spending
Popular posts in spending
Posted 5 days 17 hours ago by Philip Brewer
Personal Finance, Frugal Living
My brother told me once that, when he was in college, he handled money this way: "When I got paid, I set aside enough money for cigarettes, then spent the rest buying pizza and beer for everyone until the money ran out. The other people I hung around with did the same."
full story
Posted 3 weeks 5 days ago by Xin Lu
General Tips, Shopping
Recently, I read about a promotion from a home builder in San Diego where consumers could buy a 4000 square foot house for $1.6 million and get a smaller home by the developer valued at $400 thousand for free. This sounds like a fantastic deal, but I am always wary of anything labeled with "buy one get one free", and here is why.
full story
Posted 6 weeks 2 days ago by Philip Brewer
Personal Finance, Frugal Living, Life Hacks
Is there an amount of money that's too small to concern yourself with? People make that case, usually saying something like "Life is too short to waste time counting pennies." They're missing the point, though, because they're focusing on the wrong thing.
full story
Posted 9 weeks 4 days ago by Paul Michael
Deals and Coupons, Consumer Affairs
It seems the retail giants are serious in their quest to get hold of your economic stimulus check. One of the biggest, Sears, is offering to multiply your check if you spend it there. And others are following suit.
full story
Posted 13 weeks 1 day ago by Jabulani Leffall
Consumer Affairs
The government is letting people think that it's okay to make bad choices. The Treasury is rewarding bad behavior and the consumer is learning nothing except to keep up the good work choosing bad alternatives.
full story
Posted 21 weeks 1 day ago by Xin Lu
Personal Finance, Frugal Living, Shopping, Health and Beauty
Have you ever paid more than you normally would for something when you are trying to cheer yourself up? A recent study showed that a group of people who were sad offered almost four times more money for a bottle of water than a control group. Read on for more information about the "misery is not miserly" phenomenon.
full story
Posted 22 weeks 3 days ago by Kate Luther
Budgeting
Feel like you're just living payday-to-payday? Having trouble figuring out where all your money goes? Then a zero-based budget just might be for you.
full story
Posted 23 weeks 4 days ago by Philip Brewer
Frugal Living, Life Hacks
Are you tired of reading the same frugality suggestions? I'm talking about the repeated exhortations to eat out less, turn off your cable, and stop buying expensive coffee drinks. Tired as they are, these suggestions keep showing up for a reason: they're examples of the key insight that the best way to raise your standard of living is to focus your spending on the things that give you the most pleasure.
full story
Posted 26 weeks 5 days ago by Lana Goodrich
Lifestyle
How do you resist the urge to spend money when you're with less-than-frugal friends? 5 tips inside.
full story
Posted 36 weeks 1 day ago by Julie Rains
Personal Finance, Budgeting
Want to have the wealth you need to follow your dreams? Brett Wilder, Certified Financial Planner and author of The Quiet Millionaire suggests that there are 7 major obstacles to financial success. Find what's in your way to accumulating and keeping wealth.
full story

I tend to divide spending up into four categories. From best to worst they are: investments, items of enduring value, ephemeral items, and recurring monthly expenses.
Investments include not only stocks and bonds and such, but also anything that can help you earn money. Tools are an investment, as are a classes. I just bought two books that I'm reading before a possible job interview--they're an investment. Some investments may not pay off, but even unsuccessful investments are still investments.
Continue reading "Start with recurring monthly expenses"
Permalink | 3 comments
Posted 1 year 12 weeks ago by Andrea Dickson
Personal Finance, Extra Commentary
Money, to me, is often something to just be tossed at problems. I don't look at my receipts after buying groceries. I don't worry about being charged too much, since I figure that carefully studying my receipts makes me look petty. In fact, this is an attitude that gets me nowhere. I don't protect my money. Maybe I would if I thought of it like a kitten.
full story

Almost 3 years ago I quit my 9-6 job to "take a break." I quit not because I hated that particular job, but because I hated the 9-6 part. It also didn't help that my commute was 3 hours round trip and I didn't get paid well. I thought I just needed some time to figure out what I wanted to do. I was still under the assumption that I should be able to find something I loved to do and get paid well doing it. Hell I was even quoted in the LA Times saying something to that effect. Something about my generation demanding more from a job than just job security. We want the works: good location, cool coworkers, fun duties, excellent pay. I suppose I was naïve to think that I could be different and settle for nothing less. On the other hand, I've yet to go back to that life, so perhaps that dream is not so elusive after all. Only time will tell.
Continue reading "Adaptation: Lessons learned from being unemployed"
Permalink | 7 comments
Emotional health leads to financial health.
One Problem
I know that emotional health leads to financial health first and foremost in my own life.
On one level, it's pretty straight-forward. When I'm tired, frustrated, angry, sad, or trying not to feel any of these, it's a lot harder to give a damn about my budget. When I'm caring for myself, getting enough sleep, dealing with my emotions or the people and situations that bring them in, then it's a lot easier to care about when and where I spend my money.
Continue reading "Frugal is more than a way to spend money, Part III"
Permalink | 4 comments

Have personal financial bloggers taught us NOTHING?
Continue reading "U.S. personal savings rate close to Depression-era rates"
Permalink | 2 comments
I was researching and writing a "serious" post over the weekend, when I read each of these links. Both times, I immediately thought "Wisebread" and, though the connection between either of them and chic, frugal living wasn't clear from the get-go, I was able to figure it out enough to share with the class. Please save all comments about my craziness until the end of the post.
Continue reading "The Inanity of my Humanity (and why I choose to share it on Wisebread)"
Permalink | 1 comment

Turns out that my brain, rather like the devil, MAKES ME DO IT. Spend too much, that is.
Via Consumerist:
Continue reading "It's NATURAL for me to spend as I do!"
Permalink | 1 comment
I love the plethora of frugal ideas that people are happily posting, for free, all over the internet. I'm sharing some of my favorites here. Because I can. And because Mr. Chen's rather prolific posting of late is bringing out my long-buried (and possibly imagined) sense of competitiveness.
Also, we don't technically have a blogroll yet (or as highly technical people call it, "that-list-of-other-blog-sites-on-one-side-of-the-page-linky-thing"), I thought it might be good to prove that we are not threatened by the plethora of frugal advice online. We embrace it.
Some of these links are to main blog pages, and others are to specific blog entries that I thought were worthy and frugal without being tacky.
Continue reading "Additional smart, frugal people"
Permalink | 2 comments
All comments