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Giving kids money to manage
This article is by staff writer Lisa Aberle.
We’ve slowly started our children’s financial education. I thought the easiest way to start would be opening a savings account. I suppose I was correct, but it was met with more resistance than I expected.
When we actually opened a savings account for them, I explained that we would deposit their money into their accounts. Then the bank would pay them interest. First, my son was horrified that they would lend “his” money out to other customers, and would he ever see it again? And then, could he have his original bills back?
A conversation with Mr. Money Mustache
Note: This article is from J.D. Roth, who founded Get Rich Slowly in 2006. J.D.’s non-financial writing can be found at More Than Money, where he recently wrote about how to be happy.
As part of the Get Rich Slowly course, I interviewed 18 of my favorite financial experts. Combined, these interviews comprise over eight hours of audio and more than 200 pages of written transcripts, all of which are available as part of the package.
Ask the Readers: Do you stress-test your finances?
This article is by editor Linda Vergon.
As J.D. Roth put it, “Failure is okay.” We all experience it, and we each have to figure out how to deal with it. Some people even study it. In fact, studying failure is a very productive thing to do. A stress-test can be used to study failure in a proactive sense. It can help predict how and when failure will occur within the confines of a safe, theoretical exercise. And I got to thinking. How can we use that idea to improve our financial situation?
It didn’t occur to me until today, but my husband, Terry, has been stress-testing our finances for a long time. (Ha! I don’t mean that he pushes the budget to the limit in the real sense. But to an engineer with an MBA, it seems that life provides all sorts of scenarios just begging to be analyzed.) He is constantly tinkering with the numbers to glean insights.
‘When She Makes More’: 10 rules for breadwinning women
Note: This article is from J.D. Roth, who founded Get Rich Slowly in 2006. J.D.’s recently launched the Get Rich Slowly course, a year-long guide on how to master your money.
A few years ago, my little brother moved his family to Seattle. His wife had received a promotion and an opportunity to work at her company’s flagship location. The offer was too good to refuse. There was just one problem: They moved before Tony could find a job.
Tony’s wife enjoyed her new position and increased salary. He pounded the pavement looking for work. He had no luck. When he was in Portland a few months later, he stopped by my place for a beer.
“How are things going?” I asked.
“They’re OK,” he said, but he paused a moment, which told me things weren’t okay.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
Money challenges: Why I’m OK with them, and a few of my favorites
This article is by staff writer Kristin Wong.
I’m not usually a fan of gimmicks. But if the sole purpose of a gimmick is to save some extra cash, I guess I’m OK with it.
We talked about this recently, but there seems to be a heightened interest in frugality lately. Maybe that’s why I’ve noticed a whole crop of money-saving challenges popping up all over the Internet, from personal finance blogs to Pinterest.
And then, the other day, my boyfriend asked: “Have you heard of this thing called the 52-week challenge?”
I was a little surprised. My boyfriend doesn’t spend much time on the Internet, and he doesn’t keep up with personal-finance trends. Turns out, a friend of his mentioned the challenge during a recent hangout, as he and his wife are giving it a go.
The new way to get rich slowly
This article is by staff writer William Cowie.
The face of getting rich slowly is changing right before our eyes, even as the status quo is failing. Before this year’s State of the Union address, the President’s media supporters, fretting about his low approval rating, fumed: “…never during his time in office has the state of the economy been better — yet rarely has he gotten such low marks from the public for his handling of it.”
Book review: “Eventual Millionaire”
This article is by staff writer Honey Smith.
There are many personal finance books and tools out there that are useful to people in all stages of personal finance. I have a lot to learn before reaching financial independence, and the editorial elves thought it would be helpful if I shared some of what I learn with you.
Reader Stories: 6 ways to doubt yourself and do it anyway
This post comes from one of our readers, Adam Fisch. Some reader stories contain general advice; others are examples of how a GRS reader achieved financial success or failure. These stories feature folks with all levels of financial maturity and income. Want to submit your own reader story? Here’s how.
In my short time as an entrepreneur, I’ve begun to understand the people that describe running your own business as a rollercoaster. Like most cliches, it comes from truth: In any moment, the grandeur and surety of your world-changing vision vanishes only to be replaced by doubt and the sinking feeling that you’ve made a horrible mistake, your parents were right, you should have stayed in that boring, stable job, and disaster is imminent. In those moments, your resolve is tested.
Ask the Readers: What’s your embarrassing money moment?
This article is by staff writer April Dykman.
A few weeks ago, I had an embarrassing money moment. I was in a checkout lane. The cashier had just scanned several heavy boxes that held my to-be-assembled bookshelf, and my debit card was declined.
Being declined while in the checkout line is one of those little anxieties that I can’t seem to shake, even though it’s only happened to me twice and both times were issues with the card-scanning machine. Almost every time I swipe my card, I hold my breath for half a second until the machine says that the payment is accepted.
But that day, the day I was trying to buy a bookshelf for my office, my debit card was declined.
Normally, I use a credit card (for the airline miles). But when I opened my wallet, it wasn’t there. I remembered that I left it by my laptop when I bought a gift online the night before.
How to track your spending (and why you should)
This article is by staff writer Holly Johnson.
Recently, an old friend emailed me for help with his family’s financial woes. The confession that followed wasn’t pretty, and included tales of student loans, car loans, unrestrained spending, and empty bank accounts. It was all bad news, which I found rather surprising considering their relatively high income. So, of course, I asked about their fixed expenses. What were they?
We emailed back and forth for quite a while, and he gave a few more details of their situation. For example, their house payment was only around $900. Affordable. Car payments and student loans consumed around $450 each month. Not shocking. Then there were the expenses that everyone must contend with — things like groceries, gas, school supplies, and insurance. It was all rather boring.
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