I mean, it’s still there and all, but does it really mean anything?

And if it does mean something, what more can retailers do that they already haven’t?

WalMart Stores, Radio Shack, The Apple Store, Best Buy, KMart, Kohl’s, Toys “R” Us, and Target have already had their Black Friday ads “leaked.”   I can’t really believe that these leaks were anything but completely planned: orchestrated to create buzz.

Black Friday just doesn’t seem that special anymore. It’s gone from being a crowded, but otherwise lighthearted, shopping day to a spectacle.  People with time on their hands and a few extra layers of clothing stand out all night to grab a few loss leaders, many of them hoping only to ride the wave of hype to sell them on eBay for profit.

Then there are people who just stay out of Black Friday completely, waiting for post-holiday sales or maybe regifting instead.

Retailers need us a lot more than we need them, frankly.  It’s their bottom line that suffers if we don’t go out the day after Thanksgiving.  We, on the other hand, risk blowing our spending plan for indulgence in frenzy and a New Year’s credit hangover.

As Black Friday gets crazier, just picture Happy Days.  And change the channel.

Got tweet? I do!

Howdy!  Here are the on-topic submissions for this week’s carnival:

• Bargaineering hosts a guest post on how to sue debt collectors.
• The Smarter Wallet shares some first-hand experience with debt collection practices.
• The Digerati Life runs through options for debt consolidation loans for people with good credit.
• Studenomics asks if student loan consolidation is right for you.
• Ask Mr. Credit Card has a radio interview with Lending Club, with an emphasis on debt consolidation.
• Budgets Are Sexy wouldn’t mind moving back in with the ‘rents to pay down debt.

Thanks!

Follow me on Twitter for random acts of Mighty Bargain Hunter

It’s no secret that there are federal tax credits available for many people who are looking to buy a home.  Both first-time and non-first-time homebuyers now can play the game.

The people who are among most aware of the credits, of course, are people wanting to sell a home.  It’s not difficult at all to find For Sale signs also advertising the $8,000 tax credit, and, as I may find out soon, it will probably enter the conversation at the negotiation table.

Especially if the initial offer is a lowball offer:

“Why, Mr. M.B. Hunter, that offer is awfully low. Perhaps you aren’t aware of the $6,500 tax credit you and your lovely wife are eligible for, as qualifying second-time homebuyers?”

To which I can reply:

“Ahh, yes, Ms. Realtor®, that’s very true!  But if my job takes me away from the area and I have to move within three years, then we have to pay that $6,500 back!”

(I’d like to claim credit for thinking of this, but it was actually from a financial planner I know.)

Actually, as of right now, I’m just assuming that I’ll have to pay it back under that circumstance.  The law is new enough that IRS Form 5405 doesn’t reflect the situations of the long-time homeowner.  But if I were a first-time homebuyer (taking advantage of the $8,000 tax credit) then I’d definitely need to be paying that back if I moved within three years of the purchase.

Just as it’s a bad idea to mention your trade-in when you’re buying a car, it’s a bad idea to let tax credits enter real estate negotiations.  Why?  Because the tax credits only enter the equation after the sale, not before. It’s a red herring.  Additionally, it’s unlikely that the bank will take potential tax credits into account when they underwrite the mortgage, because it’s a bit of a financial wild card.

Happy lowballing!

Got money questions? Ask them at Cash Commons

Happy Friday the 13th. Check out these lucky links from my reader:

• Five Cent Nickel has a guest post from Money Help for Christians with several good tips on how to find a good deal.
• Digerati Life reminds us that not all cheap houses are bargains.
• The Simple Dollar relates the Hawthorne Effect to activities at work.
• Generation X Finance lists out how to avoid Holiday Financial Hangover.
• Consumerism Commentary’s potential staff writer discusses the trouble with target date funds.
• Wise Bread asks whether extended warranties are ever a good deal.
• Free Money Finance explains why you shouldn’t buy tires at Costco.
• ChristianPF says it’s time to make up your Christmas budget.
• Money Ning advises taking time to make more money.

Cash Commons, a great place to ask money questions, now has a full page of registered users and over 70 questions in the mix.  A special thank-you to these bloggers who popped over this week, as well as all of the other active members:

• No Credit Needed
• PF Firewall
• Josh Tuttle of Josh and Lorena
• The Balanced Spreadsheet
• Reduce Debt Faster

Have a great weekend!

