As most of you know it�s sometimes very difficult to make the best financial choices all the time, even when the logical side of our brain tells you its wrong, we still often make the wrong choice. It�s obvious this is the case; otherwise American wouldn�t be in the debt crisis we are currently facing. Millions of Americans wouldn�t have lost their home to foreclosure or be facing foreclose in the near future. With this article I however want to take this topic down to a simpler thought. I want to talk about why we make small dumb financial choices each day that may not have a major impact on our lives, but do affect our finances.

I want to start with an everyday example. There is a convenient store / gas station chain located in the Midwest and Southern parts of the United States called Speedway. Many of the Speedways that I know today were once Super America stores but this is just side information. The point is they have a rewards program. For all your in store and fuel purchases you are awarded points. These points can be redeemed for merchandise, gift cards to Speedway or gift cards to other partner stores. Sounds like a great deal, right? Wrong!

First, the term convenient store means you are going to pay a lot more for any item you buy there because it�s convenient. You won�t have to wait in a long grocery store line to checkout and you can get your can of soda already chilled and ready to drink, but it will cost you, sometimes as much as 500%! For example, just the past week soda was on sale for $2.50 for a 12 pack. I admit this isn�t typical, but you can sometimes find these deals. A convenient store may charge as much as $1.00 for a can of pre-chilled soda. $0.21 for a grocery store soda versus $1.00 for a convenient store soda is about a 500% markup.

How can you solve this problem of convenient store robbery? The answer is pretty simple and you have a couple obvious options. First, don�t drink soda; it�s not good for you anyway. Second, pack a small cooler to take in the car when you leave the house. Fill it with cold soda and even snacks. If you plan to be on the road for a while it�s a great break from driving to stop and grab a snack.

Remember I said this was a two part post, stay tuned for part two very soon.

I am going to start making some posts that relate to free things you can find, especially online. A few years ago I would dreamed there were so many free things, but after doing some research and real life experience I have realized it’s true. The internet has changed the way we live, sometimes for the good sometimes for the bad. Lets get to today’s freebie.

Are you are thinking about starting your own business? Already own your own business? If you answered yes to either of these questions you may want to take a look at SCORE.org. SCORE.org is a great resource for any business owner. This nonprofit organization has over 12,400 volunteers whose best interest is for you, the business owners. You can stop by one of their 364 nationwide offices nationwide or chat with a volunteer online for instant advice. Who says nothing in this world is for free?

Fortunes are made and lost overnight in the stock market. I once heard that over 95% of the people who invest in the stock market actually lose money. It’s a risky game for most of us, but with some research and luck many investors make hundreds of thousands of dollars from investing in the stock market. If you are interested in investing in the stock market, take a minute to read this post. I will give a brief overview of how the stock market works, I will teach you why you should invest, show you how to start investing, and how you can actually profit from investing in the stock market.

How the Stock Market Works

The beginning concept of the stock market dates back to 12^th century France. Since then it has grown into a huge business and created full time jobs for millions of people. The stock market is vital to our economy chiefly because it is the most important way for companies to raise capitol for their business. Investors buy stock in a company which gives this company more money to invest to grow the business. Hopefully, the business will thrive increasing the value of the stock, the investor will sale the stock and make money.

Why should you invest in the stock market?

Many people use the stock market to earn extra income or to invest in their future retirement. Almost everyone could use some extra cash, right? From personal experience it is very difficult for the average investor to actually make a lot of extra income from the stock market. In order to earn huge gains from the stock market you have to have a lot of money to invest. Because of the “per trade” fee that investment companies charge you, investors have to purchase large quantities of a stock in order to offset the costs of investments. Also, any gains from the sale of stock are taxed more than personal income tax. I would recommend waiting to do this type of investment after you learn the basics of investing and have your retirement funded.

So, back to the original question, why should you invest in the stock market? Investing for your future retirement is a great reason to learn the ropes of the stock market. Many people don’t realize the importance of having their retirement funded. The earlier you start investing for retirement to more prepared you will be when the time comes. It may also allow you to retire sooner than your friends and co-workers.

