Early this morning the pristine tranquility of my day was destroyed by the ear-splitting scream of a child playing outside. While the child who vocalized so loudly is too young to be in school, it reminded me that the school year ends next week. That means that we are about [...]

During a recent conversation with a friend of mine, he asked if I knew when old bills expired. He had received a notice about a bill for a small amount that was from 2005. He was planning to pay it, but was curious out an legal expiration date. While the [...]

The financial crisis that lasted from 2008 until 2011 or 2012, depending on what statistics you read, pushed many financially challenged homeowners out of their homes and into rentals. Unfortunately, that has had some dire consequences for all renters. Fewer Vacancies Every landlord dreams of zero vacancy. That means they [...]

There are two things that most personal finance articles have in common. One is that they advise you to reduce your debt load and, secondly, they espouse the urgent need to build an emergency fund. Oh yeah, they all encourage you to form a budget, but that is the stuff [...]

Building an emergency fund should always be a priority. It should even come before building a college fund for your children. Think of it like this: how much comfort will you take knowing that your child has a college fund if you can’t pay the mortgage after losing your job [...]

Here we are again, a quick review of yet another rewards card. It seems to me that I am hitting rewind and changing a few words since these cards are all so similar. That may not be the case this time around. The rewards offered through the Citi ThankYou card [...]

Getting out of debt can be difficult. Often there are ingrained behaviors to combat, some of which you may not even be aware of. Another obstacle is trying to protect your money in the wrong ways. That can lead you to make any number of common mistakes. Here is a [...]

How often have you had to toss out food? You are not alone. According to the National Resource Defense Council about 40 percent of all of the food in America is wasted and most Americans waste up to $43 a month or 20 pounds of food each month. Those numbers [...]

I was recently reading a story about the eleven tools that everyone should have around the house. That started me thinking about money, as so many things do. Is there a correlation between actual tools and the tools that everyone should have available for their personal finances. Here is my [...]

When you apply for a credit card or an auto loan, a lender will usually pull your credit report and corresponding credit score from a single agency. That means that they will be considering a single report; two if you have a co-signer/joint applicant. When you apply for a mortgage, [...]