Blog roundup #5 - Life, Love and Money

Ah summer…time of ubiquitous barbeques, graduation parties and vacations. Perhaps because Chicago is the best-city-ever during the summer or maybe because we spend a bit too much time cultivating our ginormous tomato plants, taking a blogging break was just what the doctor ordered. I have yet to learn how to budget my time so I have a wealth of backlogged posts enabling me to post every day even during those times when I just don’t feel like it. (Especially when not feeling like it lasts for weeks.)

Truth be told, I’ve actually unsubscribed from a few of the blogs I frequented, and expanded my horizons into (gasp) non money related blogs. If you’ve ever noticed the mantra on my homepage, it says that Our Common Cents is about “life, love and money.” Well, I’ve spent quite some time on the last one, and further posts will have a money flair, but it’s time to focus a little more on relationships and self-development. This will help my enthusiasm and my need to not add any superficial clutter to an internet that’s already overcrowded with useless information.

My blogging peers seem to share my sentiments, so rather than building on what they already stated, I’ll let you be the judge. Whether you’re burned out by sad news of the economy or just plain burned out, it’s time for a vacation. I’m glad I wasn’t the only one who had hundreds of unread articles in my Google Reader this month. The rest resulted in my first editor’s pick (!!) in a money hack carnival following my blogging sabbatical.

And on to some more links from my long suffering reader:

Cheap Healthy Good, oh how I love thee. Interesting content, witty writers, and, of course, one of my favorite subjects – The Simpsons. **Swoon**

During August I’ve begun a 30 day water only challenge. I will not drink anything but water. Yes, that means alcohol too folks. As a self-described Diet Coke addict, this will be no easy task. I’ll be sure to chronicle every aspartame withdrwal induced headache in the future, but just in case anyone else is up for the task, here’s an inspiring article I stumbled upon over at Brip Blap. To make it money related, the DC has been costing me upwards of $30 a month between lunches, the vending machine, and the extra cases in the grocery budget.)

Millionaire Mommy Next Door is doing a 30 day abundance project, using the premise of the laws of attraction. Essentially she’s trying to create wealth by visualizing it and bringing it to life. I occasionally have reservations about new age-y money concepts, but this one is hard to argue with – she’s already getting results! Perhaps Our Common Cents will try this experiment soon.

Stay tuned for more articles about life, love and money…

Blog roundup #4, Tell-me-how-to-do-it edition

Whenever I tell people I host a blog about money, they ask me what to do about their personal finances. Umm…I don’t know. It depends. Key disclaimer – I’m not a financial planner, accountant, or psychologist. I can lead you in the right direction, as in, what’s been useful for ME, but really, this blog is about entertainment. The same can be said for nearly every other blog out there. With that out of the way, let the links begin:

I know nothing about money. Where do I begin?

The best of the best – a helpful resource of financial websites
http://mizmoney.blogspot.com/2008/05/best-of-best-8-really-good-financial.html

Everything you need to know about personal finance. It’s simple. Really.
http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/11/29/everything-you-ever-really-needed-to-know-about-personal-finance-on-the-back-of-five-business-cards/

How do I talk about money with my partner?

Know where the money is going – especially what’s in your spouse’s wallet
http://www.freemoneyfinance.com/2008/06/do-you-know-wha.html

One of the best books out there for dealing with relationships and money is Smart Couples Finish Rich. For a good synopsis of the book, check out this review:
http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/01/06/review-smart-couples-finish-rich/

How do I create a budget?

A budget evolves over time, but starting from scratch is a daunting task. Here's a good go-to guide.
http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2008/04/14/building-your-first-budget/

Now that you have a budget, learn how to save even more by analyzing trends.
http://personalfinancier.blogspot.com/2008/04/how-to-save-money-by-analyzing-your.html

Contingency budgeting – you need to have a plan B, or constantly re-evaluate the budget. Your choice. (Mr. Cents and I have 3 contingency budgets for a variety of situations).
http://harvestingdollars.com/2008/04/18/prepare-for-a-recession-or-job-loss-with-2-budgets/

Now what? On the road to building wealth

Save automatically – a great way to be on the road to being a millionaire. Here’s 9 ways to save without breaking a sweat:
http://www.bripblap.com/2008/9-ways-to-save-without-breaking-a-sweat/

Invest wisely as a couple – it’s easy to make these common mistakes.
http://www.bankrate.com/gookeyword/news/investing/20080430-investing-couples-mistakes-a1.asp

More information, please

Carnivals are a great way to see many financial articles and perspectives at once. Here’s the latest in the personal finance world:
http://www.bripblap.com/2008/9-ways-to-save-without-breaking-a-sweat/
http://www.mrsmicah.com/2008/06/23/carnival-of-personal-finance-158-vampire-slaying-edition/
http://myinvestingblog.com/2008/06/26/money-hacks-carnival-18-the-history-of-money/

Blog roundup #3, Everything in Moderation edition

This week Consumerism Commentary hosts the Third Anniversary Edition of the Carnival of Personal Finance. Part 2 of the Gen X interview series is featured in the carnival. I’m learning so much from the interviews and hope to continue the series for a few more weeks. Thanks for the contributions so far!

While you’re over at Consumerism Commentary, check out how Flexo could find 10,000 per year if necessary. It’s an interesting article in understanding where your money goes and what you could cut…if you really had to.

Rachel at Ms. Money Penny has a great article this week on coping with the urge to spend and offers some tips for dealing with the “spendy little devil” on your shoulder.

