Tag:

Spending

Be the Best Trick-or-Treat House on the Block Without Breaking the Bank

by sshrx_ns3li1 February 21, 2020

written by sshrx_ns3li1

Halloween is the scariest time of the year, but that isn't always due to the ghosts trick-or-treating you, or the creepy clown sightings on the news. The price of Halloween candy, not to mention the cost of costumes and home decorations, can give anyone the heebie-jeebies.According to the National Retail Federation, which surveyed 6,791 consumers from Sept. 6 to 13 about their Halloween shopping plans, the average American will spend $82.93 on Halloween, up from $74.34 last year. All in all, Halloween spending is expected to reach $8.4 billion in 2016.Fortunately, if you are worried about going overboard this year, many decorating experts maintain that it's possible to have the best trick-or-treat house in the neighborhood without breaking the bank. It simply requires a little imagination and preparation on the front end.[See: 9 Scary Things Consumers Do With Their Money.]Candy. We'll start here first, since it's the easiest thing to find cheaply. Buy your candy several days or weeks in advance, so you can be on the lookout for discounts.If you belong to a warehouse club, buying in bulk might save you money. Digital coupon websites like Coupons.com and RetailMeNot.com have coupons for candy and Halloween costumes that you may want to utilize. Just make sure that if you do buy Halloween candy weeks in advance that you hide it, so your family doesn't eat it and gobble all of your savings.Halloween decorations. Check out the dollar stores first. Sure, that may sound obvious, but if you're something of a dollar-store snob, it also may be the last place you would consider."You would be surprised [at] the fantastic finds that can really add value to your Halloween display. There are plastic skulls, dismembered body parts, creepy spiders and so much more," says Felicia Ramos-Peters, who lives in Hurleyville, New York, and is the founder of GetHolidayHappy.com, a website aimed at helping people celebrate holidays with ideas for recipes, decorations and gifts.Jeanine Boiko seconds the dollar store. Boiko is a New York City publicist who also blogs about home decor and owns an Etsy.com shop called Okio B Designs."Stock up on fake skulls, rats and crows, and jars, window decals," she suggests, adding that, "a can of orange or black spray paint can work wonders on sprucing up dollar store finds and creating the 'eek' factor."And if you see nothing you like at the dollar stores, leave. All you have wasted is some time.[See: 10 Oddly Practical Things You Can Rent.]Lights. But one thing to think about while you're at the dollar stores? Lighting."Lighting is everything," says Jamie O'Donnell, an Orlando, Florida resident who has been an event planner for more than 15 years. "Replace the bulbs of your outdoor light with LED lights in orange or purple to cast your house in a spooky glow. It's fairly inexpensive and only takes a few minutes to do but creates a dramatic look."Judging from what you can find online, festive LED lights may run you around $20 to $30 for a string of, say, 40 to 100 lights (which could cost a small fortune if you intend to light up your entire home). The conventional holiday strings of orange or purple lights are generally cheaper, and will likely run you more along the lines of $5 to $15. Of course, you can always buy your lights after the holidays, when they're on sale, to prepare for next Halloween.Sounds and music. Ramos-Peters suggests using sound as part of your Halloween atmospherics."I think music is an underestimated element for outdoor Halloween displays. It is really easy to download or purchase some scary music and sound effects," Ramos-Peters says. "You can turn heads with a display that has some spooky sounds like a chainsaw or evil witch laughing."[See: 11 Ways to Save Time and Money.]Pro Tip: Use What You Have in Your HomePamela Layton McMurtry, an artist and designer in Kaysville, Utah, and author of the e-book "A Harvest and Halloween Handbook," feels it's always effective when homeowners create a spooky scene on their lawn."I love creative, alternative decor for Halloween and go wild for themes taken from literature," she says (think "Alice in Wonderland" and "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz").Now, that might sound like a surefire way to destroy your future retirement funds. You want to entertain your neighbors, not create a multi-million dollar Hollywood movie. But McMurtry says you may be able to find props in your home or at thrift stores. If you really want cheap and effective, McMurtry paints this picture: "Set up a fake campfire with cricket sounds and sad harmonica music. Mound dirt for a grave and put a pair of cowboy boots nearby with a clue about [what happened to] the demised, like a rubber snake."Something else to look for in your basement, attic or thrift store, Boiko suggests, is a long-forgotten Scrabble game."You can use the tiles for easy Halloween decor by spelling out spooky words. I painted the tile holders black and spelled out creepy words on mine," Boiko says.And if you can keep your Halloween costs low, you won't be tempted to spell out Scrabble letters to make phrases like "holiday debt" and "I'm broke." On the other hand, that may be a creative idea. The children on your block may not get creeped out by those words, but you'll send a chill up the spines of their parents..

