$250 Bonus for American Express Business Card

The American Express Platinum Business Premium Cash Rebate Card is again offering a $250 statement credit (update: removed) after your first purchase, with no annual fee. If you got in on this last time like I did, you may not be able to get it again unless you have a 2nd business - “You may be permitted to have more than one American Express? Business Card account; however, you are eligible to receive only one promotional $250 statement credit per unique business.”

See other similar $100+ bonuses here.

Added: I just saw this if you click on “Special Offer” in the upper-left - “Note: Only business owners who received this offer via Inc. Magazine qualify to apply for a Card through this website.” I don’t remember seeing that last time, so watch out.

Posted in Deals & Offers | 11 Comments »

Employee or Student Discounts for Cingular, Verizon, Sprint, Nextel, and More

Just about every major cell phone provider has discount for large corporations or groups, even when it’s an existing personal line. While most people know about their company’s discount, some do a bad job of advertising them. In addition, many students can get discounts using their school e-mails in some of these programs. Others require you to be an employee of the university, which many students also are. So grab your work or school e-mails, visit these links, and find out what discounts are available to you. You may be pleasantly surprised! I was able to get 15% off with Cingular Premier using my school e-mail.

Cingular: Premier Corporate Discount Program

Cingular has business agreements with thousands of corporations, government agencies and educational institutions to offer wireless products to their employees and families at a significant discount.

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Posted in Deals & Offers, Frugal Living | 75 Comments »

December 2006 Investment Portfolio Snapshot

Now how about a snapshot of our investments, as of the end of the day 12/15. Remarkably, our investments have increased $4,911 (7.3%) since my last update in October. Another example of how I can’t predict the stock market. We’re already done contributing to our Roth IRAs and 401ks this year, so we haven’t made any new deposits. Everything has been going into the house down payment fund.

I did realize that I’m not including my Bridgeway investments in my net worth calculations. This is because Bridgeway does not work with Yodlee, and I never remember to log into their website. Oops!

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Posted in Investing, Retirement | 18 Comments »

Specific Mutual Fund Investment Ideas For Beginners

Although I get asked regularly to do so, I’m always wary of making specific investment advice . I’m haven’t passed any securities exams, and I have no financial letters after my name like CFA, CFP, CIC, or ChFC. I’m just a SRDO - Some Random Dude Online.

At the same time, I also appreciate the fact that people like to hear some specific suggestions in order to jumpstart their own research. It’s like being told “go buy a good used car” versus “check out the 2002-2004 Honda Civic (7th Generation, but not the 1st year) with less than 60,000 miles on it.” It’s not the perfect answer for everyone, and you may not even buy that car, but it gives you something to work with.

With that in mind, this is what I would tell my sister to invest. Not you, because I don’t know you. She’s in her early 20s, recently out of college, working in her first professional job, and trying to balance renting in a big city, being young and trendy, paying back student loans, and oh yeah! - also retirement. She’s busy, doesn’t feel like reading the books I recommend just yet, but has some extra money now to put away for the future. So what does big bro tell her?

Get investing! You need to do this now so you can:

1. Reduce your risk in the long run

2. Get used to the ups and downs of the stock market (so you don’t just bail out later).

Option 1: No Money Down?
Set Up An Automatic Transfer at TIAA-CREF or T. Rowe Price
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Posted in Investing, Retirement | 55 Comments »

Bank of America $250 Best Mortgage Value Guarantee

I was chatting with my local Bank of America banker about mortgages, and she mentioned that they have a Best Mortgage Value Guarantee where if you apply for a mortgage with them, but end up going with another lender, they will give you a check for $250. So if you’re shopping for mortgages, it can’t hurt to include them in your search.