(If you have a true love, then you have thirty of them from last Christmas! Most people really only need twenty-nine French hens.)

Regifting this year is up.  Way up. A Consumer Reports survey found that a little over a third (36%) of American adults said they’d recycle a gift this year, which is a 50% increase from two years ago.  Regifting is an art and MP Dunleavey has a dozen good tips for learning that art.

With Christmas decorations hitting Costco in August, and “leaked” Black Friday ads popping up, and overt announcements from Walmart a month ago promising 100 toys for $10, it’s clear that stores really, really want to sell stuff badly.  (Not that they haven’t always wanted to sell stuff, but the retail wars seem to be getting more heated.)

So the realization that more people still want to give stuff that they already have in their possession is a little telling about how bad things are, no?  This increased regifting behavior will be a drag on year-end sales:  each re-gift means, roughly, a gift that wasn’t purchased.  If there are roughly 200 million American adults, and 5% of them re-gift one $10 gift (5% is the increase of “would re-gift” adults from last year), then that’s $100 million less that retailers will get this year, just due to regifting. Add to this outright lost sales, and pretty soon we’re talking real money, real hits to the bottom line, and real downsizing.

But you know what?  That’s what should happen. When people overspend, they need to underspend.  When people underspend, businesses that rely on people spending will run into hard times.  It’s not our duty to keep businesses afloat.  We should use the fruits of our labor in ways that benefit ourselves, and right now that includes reducing debt and saving for retirement.

So dust off those Christmas knickknacks, rewrap them, and pass them on, preferably to people other than the those who gave you said knickknacks.  Lots of others are doing it!

Got money questions? Ask them at Cash Commons

My wife got Wii Fit Plus earlier this week and it makes you think on some of the games.  Nice build-on to Wii Fit.  Besides, what other game can I flap my arms and fly around in a giant bird suit?

Here are some links of interest from my feed reader:

• Bible Money Matters comes through with a huge list of budgeting tools, finance software, and iPhone money applications.
• Tough Money Love wonders if Las Vegas deserves a recovery.
• Frugal For Life discusses the secondhand shopping be-attitudes.
• Being Frugal shares her inexpensive photo Christmas card trick.
• All Financial Matters shows how to use the rate function in Excel.
• The Digerati Life has a number of good ways to invest small amounts of money.

Also a big thank-you to these bloggers who’ve participated for the first time this past week at Cash Commons:

• Tough Money Love
• Steadfast Finances
• Damon Day
• The Wisdom Journal

Have a great weekend!

Got money questions? Ask them at Cash Commons

This article on MSN Money misses a bit in the title:

Banks punish perfect customers

The article is another one on how credit card companies are hitting otherwise conscientious users with annual fees.  The users that are being targeted now are those who pay their bills on time and don’t carry a balance.

These are not perfect customers as far as the bank is concerned.  They are close to the worst, actually: just one step above those customers that declare bankruptcy and discharge their debts.  Convenience users are not very profitable for the credit card companies, and could well cost the companies money.

Who are the best customers?  Customers that pay the minimum balance each month for years and years.  Even better are ones that do so while going over their credit limit and occasionally are slightly late on a payment, triggering more fees.  They’re the profitable ones for the banks.  If it weren’t for the profitable customers, the credit card companies couldn’t afford to hold onto the unprofitable ones.  But what’s happening now is that the CARD Act is clamping down on a number of these very profitable practices, and everyone suffers.

The tone of the article is interesting, in that it suggests that credit card companies exist to make the lives of responsible people easier.  That’s just not true.  They exist to make money.  They don’t make money by letting people like me get three weeks’ use of their money, interest-free, and a rebate to boot.  They tolerate people like me because I might fall on hard times, carry a balance, and then they’ll make money off of me.  They’ve kept me around only because I’ll go elsewhere if they make life too difficult for me.  (Perhaps they already want me to go elsewhere.  I don’t really know.)

If most people are responsible with credit and pay their bills in full, then we’ll mostly be convenience users and will have no choice but to pay fees.   But the convenience users are starting to pay fees now because banks are needing to look for sources of income, as it’s been made clear that credit card users shouldn’t have to face the full consequences of their misdeeds.