I read the Get Rich Slowly blog every day. JD has been writing for over 2 years now and has quite a backlog of interesting articles. He realized that new readers happen by all the time and his new readers guide to Get Rich Slowly is a fantastic idea, one I hope more PF bloggers decide to copy. Blog dewy decimal system anyone?

My sister in law graduated from high school a couple weeks ago and consumer education in high schools has been a topic I’ve thought quite a bit about lately. Someday, I’d love to be part of the solution to improve financial education for people before they reach adulthood. We need to find a way to educate people about things like compound interest before they are offered their first credit card. The Simple Dollar proposes an interesting discussion on what should be part of a high school consumer education.

Like anything good for you, frugality is great in moderation. A little bit of blog love goes out to my favorite foodie blog, Cheap Healthy Good, who broached this very topic last week.

Brip Blap entertains us with a personal story which emphasizes why you need to write your goals down in order to accomplish them. The moral of the story? Writing your goals down makes you more likely to get serious about them.

Till next time, keep reading and recommending articles – it’s the best way to get the message out!

Blog roundup #2: Carnivals, how retirement can save you $32k a year, and more “common cents” from the web

Blog roundup #2: Carnivals, how retirement can save you $32k a year, and more “common cents” from the web

In case you haven’t been introduced to a blog carnival, let this be your introduction: The Carnival of Personal Finance #155 – Time With Family, hosted over at Moolanomy. A carnival is a great way of seeing a network of interesting topics you might not otherwise stumble upon. My recent introduction to interviewing Gen X is posted under the finance subcategory.

Another worthwhile carnival is the money hacks carnival. My post on saving money by having an outside of the box wedding is featured here.

On to some of my favorite common “cents” over the past couple weeks:

Meg at All Financial Matters talks about the end of the world as we know it, aka the personal finance brain drain for our generation, a topic near and dear to Our Common Cents. One of the biggest reasons I started writing this blog was to educate Gen Xers about personal finance, something I saw that was drastically lacking in the world. This is an article/vent I highly recommend reading and posting a comment.

I can’t get enough of Tim Ferris. I spent several hours of a recent vacation reading his bestseller The Four Hour Workweek, and although I do not agree with all of his principles, I couldn’t turn away… while on vacation… in Florida. (I know, I know, what’s wrong with me?) At times, Tim’s writing can be a bit in-your-face and a tad egocentric, but that doesn’t detract from the fact that he is just a fascinating guy. Perhaps it’s my desire to have self-sufficient sources of income with very little effort, but I think it’s really more a desire to pursue my vagabond dreams.

Luckily, I’m not alone. JD over at Get Rich Slowly seems to have also latched onto my undying infatuation, and has been running several interviews and articles lately on Tim. The most recent story was how to take a mini retirement tips and tricks. The most important quote on this article was that Tim “saved $32k by living overseas instead of sitting on the couch in SF Bay watching cable.” It was enough to fulfill my Tim Ferriss obsession for the week (don’t worry, Mr. Cents, you’re still the object of my affection! Now about that vacation to Buenos Aires….)

Gen X Finance is one of my new favorite blogs in the PF world (can you guess why?) The best way to describe his no-nonsense approach to finance is a financial whack in the head. In a recent article about increasing sales of SPAM during the astronomic rise in food prices, he outlines why buying SPAM to save money doesn’t make sense. It’s just the kind of common cents we need to keep us grounded.

Happy cents-able reading! (Note to self – no more puns….at least until next week.)

Blog roundup week 1: Earn more, spend less edition

By Carrie

If you’re anything like me, you read several blog posts a week, perhaps any one of the major financial blogs, maybe some other life skills blogs, a cooking blog, and something just for fun. For several weeks now, I’ve been meaning to devote some of my prime blog real estate (note: sarcasm) to referring my readers (yes, that means you mom) to other worthwhile posts. This week, one common theme in the personal finance blogosphere seems to be at that fundamental level – either earn more or spend less. A few insightful tips and my favorite links this week follow:


Sometimes, to really make a financial impact you need to go beyond nickel and diming your monthly budget to death. For advice on impacting the big expenses, The Simple Dollar gives us sixteen hardcore tactics for minimizing your monthly bills.

Do you ever feel like you’re running in place, not really getting ahead? Rock Your Day challenges us to ask ourselves the tough question: Are we moving toward our goals or are we just spinning our wheels?

Unhappy with your job? You’re not alone! Gather Little by Little talks a little bit about his own dissatisfaction with the working world and summarizes a recent Salary.com survey about worker attitudes in this post.

BripBlap engages us with a story many of us can relate to – pouring endless hours into a job in hopes for a big payoff later. He recounts tales of life at a Big 4 accounting firm as the big present I gave my first employer.

When I met Mr. Cents, he was deep in financial debt and had to take drastic measures to dig himself out. Gen X Finance offers ten steps to take when you’re in financial trouble – a great reference tool to prepare for (or prevent) a financial meltdown.

In the theme of spending less than you earn, sometimes we need to look at our financial situation in reverse – by earning more than we spend. My favorite post this week over at Digerati Life has some brilliant ideas to increase your salary without increasing your work – a laudable goal we all aspire to.

One of my personal favorites this week is about slowing down the daily grind over at Ms. MoneyPenny. Sometimes, work gets the best of us and our best solution is to create personal margin and get some peace and quiet the American way.

Finally, JD over at Get Rich Slowly talks about something we rarely discuss in the personal finance world – how to deal with relationships when you’re doing well financially but your family is not. As a side note, JD vents about the lack of information out there available for people dealing with relationships and money. I think he’s on to something and I may start posting more about this. (After all, I am a trained psychologist.)