So, Ready to start investing in the Stock Market?

Not so fast, investing in the stock market can be risky, know what you are doing before you sign up.

First, learn the lingo of the business. There are many websites online you can research and learn the basic lingo of the stock market. At least learn the basics before you start. It’s just like the rule of reading the instructions before you try to put together furniture. Sure you can jump right in and try to put it together, but you will probably miss a step or do something out of order and the whole piece of furniture is ruined. Take some time to read the stock market instruction book before throwing away your money.

Second, open a virtual portfolio at an online stock market trading website. There are many websites online that let you play the stock market game without investing a dime. You can choose any real stocks you want and they will track your progress over time. You can buy and sales just like the real market. After several months if you aren’t making virtual money odds are you won’t be very successful at the real game either.

Research, research, research is the key to success. Obviously, no one knows exactly how the market will work but if you know what to look for sometimes you can get a heads up over the competition. Key factors such as the company earnings reports can have an impact on the stocks value. You can also watch trends of stocks, sometimes the values of stocks peak at certain times of the year. There are many theories on stock market fluctuations but knowing the inner workings of a company can help you invest smarter.

Now, you have earned some virtual money and done some research on your favorite stocks you are to try your luck at the real stock market. There are many places that will allow you to invest in the stock market: two that I use and recommend are Zecco and Sharebuilder. These two programs do not require you to keep a minimum balance and their fees are very low for investing. Once you choose a place to start investing you must decide your investment goals. Do you want to invest for retirement or invest to make money right now?

I would always suggest to the beginning investor to invest for retirement. My choice of retirement investment would be a Roth IRA. A Roth IRA allows you to invest funds after taxes and those profits can be withdrawn at retirement tax free. A Roth IRA allows you to invest in stocks, bonds, mutual funds or ETF’s. It allows you to have a diversified portfolio and still have complete flexibility of your choice.

If you plan to invest to make money now, you should be aware of what this entails. Any gains you make from stock sales in a year are taxed at a different rate than income taxes. These gains are taxed harder so take this into consideration when investing.

Profit from investing in the Stock Market

Again, I obviously don’t know all the secrets to the stock market. If I did I probably wouldn’t be taking the time to write this article. However, there are some simple rules to follow in order to profit from the stock market.

First, buy low sale high. It’s an age old rule that investors still struggle with today. If a stock jumps in price to a peak, you may want to consider a sale and keep the profits. If a stock drops to a new low you may want to consider buying.

Remain calm. If a stock drops a considerable amount in one day, don’t panic. Unless the company is in danger of bankruptcy the stock price will rise. The best thing to do would be buy more of the stock at the lower price.

Diversify your portfolio. As the ole saying goes, don’t put all your eggs in one basket. If you put all your money into a single stock you are living very dangerous. If anything happens to this company your entire portfolio could disappear. It is a good idea to invest in different types of funds including, stocks, bonds, mutual funds and ETF’s. Spread your money around and even if something happens to a single company you will still make money in the long run.

Watch your portfolio. If you are going to make money you want to keep an eye on your investments. Track their progress over time and make necessary changes to your portfolio. You may need to sale some of your investments that have reached highs and maybe buy more of investments that are at all-time lows.

Change your investments with your lifestyle. As you grow older you should move more of your investments to safer areas of the stock market. Individual stocks are considered extremely risky and should be avoided the closer you get to retirement. Instead consider safer investments such as bonds and CD’s.

Conclusion

There is a lot of money to be made in the stock market and there is a lot of money to be lost. If you are going to play the game be sure you understand the rules. Know exactly where you are putting your money and why. Staying on top of your portfolio will increases your changes of winning with the stock market

It has been a while since we’ve had a guest post. Today, Veronica from Credit Magic would like to share an article about credit repair. Please enjoy.

