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Posted
Jul 06 2009, 08:35 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This guest post comes from Mr. GoTo at Go To Retirement.
Our vacation home is on a lake in a rural area. The nearest small town is a 20-minute drive. Although we do not live on a farm or have lots of land, it is a country lifestyle with a waterfront bonus. When we spend time here, I often think about the positive and negative aspects of retirement in a small town or rural community.
Benefits
Our neighbors across the street retired years ago and live at the lake full time. Our neighbors next door are retiring this summer and plan on living at the lake after they sell their city home and farm. That has caused me to think even more about the combination of small town country living and retirement for us.
Cost of living. Food is more expensive in our local grocery stores. If we were to drive another 30 minutes, we can find larger chain groceries with lower prices. When we start living here for longer periods, that might make sense.
Everything else that we buy in our rural community seems to be less expensive, including utilities, insurance, and maintenance services. I think that a lot of that is related to real estate. The land is cheaper, houses cost less, and property taxes are lower compared with city living. This flows into all other cost-of-living categories.
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Posted
Mar 18 2009, 06:56 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This guest post comes from Mary at Simply Forties.
I have to admit, fear of becoming a bag lady is starting to creep up on me.
Record numbers of women are living alone these days and we're living longer. We're starting to worry about what is going to happen to us when we're too old to work or when no one is willing to hire us.
I'm in a good place in my life right now with an exceptionally good job, which I do from home, and which allows me a great deal of free time. I'm paying down my debt and socking away money as quickly as I can but, having gotten a late start, I have some concerns about getting where I need to be financially by the time I need to be there.
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Posted
Dec 15 2008, 05:05 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
What's the best route as you near retirement: Use extra money to pay off the mortgage or pad your investments? That question deserves a new look in light of the economic events of 2008, argues Mr. GoTo, a baby boomer and blogger who comes down on the side of paying off the house. The No. 1 reason: A guaranteed rate of return of 6% (or whatever your mortgage rate is) tax-free. "Compare that to what we have experienced in the markets recently," Mr. GoTo says.
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Posted
Oct 30 2008, 05:51 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from Nora Dunn at partner blog Wise Bread. Retirement [ri-tahyuhr-muhnt]: The act of retiring or the state of being retired; removal or withdrawal from service, office, or business. You go to school. You get a good job/career. You work for 40 years or so. In the meantime, you find a soul mate, marry, buy a house, have kids, and live happily ever after. The kids grow up and move out. Then you retire. Your life map is so clearly laid out in front of you; yet the last piece of the puzzle -- retirement -- is a fuzzy and often incomprehensible anomaly. With people living longer and striving for earlier retirements, the very definition of retirement is evolving. No longer is it merely a way to stop working and basically wait for death to come; that would take too bloody long and be a bore. Now retirement takes many different shapes and forms:
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Posted
Aug 07 2008, 02:39 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Someone asked Jennifer Derrick the other day why she doesn't make more money so she can have the "finer things in life" -- jewelry, fancy cars, big house, expensive vacations. She's talented enough. Doesn't she want these things? Nope. But that person said: "Everyone wants those things and if you think you don't, you're living in denial. You only say that to make yourself feel better because you can't afford them."
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Posted
Apr 07 2008, 05:03 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
A newspaper story about Ford Motor Co. warehouse worker David Sneath walking off the job after winning the Mega Millions jackpot prompted "JLP" of All Financial Matters to wonder what he'd do if he won the lottery. He asked his readers the same question.
Sneath, 60, is taking a lump sum of $59.6 million after taxes. Fishing for walleye plays a large role in his plans. JLP said that if he won, he'd give a lot away to charity and family members, fix up the house, put in a pool, buy a vacation home in Colorado, and invest the rest of the money.
Many of JLP's readers presented common-sense or even modest plans for the imaginary windfall. In fact, Ernesto wrote, "I would for sure buy myself
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Posted
Jan 18 2008, 07:16 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Millionaire Mommy Next Door offers a suggestion for making $1 million for retirement, and it all begins with lunch. You don't spend $9.50 for lunch every workday, and instead eat a $3 lunch from home. You invest the difference in a Roth IRA, and "let the account simmer for 41 years," she says. (We can only imagine how much more money you would have if lunch were a simple tuna fish sandwich and an apple, instead of, say, Lean Cuisine.) This wonderful post illustrates the beauty and power of compound interest in a way everyone can understand. Her point is that you can make even small amounts of money work for you in a meaningful way.
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Posted
Nov 16 2007, 03:05 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
LifeEdit.net provides some very sound advice to people in their 20s about managing money: Save for retirement, pay off student loans as soon as you can, budget and keep your credit score high. But there's more than one way to skin this cat. The Retirement Hobo is 24 years old, and he's already retired.
He's aware that some readers might be incredulous. "At a first glance, you might think my blog about (extremely) early retirement is about a lazy guy trying to find a loophole in the system so he can keep on being lazy. I assure you, that is not the case," he writes in his first post, called, appropriately, "Newly retired."
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Posted
Oct 22 2007, 10:11 AM
by
Karen Datko
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
We reported recently that J.D. at Get Rich Slowly had asked readers for advice about how to live debt-free because he will become free of consumer debt by Christmas. He got a thought-provoking response : You'll be tempted to spend, spend, spend all the extra money you'll have when you're no longer paying off debt. That's a road back to financial ruin. Think big, make long-term plans, and automatically save for them. (Does early retirement sound attractive?) On a smaller scale, budget yourself an allowance and stick to it.
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Posted
Oct 08 2007, 08:01 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
We've all heard about the millionaire next door . Rather-Be-Shopping begins a series of blogs about a school janitor who long ago discovered the power of saving and investing. He owns his house mortgage-free, has two cars, lives without debt, and is about to embark on a comfortable retirement. All this on $35,000 a year in California.
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