February 21, 2020 0 comment

Banking & Credit

6 Credit Card Blunders to Avoid This Holiday Season

by sshrx_ns3li1 February 21, 2020

written by sshrx_ns3li1

If you've just finished paying off your credit card debt from last year's holiday shopping, you know that gift buying and paying with plastic can be a dangerous combination.There are so many things that can go wrong (and right) that it would take forever to list every possible way you could spend yourself into the poor house. But whether you're someone who always pays off credit card debt every month or you're still working on paying off debt from Christmas 2009, be sure to at least avoid these credit card blunders.[See: Best Credit Cards: Find the Right Card for You.]Falling for store credit card deferred interest deals. Planning on buying someone a big, expensive gift, or maybe getting something monumental for yourself? Wondering if you should really splurge? That's where deferred interest often lures consumers in. The store will promise that you won't pay interest if you pay off the entire purchase by the end of the advertised period."Every holiday season, many store chains that sell large and expensive items like furniture or appliances start advertising deferred interest offers on their store-branded credit cards," says Alex Gerard, CEO of CardsMix.com, a credit card comparison site. "These offers seem attractive, but they can be dangerous for your pocket if you have little discipline, like the majority of us."If you do have discipline, deferred interest deals can be swell. But it can be devastating if something goes wrong."If you don't pay off the entire purchase and owe even a penny at the end of the advertised period, you will be charged the interest for the whole introductory period," Gerard says.[See: Spend a Windfall Wisely.]Forgetting to track your spending. "The holiday spirit blinds you to how much you're really spending – until the bill comes due in January," says Howard Dvorkin, a certified public accountant and chairman of Debt.com. "So my suggestion is to keep a running list of all your holiday expenses and post them on the refrigerator or somewhere prominent in your home. Once you hit a dollar figure you agreed to stay below – whether it's $300 or $500 or even $1,000 – you and your family agrees to stop spending for the holidays."And if you still have some important gifts you really want to buy? "Everyone agrees to cut from somewhere else in the non-holiday part of the family budget," Dvorkin says.Carrying revolving debt from the holidays. Consumers plan on spending an average of $1,159 on their holiday purchases this year, according to a just-released annual survey of 2,006 consumers (between Oct. 5-9, 2016) from the credit card Discover.You know revolving debt is important to avoid, but you may want to do some math before you whip out your credit card, so you can see what you're getting into. If you were to spend $1,159 on holiday gifts this year, and you had a credit card with an average interest of 15.18 percent (the national average at the time of this writing, according to CreditCards.com), and you planned to take six months to pay it off, you would pay $201.81 each month, spending a total of $1,210.86.That arguably isn't too expensive, spending $51.86 to float $1,159 in gifts in exchange for making your family or friends happy. But, of course, the question becomes – do you only carry that revolving debt for those six months? If you're likely to buy more with your credit card and not pay it off right away, then suddenly that $201.81 payment is going to balloon and will likely become a weight around your neck. For all you know, next holiday season, maybe you'll still be paying off that $1,159 in gifts.Thus, it's vital you pay off that holiday credit card debt as soon as possible.[See: 10 Easy Ways to Pay Off Debt.]Failing to remember that the holidays are ideal for scam artists. It's smart to be something of a Grinch, assuming the world isn't full of good people when you're shopping at your computer or at the mall. From pickpockets to scammers with sophisticated equipment hoping to steal your credit card information when you shop at a public place with unprotected Wi-Fi, some people are out to get you.In Calgary, Canada, for instance, police recently alerted the media that they've seen an escalation in text messages asking consumers if they want to be secret shoppers, and while that might sound plausible, no, these text messages aren't legitimate. And throughout North America, there have been reports of fraudulent online stores and fake shopping apps being created, just waiting for people to find them and type in their credit card information.Be careful about applying for store credit cards. Like deferred interest deals, you'll get a lot of sales employees asking if you'd like to apply for a store credit card. Unless you shop there all the time, and you have a great track record of repaying your credit card debt, your answer should be: no, thanks."It's during the holidays that consumers, revolvers especially, are most susceptible to credit card debt," says Kerri Moriarty, CEO of Cinch Financial, a website that makes customized suggestions to people on what types of financial products they should get.She admits that it might seem "like a no-brainer," to open a store credit card to get a 20 percent discount, "but when you do the math on what it takes to really benefit from the action as a year-round decision and not just a Christmas Eve one, you might be surprised to realize how little of a deal there is – and even more so if you'll carry a balance on that card," she says.Forgetting about rewards on credit cards – or focusing too much on them. According to the aforementioned Discover survey, 46 percent of shoppers said their main reason for using credit cards for holiday shopping was to earn rewards. This is great, if you're racking up rewards and paying off your cards every month. But every credit card and personal finance expert who ever lived will tell you to not overspend just to get a bunch of rewards. Drowning in credit card debt isn't much of a reward.10 Tips for a Budget-Friendly Cyber Monday.