Posted in Real Estate | 13 Comments »

StartSampling: Get Free Product Samples

I got some reader requests for more Bored Money entries. Remember, this category is for stuff that I feel has a relatively low reward-to-effort ratio. This usually includes things that involve taking surveys or that involve smaller or non-guaranteed payouts, as compared to the fatter rewards like $100 signup bonuses or free iPods that I put in the Deals & Offers posts. They also tend to be things that are always available. In other words, you can save them until you’re bored!

Coincidentally, I just got another e-mail from StartSampling.com. As the name suggests, you give them some of your demographic information and they match you up with manufacturers that are looking for feedback on their products. You pick what you like, and it gets sent to you free in the mail. I’ve gotten things from food to soap to various coupons (nothing worth over $10). I just picked up a sample of Swiffer dusters. Just stick to the “Select Samples” area and avoid everything else. The “Tryer Miles” points system is largely useless, as there is nothing to redeem them for.

Posted in Bored Money | 4 Comments »

Why Your CLUE Report Is Important

Follow-up: Not being a homeowner, I may not have adequately expressed the importance of knowing what’s on your free CLUE report. For a better explanation, see this MSN article titled “Insurers keep a secret history of your home“. If they decide your house is high-risk, even if you don’t file a claim, finding homeowners insurance may become next to impossible. This is also something to be wary of when buying a house. Link via Consumerist.

Don’t tell your insurer about problems unless you’re sure you’ll file a claim. This last piece of advice is unfortunate, because insurers and insurance agents can be a decent source of counsel on whether it’s worth filing a claim. Since any damage you report could get passed on to the CLUE database, however, it’s smart now to err on the side of caution.

Posted in Insurance | 5 Comments »

Free iPod Shuffle For Trading At HedgeStreet.com

(This offer expired at the end of 2006.)

Is it just me or are iPods quickly taking over the world? A new trading site, Hedgestreet.com, is offering a free 1 GB iPod Shuffle for opening an account, funding with at least $100, and making one trade. No trading fees for the first 30 days. You can start trading immediately when you open the account. However, this is because you cannot take out your money for 30 days after deposit.
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Posted in Deals & Offers, General | 31 Comments »

What Do You Want Me To Write About?

I’d like to know what topics that you’d like to learn more about, whether it is something personal related to me, or a financial topic in general. Please go ahead and leave an anonymous comment in this post (type in anything for name and e-mail). I won’t publish them, it’ll just be between you and me. I can’t make any promises, but I will take each suggestion into consideration. Thanks!

Posted in General | 1 Comment »

Get Your Free Credit and Insurance Reports Before Year’s End

Before we get really close to the end of the year and things start getting frantic, I just wanted to remind everyone to get all the free stuff that the government promised you via the FACT Act:

Free Credit Reports from all three bureaus at AnnualCreditReport.com. I’ve already gotten all of mine. I put in a request to fix a minor error my address, but I don’t think I ever got a reply. Grrr. I’ll have to try again.

Free CLUE Insurance Report at ChoiceTrust. This shows your previous auto and home insurance claim history. More details here. Mine was thankfully mistake-free.

Posted in Deals & Offers, Insurance | 16 Comments »

Death and Taxes: A Visual Guide to the Federal Budget

Ever wondered where your taxes went? Who has the time to actually read our $2.8 trillion budget? Well, now there’s an easier way: the incredibly high-res Visual Guide to the Federal Budget. From the site:

Knowledge of how your taxes are spent is essential to being a responsible citizen. If people actually knew what their thousands of dollars of income taxes paid for, there would be rioting in the streets, or at least some more accountability in Congress.

