Tips for Successful Personal Finances
Thank you all for your posts / comments over the past few weeks. We are back from a fantastic vacation to Amsterdam (as you can see the flowers / tulips from Kuekenoff) and then a British Isles cruise. Starting next week, we will be live posting and responding.
If you have travel plans for Memorial day weekend or the summer, you should check your pricing again (just before you leave). We always recheck the pricing on hotels, cruises, rental cars and more. 
A while back, we found our hotel room was $60 less per night. Made a new reservation and cancelled the original. For our most recent trip, we were able to get upgraded to an executive room for the same price. The executive room includes breakfast and light dinner. This saved money as we will be paying less for food.
A few years back for an upcoming cruise, it seemed as if the price went down every Monday. We we are able to save about $500 – this is money that was deducted from what we would have owed at the time the final payment was due. After the final payment is made, any savings is given back to you as an onboard credit – which we had another $200).
Money is my pocket is always good. Make sure to check your reservations to save more money.
Monday to Friday 7/16/18 to 7/21/18 1:00PM – 4:00PM
To register: Telephone: (203) 857-7080 Email: extendedstudies@norwalk.edu
This is part 3 of Money Habits To Avoid. If you missed part 1 or 2, please search my blog post.
6. Keeping up with the Jones’ — There is always going to be someone with a nicer home, car, clothing, etc. That’s just life. Your budget cannot survive trying to keep up with others. This habit will send your budget off a cliff. You going to need to get comfortable with where you are and what you have.
If you see yourself in any of these habits, the first step is awareness. Once you are aware, you can make the changes necessary to break the habit.
This is part 2 of Money Habits To Avoid. If you missed part 1, please search my blog post.
3. Using Credit Cards to Get By — You know what I mean, you use your credit card because you don’t have the cash to purchase … This is a red flag if this is an every day, week, or month occurrence. Credit cards definitely havea place in your finances, but they are not the means to spending more than you can afford on a regular basis.
4. Discretionary Spending to Impress — This may have happened to you, I know it did for me when I was coming out of college. You are out with friends and you offer to pick up the tab. Maybe you want them to think you are doing better than you actually are, maybe you want to seem on par with your friends, whatever the case, no one expects you to pay more than your fair share. If you can’t afford to do something at this point, maybe you politely decline.
5. Emotional Spending — Just like emotional eating, emotional spending can be a problem. You are upset, and you go out and buy a …… Yes, you feel great in the moment, but did you need a … ….? Was it money you were planning on spending? Probably not. You know what you need to purchase, make a plan and stick to it.
Check out the next posts to find out the rest of the Money Habits To Avoid.
In my opinion, there are seven money habits you want to avoid.
You may be currently doing these or have done them in the past (and I have been guilty of them myself), but now is the time to break the habits and get on with your finances.
Check out the next two posts to find out the rest of the Money Habits To Avoid.
We all hear about the college students and the money mistakes they made while in college. I was one of them. This article from US News shares the top six mistakes and gives you ideas to think about. Read more
As April is typically a clean out month, I want to make you aware of two different opportunities to get rid of some items in your home.
First, this Saturday, April 28 is National Prescription Drug Take Back Day. Now you can safely get old and unused prescriptions (and over the counter medicines) out of your home easily. For more details and locations, click here.
Next, do you have unused toys? Hasbro is offering a pilot recycling program to recycle your unwanted toys. You start at the website, register, print the free shipping label and drop off the package. It’s that simple and keeps the toys out of landfills, click here to start.
For more resources and suggestions, please visit my website to get rid of your unwanted items.
For the past couple of years, we have tackled paper in our home. It always 
amazes me that so much paper could accumulate and how many file cabinets for all this paper . So in our household, we are working our way to minimal paper. This is how we are doing this.
Step one was to make a promise to go through the mail each day – recycling what is junk and dealing with the remaining. That means putting the bills in the bill pay file. Responding to invites. Creating a folder for menus and discounts. Keeping on top of subscriptions. This is working in our home.
But there was still papers! Like many of you, I didn’t have a lot of time to spend on this project, so I planned baby steps. For me, that was one major area per year. There were two items I needed to tackle this. First a scanner – I chose one with a feeder to be able to scan multiple pages. Next, the shredder – I chose a cross cut versus a strip cut to really make confetti out of the documents.
Year one, was our medical records – lab results, doctors notes, insurance claims, cancelled checks etc. We sorted these into piles – keep and scan, toss and to do. This took time, we spent 5 minutes most days and did a little more each day. Within the year, this was done. One file cabinet drawer tackled.
Year two, was taxes and supporting documents. This wasn’t as hard as I imagined. We kept 7 years worth of paper returns. We choose to scan the actual old tax returns before shredding them. Now, we scan everything including the supporting documentation and keep the returns in a pdf file.
Year three (honestly, this two two plus years) was the family photos. For our home, this included movies and slides in addition tot he photos. I inherited all my families media and sorting this took time. First, we the movies. we didn’t even own an 8mm projector. We took a giant leap of faith and trusted the titles to a company to put them on DVD. And that worked for us. Next, the photos. I have to be honest and tell you this was time consuming. It took lots of time to sort and scan the photos we wanted. Last, came the slides. We sorted these and sent them to the same company to be put on a flash drive. This project is done!
This year is the year of the manuals, you know those items that come with a new item and you keep it just in case. Ours are very organized and filed by room or type of product and we do refer to them from time to time. But they are taking up a whole file drawer. My though process, is to download the manual as we by new products to refer to and not save the paper. I will create a file with folders like my file cabinet.
Remember to back up anything on your computer, either in a cloud or on external media. You would to lose your family photos or important documents with a computer crash.
We have gotten rid of three file cabinets – two four drawers and one lateral – so far. And there is more to go. What do you do with all your paper?
As I sit here and write this blog post about spring, I feel that I am missing spring. Here in the northeast we seem to be having a never ending winter. Yes, we have had a few days of warm sunshine. We have been subject to various temperature swings – one day 50 and then cold, snowy / rainy days. I know it’s spring because the daffodils and crocus are blooming (and something peeking out of the snow).
Because the calendar says spring, lets talk about your finances. Now that tax season is over, it’s a good time to take a look at your finances and tackle these ideas:
Hopefully, the weather will agree with the calendar and spring will arrive soon.
Let me know what your spring finance projects are.