February 21, 2020 0 comment

Banking & Credit

4 Life Hacks That Cost More Than You Think

by sshrx_ns3li1 February 21, 2020

written by sshrx_ns3li1

"Life hacks" is one of those trendy phrases that describes strategies people use to be more efficient. But you know that.You probably also are well aware that you'll often see online articles with headlines like, "Life Hacks to Save You Money." Many life hack ideas are smart, but often the breezy advice attached to the life hack forgets to mention there may be a hidden cost, too. If you hear any of these life hacks mentioned, don't discount them, but do your homework to make sure they're actually saving you money.Life hack: Use coupons at stores to save money, and you're really missing out if you don't look for coupon codes when you're ordering food online.Why this life hack can cost more than you would think: Couponing only works if you were going to buy the item, anyway. You're probably also better off if you don't let couponing become a way of life."Years ago, I attempted couponing, when it was all the rage," says Kristie Garduno, a business owner in Newport Beach, California. "I took the time to learn all the tricks and lingo and even joined a group, so we could swap coupons. I started spending more and more time trying to save money, even skipping church so I could be first in line to get a good deal on an item – that I probably wouldn't use."[See: 12 Shopping Tricks to Keep You Under Budget.]Garduno says she went way overboard, scouring the internet, looking for deals, sometimes ignoring her business, a retail website called GivingSoaps.com. She even remembers getting in arguments with cashiers over 25-cent coupons."It became almost an addiction, and I'm grateful that I stepped away when I did," Garduno says. "I have no idea how much money I wasted in the name of saving." Life hack: Do a credit card balance transfer to save you money on interest. You apply for a credit card with a low introductory annual percentage rate (APR), preferably zero and one that will remain low for 12 to 18 months.Why this life hack can cost more than you would think: Yes, transferring money from a credit card with a high interest rate to a lower interest rate can be a good idea. But some credit cards have a high annual fee, negating the savings you're going to get. Other cards have a balance transfer fee, and while it may only be 3 percent, that adds up if you're, say, transferring $5,000 from one card to another. In fact, it adds up to $150.And you'll really blow it if you miss a payment, which happened to J.R. Duren, a copywriter in Jacksonville, Florida.In 2009, Duren transferred about $3,300 from one credit card to another. All was well until he was late with a payment and saw his interest rate jump 7 percent. It wasn't a financial disaster since he paid off the card by the end of the year, but he undid some of the work he was trying to do in saving money."I'm guessing the mistake cost me at least $130," Duren says.And keep in mind it's a terrible life hack if you transfer money from the high interest credit card to the lower interest rate one, and then later you end up maxing both of them out and carrying revolving debt.[See: 12 Ways to Be a More Mindful Spender.]Life hack: Buy in bulk. You know how it works. Buy a pack of 16 paper towel rolls at a warehouse discount store, and in the long run, it's cheaper than buying a pack of four paper towel rolls at a supermarket. You spend more upfront, but over time you save money.Why this life hack can cost more than you would think: Buying in bulk can backfire, especially if purchasing perishable items. Tyler Riddell, who works in marketing and lives in Temecula, California, says, "Every time I go to Costco, I think I'm saving tons of money by buying in bulk when in reality, only half of the items I buy get eaten while the rest goes bad and ends up being thrown out."Life hack: If you're looking for a new bank, sign up with one that offers a cash bonus.Why this life hack can cost more than you would think: You really want to be careful when you choose any monthly service, whether it's a bank or a telephone plan, that offers you money to sign up. The deal being offered may be good, but the company is going to get their money back somehow. Tyler McIntyre, a New York City-based business owner in the banking industry, says he once signed up for a bank's checking account offering a $200 sign-up bonus. Before long, however, he realized he was being charged a $12 monthly fee for owning the account. In less than two years, McIntyre's signing bonus would go right back to the bank, and he would still be paying $12 a month.[See: 12 Millennial-Inspired Ways to Spend Less.]That didn't sit well with McIntyre, who knew he could get the same services for free from a community bank."I closed the account, and they took back the $200," McIntyre says.11 Expenses Destroying Your Budget.