There are various attorneys and repair clinics which professionally repairs credit reports. There are various tricks and tips to remove false records from credit report. Few tips for credit repair are �
 
·  Check credit report

Credit reporting agency moves together all credit report electronically. These reports have information from where one live to details of their paying habits, arrest information and bankruptcy. This information compiled will be used for verifying whether one would be adequate borrower or not. Contact credit bureau who is having your file. You entitled with a free credit   report each year and also entitled to free credit report only if you denied credit within past 60 days. Review it cautiously for inaccurate information, particularly offensive information that will importantly affect credit rating and possibility for qualifying for credit or loan. At times if creditor do not re-verify on time or credit bureau does not handle dispute properly and is busy, one can delete its credit record from credit report later. Be very careful and precise in checking that whether all information is accurately reported or not. If someone finds any negative information in their report, verify them urgently, one cannot afford off putting remarks and errors in their report.
 
· The credit bureau must investigate matter within allotted time

Every negative credit record in any credit report can deny by you any time. Credit bureau must reinvestigate and if particular item cannot verify within reasonable time, that credit record should be removed from credit file. They should provide you with free copy of corrected credit report. Then send dispute letter to credit bureau through certified mail and request return receipt. If credit bureau completes investigation and then decides that negative information must remain in file, you can then add letter of explanation for refusing the claim.
 
After removing unconstructive items from credit report, next task is rebuilding your credit. You include positive credit items on report by obtaining a secured credit card or by taking out small secured loan. You can build good credit also by having somebody with better credit record cosign in your application for small loan.

Want to know how to buy your family�s clothes for next to nothing? Stick with me throughout this article and I will teach you how to save up to 95% off your clothing budget. As many of you super savers already know there are a few techniques you can use to get great discounts on clothing, but if you learn how to combine these techniques you will be amazed at how much money you can save! I�m going to start off explaining a few savings methods you may already know and the wrap it up with the techniques to use in order to maximize savings.

For the most part America is a �living in the present� society. The majority of us do not plan ahead, and financial statistics will prove that a small percentage of us even have a savings account with a balance of $1,000. That�s why my first technique may be obvious however; difficult to implement. Clothing stores often mark down their clothing as much as 85% toward the end of a season. Most of us will wear the same size clothing one year later so why not take advantage of the sales? Store the clothes away in a storage tote and break out your new, extremely discounted clothing the following year. Sure, it may be a season old, but I would be willing to bet that the majority of us wear clothes for longer than one year anyway. My wife often buys new, brand name clothing for our children for $2 and $3 per piece using this technique.

 Second, use those coupons! Almost every clothing store will issue some type of coupon in the local paper or on the internet. These coupons may only be for 10% – 15% discount but if you were going to buy the item anyway, why not save a few dollars. When using coupons always read the fine print, often coupons exclude certain items including items that are on sale or on clearance. If you get to the checkout counter and they wonâ��t accept your coupon donâ��t be afraid to walk away. In order to avoid a voided transaction the cashier may honor the coupon anyway.

 Take advantage of discounted gift cards. Gift card resale is becoming a very popular trend and many websites and businesses are completely designed around the resale of gift cards. They offer to purchase gift cards that you won�t use for less than face value and in turn resale these gift cards to someone who will use them for a small profit. For example, you may receive a $50 gift card for Dicks Sporting Goods as a Christmas gift. You know you will never use it so you decide to sale the gift card for $40 to a gift card resale business. The resale businesses will in turn sales your card to someone else for $45. You get $40 for your gift card that you would never use and someone else saves 10% from purchasing your gift card, everyone wins!

 Now that you have read the saving techniques you may already know where I�m going with this, but if not let me explain. Simply combine two or three of the techniques for extreme savings. Let me give you an example to further explain. I start my search on a gift card resale website. I purchase a $50 Kohls gift card for $45. My wife loves to shop at Kohls because their off season clothing prices are great and usually you can use a coupon even on clearance items. Let�s assume it�s the end of summer and their discount is 85%. I buy $350 worth of clothes and after the 85% discount my total is $52.50. I use a coupon that is 15% off your total purchase that brings my total to $44.63. Sales tax adds another $2.68 for a grand total of $47.31. I use my $50 gift card to pay the balance and get back $2.69. My total percentage saved after all discounts is is almost 88% and that�s not including the discount on the gift card, not bad. I just bought $350 worth of clothes for $47.31.

