Another home remodeling project is almost complete.  My back hurts, my hands are scraped up pretty good and I'm tired.  Working on my house always makes me wonder if I made the right decision about buying a home.  If I could go back in time and give a younger me advice, what would I say? I [...]

I was reading another book where the author mentioned they don't watch TV.  It was How to Get Rich by Felix Dennis.  I starting wondering if there is a strong correlation between hours of television watched and wealth. I did a quick search for information relating income/wealth and television viewing.  I didn't find anything in the [...]

I received a solicitation from ING Direct today.  Their 12 month CD rate is 4%.  If you're a saver this is a good sign. Interest rates have been terrible recently.  If you're a saver and have a decent amount of money in a savings account or CD's you've most likely been losing money (with inflation). I have [...]

America is supposedly in a recession and people are suffering.  Parents can't afford to send their kids to school in new clothes and people are starving to death because they can't afford the gas to drive to the grocery store.  I think the news (as usual) is making a crisis where none exists.  The only [...]

Many people carry their debit card PIN around in their wallets or purses. Because they have so many credit cards and debit cards they have to write down the pin number of each one. That's a bad idea. Here are a few tips to manage and protect your banking information. Don't Carry Around [...]

Is the stock market predictable? No says Burton Malkiel author of A Random Walk Down Wall Street. Like Graham's Intelligent Investor, A Random Walk is one of those books that seems to stand the test of time. First published in 1973, it's currently in its 23rd edition. This book is readable. Unlike some other [...]

I've been struggling with a decision. Should I stay in my house or sell it and either move into a condo or buy a new house? There are pro's and con's for each. I live in a rather modest home (especially compared to today's standards). We have one child and we could use [...]

Randomness is difficult concept for the human mind to deal with.  However, randomness plays an important roles in our lives.  In his book Fooled By Randomness, Nassim Nicholas Taleb discusses randomness and how we are fools of randomness. First of all, I highly recommend this book.  Fooled by Randomness, is a very digestible book even (especially) [...]

Should you rent or buy?  That's one of the hardest questions to answer.  Most articles don't tell you what you really need to know.  This one does.  I'll give you the facts about home ownership. Fact:  Houses need maintenance.  Your maintenance costs could be as high as thousands of dollars a year (or more). Fact:  Your must [...]

Should you keep track of your expenses (and receipts) from home improvement projects?  What are the tax consequences? Taxes Generally, there are no tax breaks for most home improvement/remodeling projects (excluding those projects that qualify for some type of tax break based on energy savings) in the year that you make the improvements. From Jackson Hewitt: The terms repairs [...]