February 21, 2020 0 comment

Banking & Credit

Could Fake News Affect Your Finances?

by sshrx_ns3li1 February 21, 2020

written by sshrx_ns3li1

Fake news has been in the news a lot lately. But fake news is old news. Supermarket tabloids have been around for almost as long as supermarkets. Celebrities often find themselves the unwitting victim in a death hoax. During the 1800s and early 1900s, it was somewhat common for fake news agencies to sell stories to editors, many of whom were practicing yellow journalism and publishing sensational stories (yesterday's version of today's click-bait headlines). As an Indiana newspaper (The Martinsville Morgan County Gazette) lamented on August 26, 1893: "There is so much 'fake' news, now-a-days, from country correspondents to city papers, that it is hard to separate the counterfeit from the genuine."[See: 25 Fast Financial Fixes.]But it may be helpful to your wallet to remember that fake news doesn't only apply to invented stories about your favorite or least favorite politicians. If you aren't careful, you can be duped by fake economic news and make decisions that could quickly empty your wallet. If you're at all concerned, keep a few things in mind.Fake news comes in many forms. Fake news is a term that often applies to completely fake news stories written to fool people, but it's been used to describe gossip and rumors and actual news stories that have errors in them. President Donald Trump often refers to various media organizations as fake news.Misinformation might be a better term to use, although for now, fake news is in vogue.And fake news doesn't have to come from the media. Crowdsourcing websites, where consumers can learn more about stocks, sometimes serve up fake news, points out Ajay Patel, a finance professor at the Wake Forest University School of Business in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.On these sites, Patel says, "it then becomes easy for a person to use different pseudonyms and push out fake news articles that appear to be legit because multiple sources are indicating the same story. The reader, being unaware that the same person has used different pseudonyms to basically write the same story, might treat that as legitimate and trade on the news."This type of thing has been happening for awhile now. For instance, in 2000, Emulex, a network connectivity company, lost 60 percent of its stock's value after financial news wires picked up and ran a fake press release that had been placed online.[See: 10 Money Questions to Ask Your Parents.]Your biases may be working against you. If you have a certain worldview and never question it – well, that could blow up in your face.Michael Chadwick sees that a lot. Chadwick, a certified financial planner in Unionville, Connecticut, says that he has seen clients who "think the world is coming to an end, the dollar will be worthless, inflation will go crazy … We've seen very smart people get sucked into thinking many crazy things are going to happen, when in reality they're simply a product of what they've been taking in, typically in outrageous quantities for some time."Chadwick says that a lot of "gold bug" companies have produced videos and websites "that scare the bejesus out of the public."Gold bug, if you're not familiar with the term, refers to someone who supports the gold standard and believes that the best, most stable investment is in gold.Of course, if that's your mindset, you may not consider a video promising that gold will keep you solvent as the economy crumbles around you as fake news. But Chadwick, who does see that as fake news, says that he has had a few clients start to sink as much as $100,000 in sketchy gold and end-of-the-economy type of investments before he was able to convince them to put a stop to what they were doing before any checks were cashed."People need to be very careful what [news sources] they consume," Chadwick says.[See: 14 Important Personal Finance Dates to Mark on Your Calendar.]Your best defense is to be an avid consumer of news. The most effective way to protect yourself from falling for fake news is to have a varied media diet and not rely on one or two outlets for all of your news."Check the story with multiple reputed sources," advises Vic Patel, the founder of Forex Training Group, a company that provides advice to currency market traders. "It's much better to make an investment decision based on reliable research than through an emotional reaction to a particular news story. Most importantly, do not rely on any viral sources, as they may simply be spreading stories without corroboration."David Primo, an associate professor of political science and business administration at the University of Rochester in Rochester, New York, agrees."I think the message to investors should be, 'Don't base your investment decisions on social media, period,'" Primo says.Primo also points out that "financial markets are information sponges.""If the news on Twitter is real, then professional investors tracking social media with powerful technology have already traded based on that information, so the price you pay when you trade will already reflect that information," he says. "If the news is fake, well, you've saved a lot of money by not investing.""Using the news as a sole source of investment analysis is a common investor mistake," says Bob Stammers, director of investor engagement for the CFA Institute, an association for chartered financial analysts.He echoes Primo's point that information that is public is already factored into market pricing, and Stammers says, "Successful and seasoned investors gather information from several independent sources and conduct their own proprietary research and analysis."In other words, before you make any financial decision based on what you're hearing in the media, the safest course of action is to also solicit an opinion from a trusted professional, like your financial advisor, financial analyst, attorney, tax accountant, banker or whomever seems appropriate. After all, even if the news is accurate, and it's a good time to buy a house or purchase stocks, that doesn't mean it's a good time for you.8 Big Budgeting Blunders – and How to Fix Them.