So my family recently moved into a new house. Well, new to us the house is actually about 4 years old. That is just old enough to develop a great home for a bunch of mosquitoes in our back yard. We have now lived here for about six weeks and the bug bites were horrible. I’ve bought some home pest treatments from our local hardware store but haven’t seen much success.

Before you dismiss the power of insect bites let me explain our situation further. We have a small dog and no fence yet in the backyard, this means taking the dog out 3 or 4 times per day. Each visit to the backyard means either covering yourself in bug spray or accepting the fact that you will get a few bug bites. Multiply 3 trips per day times 2 bug bites and it adds up quickly. We were all in misery from the mosquito bug bites. One of them even bit me deep enough to leave a bruise!

About two weeks ago my wife decided to call the professionals. Armed with a cell phone and phone book she got some quotes from different pest control businesses in the area. Basically, it was going to be about $100 to spray the back and front yards, cover the perimeter of the house and dust the vacant lot next to us. I personally thought it was a little expensive just to kill some pesky insects but I’ve been proved wrong.

Yesterday I took a vacation day from work to start the construction of a fence. After spending about seven hours in a tank top and shorts I am happy to report one bug bite on my arm. I’m not even sure that came from our backyard. It’s pretty amazing the difference after the spray.

Pest control wasn’t in our budget when we decided to buy our hose. We love our new house, but honestly wouldn’t want to stay around with the bugs. However, since the pest control we are happy residents! The pest control man recommends treating the area every three months. We have decided to add it to our budget!

The barter system was used for centuries before the invention of money. It was a great way for people to exchange goods and services for other goods and services. The local Tailor may trade a nice pair of pants for a weeks worth of milk from theÃ� dairy farmer. It didn’t really cost either person anything except their time and skills.

A few weeks ago a lady at work overheard me talking about needing a babysitter. She jokingly told me she would babysit for me anytime I wanted to come over to her house and cut her grass. I never really thought any more about it until a couple of days ago. Why wouldn’t I take her up on this barter for services?

We usually pay our babysitters $25 or so for a couple of hours of service. That’s a pretty big amount per hour for a babysitter, but we feel it’s not worth the hassle of someone coming to our house for less money than that. This can make a date cost upwards of $80 for dinner and a movie. Why wouldn’t I barter for free babysitting?

The lady from my work hates yardwork and tending to her lawn. She would much rather watch our kids for a couple of hours than cut the grass. I actually don’t mind yard work and I could always find an extra hour or so to tend her yard if it meant free babysitting.

Think of some ways you can use your skills to save some money. With the recent recession I think it’s possible you will start seeing more of the barter system being used. An ancient system may be making a comeback!

So it would appear that our economy is headed back to the positive. Over the last six months the DOW has gained over 2,200 points. Investors are slowly gaining enough confidence in the market to start buying stocks again. But, what about the housing market?

The last few years has given the market in real estate a major beating. Home values have been pounded with little signs of recovery. Just recently the housing market seems to have became somewhat stable. Instead of falling home sales it appears the market has became flat.

So what trend will mortgage interest rates follow? The last week has given way to another slight decrease in the 30 year fixed rates, which brings me to the real reason for writing this article.

A few months ago I wrote an article about buying some land to build a future home. We got a great deal on a foreclosed acre of land in a nice neighborhood. The land appraised for just over $80,000 and we paid $52,000 so a deal that was hard to pass up. When we purchased the land we couldn’t find the developer in the phone book or Internet so we assumed the rules for building would be relaxed. The only rule that worried us was having to build a home within 8 months after purchasing the land.

We were prepared to build the house in the next couple of years, but 8 months would be a little too soon for us financially. Well about a week ago I met the developer while cleaning up the lot. Needless to say he wants us to start construction as soon as possible in order to keep the contract valid. He was very nice about the situation but wants us to start within a year.

