solid personal-finance plan. Whether you subscribe to saving enough to cover three months, six months or a full year of expenses, an emergency fund is something that every single person and family needs. An emergency fund enables you to weather difficult times -- especially since they seem to cluster -- without getting in an even worse situation. Some people rely on credit cards to supplement an emergency fund, and others will use them only as a last resort. But ultimately you need to have an emergency fund that matches both your needs and the chance of a bad thing happening. For those of you who understand risk analysis, the part people understand best is the impact or severity of a risk.
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