February 21, 2020 0 comment

Banking & Credit

How to Break a Contract Without Paying Dearly

by sshrx_ns3li1 February 21, 2020

written by sshrx_ns3li1

We're taught to keep our promises, but sometimes staying true to our word can be financially devastating. Clearly, you should never flake out on a promise to take grandma out to dinner. But if you've signed a lengthy financial contract with a gym, a cellphone company, a bank or a landlord, continuing to pay for a service or a product may no longer be feasible. For instance, perhaps you've just lost your job.It's times like those when everyone finds themselves asking that age-old question: Can I break my contract?Maybe, maybe not. But if you think you're going to have to try and extract yourself from a contract, remember the following:[See: 11 Expenses Destroying Your Budget.]Honesty is the best policy. If you simply want to stop paying for a service or product, that sort of frank answer might not get you far. But if there's a reason you can't pay – you're no longer employed or perhaps your time is being consumed by taking care of an ill parent or child – share that information. You may find that you'll get a break, says Marc Fitapelli, an attorney at the law firm Fitapelli Kurta, based out of New York City. Fitapelli says he once represented a client who signed a contract to purchase some property and put down a large deposit."After the contract was signed, he started experiencing serious financial problems related to a bitter divorce," Fitapelli says.His client realized he couldn't close on the property and found himself wishing he had that deposit back. Fitapelli's client explained his situation to the seller, who turned out to be sympathetic. Fitapelli says his client didn't get all of the money back and wasn't entitled to, but he did have much of it returned.[See: 11 Ways to Save Time and Money.]Don't be a jerk. That's always good advice, but in this case, along with explaining to the other party why you're asking to break a contract, be pleasant. You may be planning to break your contract regardless, but don't say that. Ask if you can break the contract; don't announce that you will. Give the individual or company a chance to be magnanimous. You may be pleasantly surprised."Empathy goes a long way in contract disputes. Someone is less likely to hold you to the terms you're bound to if they aren't angry at you," says J.R. Skrabanek, an Austin, Texas-based attorney who specializes in civil litigation.Try to negotiate. Maybe there's a compromise both parties can agree to. For instance, many people, when they're struggling to pay off a house or car, will refinance the terms of the loan, so that the payments are smaller. They'll generally pay more in the long run in interest, of course.Perhaps you can negotiate your way out of a contract, so that you're paying something but not everything.If you go the negotiation route and get a satisfactory result, "ask for something in writing if you can, or save any subsequent invoice that shows a zero balance owed," says Shaolaine Loving, an attorney in Las Vegas who specializes in family law and estate planning. In other words, you don't want the same party to come back later and claim you still owe money.Prove the other party broke the contract. This could be a sleazy move on your part if the other party has been perfectly reasonable, and you're just looking for an out. But if this is an individual or company that's been difficult to work with, and particularly if the other party's behavior is part of the reason you want to back out, then start scrutinizing the language in your contract."Obviously, the most arguable way to avoid penalties would be to find a way to say the other party breached the contract," Loving says. "For instance, if the home seller wouldn't allow showings or didn't correct any identified problems in time."[See: 10 Things Teens Should Know About Money.]Minimize the damage. You've explained to the other party that you're going to have to break your contract. You've been nice. You've tried to negotiate a way out. And you've been told that it doesn't matter – you still have to honor the contract.If you're going to go ahead and break it anyway, minimizing the damages you'll cause the other party may mean you're liable for less money if you go to court, says Tom Simeone, a trial attorney at Simeone & Miller, LLP, in the District of Columbia."For example, if you are going to breach a lease, if you give notice ahead of time and leave the premises clean and ready to rent, then a court will find that a landlord can and should relet it out within a few months and not award damages for additional months, even if your lease is for several more months," Simeone says.That isn't just optimistic thinking, according to Simeone."Courts routinely require plaintiffs to mitigate their damages, so anything you can do to minimize the other party's damages will reduce your potential liability," he says.Skrabanek seconds that. "If you break your lease, the apartment complex needs to show it's making a diligent effort to find replacement tenants. They can't just let your apartment sit vacant for months on end with no effort and claim you owe them for the money," he says.And there's always the chance you can break the contract without negative repercussions. That's a gamble, but possibly one worth taking if the money left to pay isn't all that much."If you breach it by failing to pay or otherwise perform, the other side simply may not pursue a claim against you because the cost of doing so – in terms of legal fees and other expenses – may not make it worth their while," Simeone says. "Few people file suit to collect a hundred dollars."10 Ways to Feel Better About Your Money.

February 21, 2020 0 comment