With all this said, I’m hoping interest rates continue to stay well below 6% over the next year. A difference of 1% in interest rates will cost us an extra couple of hundred dollars per month. We’re listing our house next month by owner with hopes of a quick sale. We want to rent for 6 to 8 months while saving some money for a good down payment. Hopefully interest rates will stay on our side.

Whether you are looking forward to retirement or dreading your final day of work we all hope to be prepared for the day when it arrives. With the current economy retirement planning has never been more important. There are many different paths to choose when it comes to planning for retirement, the key is to pick the type of retirement you feel is most appropriate for you personally.

What if a company you were wanting to work for offered a particular type of retirement program. Would this have any affect on� your decision to take a job with this company?

Two popular choices among many companies are defined benefit or a defined contribution plan. Both of these plans are still in use today by employers. If you were given the option which would you prefer?

A defined benefit plan (DB) is like a� traditional pension or fixed pension.� Usually, the employee is guaranteed for the rest of their life and sometimes even the rest of their spouses� life,� a set monthly amount of money upon retirement. This amount is determined by factors such as years of service and their salary while working. This benefit may also include additional perks including health insurance and a cost-of-living increase each year. A defined benefit plan is popular among government agencies.

A� defined contribution plan (DC) � is a retirement plan where the employer usually promises to contribute to the plan, but does not guarantee there will be any certain amount of funds available upon retirement. Examples of defined contribution plans include 457, 401(k), and 403(b) plans.

There areÃ� pros and cons to both types of retirement plans. Traditionally defined benefit plans offer much better retirement benefits, however in return salaries and wages are typically lower. Likewise, employers who offerÃ� defined contribution plans pay higher wages but don’t guarantee any funds available at retirement.

There are many factors� I would have to consider� before chosing a retirement benefits package if given the choice. Obviously, the percentage the employer offered to a defined contribution plan would have a great impact on my choice.

Second, many companies seem to be moving away from traditional pension plans. New employees aren’t offered the same plans older employees were offered years ago. The original retirement packages are much more taxing on the company than they originally assumed. So it appears pension plans are on the way out.

Finally, I think I like to have more control of where my money is placed. It’s my future and I feel involved more in the decisions. Most defined contribution plan have a variety of fund options available for investment. You also have control of how much money to put in these funds and can move funds around as you choose.

So, personally I would choose a defined contribution plan given the option. You have more control of your money and you typically earn a higher income while you are working. This means if you budget correctly during your working years you can save more for retirement years.� 

Many, many year ago before credit cards were invented people paid for everything with cash or a barter system. I know for most of us it’s hard to imagine not being able to conveniently whip out the plastic at the grocery store, gas station, movies and even fast food restaurants.

For some of us this still remains true. My dad still only carries cash to pay for many common things such as those mentioned above. Even the president of the company where I am employed told me he still only uses cash for most common purchases. I have gotten so used to using a credit card to pay for things it’s hard to imagine life without them.

What would life be without credit cards? So many timesÃ� I have heard that you can save so much money by using a cash only system. It hurts so much more to pay for something with cash than with a credit card. I’m still not completely convinced this is true for me, but recently I have thought about something that does temp to to test the cash only system.

Let’s assume I went to the grocery store and only took $80 cash to pay for my groceries. I left my wallet at home with my credit cards hidden away to prevent any possible usage. I would think twice about buying those Twinkies for $2, after all that’s 2.5% of my weekly grocery budget! On the other hand if I had a credit card I basically have a $10,000 + limit so buying something unnecessary would be much easier. So using an all cash system in this case would definitely help save money.

Another great example of where I could see an all cash system being successful in our life is with the eating out budget. Sometimes we spend over $400 per month eating out. I know we could easily make it on $200 and put an additional $200 per month in our savings account. If we only brought $20Ã� cashÃ� with us for dinner it would be much easier to skip dessert or the appetizer that we don’t really need anyway.

I think an all cash system could definitely save our family money. However, because we have used the “pay your credit card off every month” system for so long I think it will be very difficult to get used to destroying our credit cards. Maybe I will have to create a happy medium to ween ourselves off our addiction!