Posted in Budgeting, General | 5 Comments »

A Better Way To View Stock Market Risk

The prospect of losing your hard-earned money is scary. You know that if you invest with $1000 in stocks, in a year you could be left with either a huge gain or a huge loss. People (including me in the past) tend to look at the stock market like a slot machine:

This is good in that, yes, for the short-term the stock market is risky. Don’t put money you may need right away into stocks. However, when young people tell me that they are putting their Roth IRAs in a bank CD because they are afraid of the stock market, that is bad. Roth IRAs are long-term investments. We’re talking 30, 40, 60 years for some people! The way you should be looking at the stock market is this:

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Posted in Investing, Retirement | 33 Comments »

Understanding My Local Real Estate Market - Portland, OR

Although I try to keep this blog pretty geographically neutral, many of you know that I currently reside in the Portland, Oregon area. Although we aren’t planning to stay here that much longer, it’s a great place to live and we almost hate to leave. But we have made personal commitments to move closer to our family. In the meantime, my new hobby is going to be learning more about the local Portland real estate market. Hopefully I can better understand which cheaper neighborhoods are on the upswing and also look for houses for potential rentals. It also gives me something to do before we find new jobs and can therefore start looking for houses for ourselves.

Besides comparing mortgage payments and the market rates for rent, I also need to figure out:

1. Local property tax rates
2. Average home insurance costs
3. Average Vacancy rates
4. Home warranty costs
5. How to find foreclosure listings and auctions
6. Property manager recommendations and rates
7. (anything I’m missing?)

I’m probably not going to contact any real estate agents or mortgage brokers just yet, as I don’t want to waste their time. I’m going to hit the Open House circuit on weekends and maybe talk to For Sale By Owner houses. Pretty much keep it low key, but hopefully educational too. Also, I’ve discovered that while people tend not to like talking about money and salaries, they are much more willing to talk about houses!

Posted in Real Estate | 29 Comments »

Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI) Is Tax-Deductible In 2007

Traditionally, if you couldn’t afford a 20% down payment on a house, you had to pay private mortgage insurance, or PMI. To avoid this, many people now take out “piggyback” or second mortgages, which carry higher (but tax-deductible) interest payments. But Congress just passed a provision allowing taxpayers with adjusted gross income of $100,000 or less to fully deduct (if they itemize) the cost of private or government mortgage insurance. The mortgage insurance contract must be issued in 2007, and currently only 2007, unless they extend it. More information can be found in this MSNBC article “Homeowners’ Lucky Day“.

This is potentially good news if you’re currently trying to buy a house with less than 20% down, but doesn’t really help the people who are already paying PMI.

Posted in Real Estate | 14 Comments »

The Automatic Millionaire Homeowner: Book Review

David Bach has sold a lot of books under his “Finish Rich” and “Automatic” titles. Most of his books seem to be heavy on the inspirational talk and light on the specifics, but I think that’s actually what has helped them sell so well - they are targeted for beginners.

Case in point, I wasn’t very impressed his earlier book The Automatic Millionaire (review), but as a home-buying neophyte I found a lot of useful information in The Automatic Millionaire Homeowner. Sure, he recycles a lot of his “make it automatic” mantra when talking about saving up for a house down payment (set up automatic transfers to a online savings account) or setting up a bi-weekly mortgage repayment plan (set up automatic transfers with your lender), but you can pretty much just skip over those parts.

Besides all the automatic-talk, what this really provides is a brief overview of the home-buying process. Think of it as “Home Buying For Dummies”, but even shorter. From finding a real estate agent, to finding the right loan, to finding the right home. The writing is clear and well-organized. It promotes long-term homeownership, and is not at all about flipping properties. However, if you’ve already gone through the process once, the book will probably bore you to death.

The main weakness in the book is that it focuses on the upsides of homeownership without fairly discussing all the potential downsides. It’s very “rah-rah”, you can almost imagine David Bach wearing a cheerleader’s outfit complete with pom-poms:

“I say BUY, you say HOUSE!” “GO REALTORS GO!”

(I added the Wells Fargo logo as he is sponsored by them.)

Conclusion
I would recommend this book for first-time home buyers, as it provides some helpful information. But, I would not recommend it as the only book to read, as it is doesn’t address the pros and cons as fairly as possible.

Overall Rating: [ratings explained]

Posted in Book Reviews, Real Estate | 17 Comments »