Got money questions? Ask them at Cash Commons

Welcome to this week’s Carnival of Debt Reduction! I’m very pleased that more of the submissions are on-topic. This is a very good thing, and I know it will benefit everyone concerned, from readers to submitters to hosts, to have a more on-target carnival each week.

Here are this week’s debt reduction posts, with the personal debt reduction stories up top:

• The Good Life on a Budget has paid off a car loan eight months early! Congrats!
• Man vs. Debt has a post from a reader on how they paid off their $15,000 debt by selling their stuff on eBay.
• Digerati Life has a post from a guest contributor that reduced debt with a loan modification.
• Reduce Debt Faster outlines three good ways to lower your credit card payments.  (Hint:  It never hurts to ask!)
• PT Money has an interesting question from a reader with a bit of debt problem that isn’t really her own overspending.
• Damon Day shares a sad story of a woman hit with a debt settlement nightmare.
• Christian Personal Finance gives four ways on how to pay off your mortgage early.
• Bargaineering has a post from Kyle from Suburban Dollar on telling the difference between first- and third-party debt collectors.
• Cash Money Life suggests this question as a wake-up call:  “Do you know how much interest you are paying each month?”
• Clear Choice Credit Cards posts a debt elimination guide.
• Your Money Relationship stirs up the good debt vs. bad debt question, with an anecdote on student loan debt.
• Eliminate the Muda has an interesting take on debt consolidation.

Again, thanks everyone for the on-topic posts.

One last thing:  If you’ve got debt questions, head over to Cash Commons and ask them!  They can even be as specific as this one.

Have a great week!

Got money questions? Ask them at Cash Commons

Here are some posts of interest from my feed reader:

• Generation X Finance shows how to get your cheap books and movies.
• Free Money Finance tells us what not to aspire to:  being at the bottom of the financial barrel.
• Wise Bread hones the fine art of haggling for a great deal on a used car.
• The Simple Dollar discusses stress and overspending.
• Get Rich Slowly alerts us to the pitfalls of buying in bulk.

And a special thank you to”Dr. Dean” The Millionaire Nurse for participating over at Cash Commons!

Hot hot hot money questions at Cash Commons

I requested a review copy of Secrets of a Stingy Scoundrel, and the first time the book was sent out, somehow it got lost in the mail.  The publicist contacted me to ask if I was going to review it, and I said that I never remembered seeing it.

They sent me another copy, and looking back, I really wish that I hadn’t responded to that e-mail.

Many of the tips in this book will quickly and efficiently alienate you from your family, your friends, your colleagues, and the businesses you patronize.  Try these tips once, or at most twice, and they will tell you about it, or they may just not want you around anymore.  Try these tips with the wrong person on watch, and you could get fired, or land in jail.

Mr. Villarreal issues this warning in the front of the book:

Honor.  Integrity.  Honesty.  Dignity.  If you live by any of these values, you may as well drop the book right now, because they’re against everything it professes.

Oh boy, is this ever true.  I should have put the book down right there, but I didn’t.  One word that should have been added to that list of nouns is decorum. It’s been a long time since I’ve read anything, or talked with anybody, with as vulgar and self-indulgent a speech pattern, and with such disregard for polite topics of conversation.  (There are only a few people that have permission to talk to me about my wife’s privates, and Mr. Villarreal isn’t among them.)

There are plenty of ways to save money without lying and stealing, but he wastes far too many pages describing these bad ways:

• Saying it’s your birthday (when it isn’t) in order to get free food at a restaurant
• Manufacturing fake price matches for grocery store items
• Taking the five-finger discount with office supplies from work
• Catching a double feature by sneaking into the second movie on the first ticket
• Taking money off the bar that was clearly left for the bartender
• Complaining about a meal when there’s nothing really wrong, just to get reimbursed
• Faking homelessness

And these aren’t lying or stealing but they will make you a problem child very quickly:

• Being just plain cheap with friends on road trips, gift exchanges, potlucks, and splitting the check
• Taking several of every food service supply that isn’t nailed down in a fast-food restaurant
• Actively avoiding tipping of any kind
• Being a repeat problem customer to get free services
• Abusing trial subscriptions and return policies

There were some good tips in this book, but it isn’t worth slogging through pig manure to find a couple of quarters.

Get Wise Bread’s book instead. 100% scoundrel-free, guaranteed.

Ask your burning money questions at Cash Commons