Search results for mutual funds
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Posted
Jan 16 2009, 08:22 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Here's something you don't see every day: a personal-finance post by an ex-con. "Prison taught me everything I need to know about personal finance" was written by Roger, a 34-year-old former client of "MGL" and posted at MGL's site, MoneyGrubbingLawyer. (Thanks to Financial Reflections for the link.)
It's an unusual perspective on PF topics. For instance, while we all know that debt causes stress, most of us don't have to worry that "your creditor will settle things with a shiv."
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Posted
Jan 17 2008, 07:04 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Filed under: college, debt, marriage, The Dough Roller, student loans, children, getting started, stocks, mutual funds, frugal, cars
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from partner blog The Dough Roller. The best thing about being 40 is having survived your 20s and 30s. And at 40, I'm considered an old-timer in the personal-finance blogging community. Reflecting back on the past 20 years, I realize that I've learned a thing or two that I wish (oh, how I wish) I had known when I was 20. Here they are, in no particular order: School loans are like a bad date -- easy to get, but hard to get rid of. At 40, I still have more than $20,000 in school loans. Education is important, but I spent far more money during school than I needed to spend. Compounding, like the 1970s Big Red Machine, is pure magic. Assuming you retire at 65 and earn a 10% return on your investments, $1 invested when you're 20 will be worth 2.5 times more than $1 invested when you're 30, 6.5 times more than $1 invested when you're 40, and 18 times more than $1 invested when you're 50.
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Posted
Dec 02 2008, 06:30 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Filed under: banking, credit, Bargaineering, online banking, financial planning, credit cards, credit reports, homeowners insurance, mutual funds, estate planning, wills, executor, emergency fund, income tax, tax software
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. Popular Mechanics created a list called "100 skills every man should know," which naturally gravitated toward DIY/physical skills like jump-starting a car and splitting firewood. The Frisky listed "30 skills every woman should have before turning 30," which actually touched on more than physical skills (though No. 12 is physical), with a handful of financial skills (Nos. 17-20). The following isn't a checklist of things you necessarily need to do in your life. It's a list of things you should know how to do in case the need arises.
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Posted
Nov 01 2007, 12:13 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from Joan E. Lisante at partner blog ConsumerAffairs.com . Sometimes having money is more worrisome than not having any. It means you have to find a safe place to keep it, and in today's turbulent economy, that's not always as easy as it sounds. Many moneyed souls have their bucks sitting in taxable money-market funds, whose assets have reached a record $2.438 trillion, according to Reuters. It makes sense, because most consumers think of money-market funds as unsexy, low-yield vehicles in which to park extra cash. They also think they're about as safe as that plastic piggy bank you kept on your dresser at age 8. But as George Gershwin once said, “It ain’t necessarily so.” For one thing, all money funds aren’t created equal. There are two basic types: Interest-earning money-market accounts designated as “money-market deposit accounts” (MMDAs) are insured up to $100,000 each by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (Coverage on qualified retirement accounts jumps to $250,000
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Posted
Mar 24 2008, 11:29 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Grace's post at GRACEful Retirement will sound familiar to many aging boomers watching the effect of Wall Street gyrations on their retirement accounts. Grace is 58 and playing catch-up after getting a late start on socking away money for her hopefully golden years. "I started this blog last July with $176,000 in retirement savings. Now I'm down to $146,000, notwithstanding the money I keep putting in," writes Grace, who plans to retire in 10 years. That drop, "when I allow myself to think about it, scares me to death." Yet she continues to invest $1,025 a month in index and growth funds. She tells herself she's right to keep buying when the market is down because it inevitably will come back up. She asks, "When do I find out if I passed the test?"
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Posted
Sep 19 2008, 11:02 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
With the stock market's crazy ups and downs, we decided to see what some clever personal-finance bloggers are doing with their retirement and nonretirement accounts. Does the phrase "stay the course" ring a bell? For instance, after some heavy-duty thinking, Nickel at Five Cent Nickel and Mr. ToughMoneyLove are changing nothing about their investment strategies.
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Posted
Sep 09 2008, 09:34 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from partner blog The Dough Roller. Successfully managing your money comes down to one thing -- control. For all the things we talk about here at The Dough Roller -- from retirement to investing and taxes to credit cards -- financial freedom and sound money management come down to whether you control your money, or whether it controls you. The good news is that sound, wealth-building money management is simple. The reality check, however, is that managing your money, while simple, is not always so easy.
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Posted
May 26 2009, 04:36 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from J.D. Roth at partner blog Get Rich Slowly.
I thought it would be fun to share an interview with my real millionaire next door, a man we'll call John. He used the basic tenets of money management to build wealth and to retire early. Here's how I described John when I first wrote about him last year:
John is a 71-year-old retired shop teacher who lives in a modest ranch house on half an acre, the same house he's had for over 40 years. He has an old barn filled with salvaged lumber, outdated appliances, and who knows what else. When he's around, he drives a junkie 25-year-old station wagon. But most of the time, he's not around.
He spends his winters in New Zealand helping friends on a dairy farm. His summers are spent fishing in Alaska. For a couple of months each year, he's home, puttering in the yard. Year-round, he rents his house to boarders. He leads a very active retirement.
John's story was popular with Get Rich Slowly readers, and many of you asked me to interview him. I had to wait for him to return from New Zealand, but recently the opportunity finally presented itself. John agreed to sit down for a chat.
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Posted
Sep 15 2008, 05:52 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
With the confluence of news about Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch and AIG, the stock market today had its worst drop since 9/11. It's no wonder that former Fed chief Alan Greenspan on Sunday referred to the ongoing turmoil as a "once-in-a-century type of financial crisis." Other than the beating your retirement and investment accounts took today, what do these events mean for you? The best advice is: Don't panic.
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Posted
Jun 23 2008, 05:44 AM
by
Karen Datko
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from J.D. Roth at partner blog Get Rich Slowly. Financial news can be dangerous to the health of your investment portfolio. I spent some time recently reading articles about the stock market. What I found was mostly hysterical hype ("Gasp! Dow Jones Industrials tumble 400 points!"). All the financial stories seemed to be written as if our investment horizons were days, not years. No wonder people panic when the stock market hits a rocky patch. But do daily market movements -- even 400-point drops -- really matter? How important is up-to-date financial news to the average investor?
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