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Save on Shaving: Dollar Shave Club

May 14, 2013 by Jeff Davidson Leave a Comment

dollar shave club reviewOk I know many of you have heard of this before, but I’m just catching on. Thanks to a klout perk I was introduced to Dollar Shave Club

Thoughts on the Products

First a little history… I hate shaving! Some may call it lazy but I don’t shave unless I am having clients that day other wise I’ll go days with out shaving (went two weeks once). The price of razors also contributes to that. I’ll make a razor last a month sometimes (painful but true) and then buy the cheapest I can find (just as painful).

My klout perk had the Dollar Shave Club send me a razor handle, (4) four blade razors and their shaving butter. The day it arrived it so happen that I needed to run a razor across my face and it had been awhile.

I must say I was expecting cheap razors. I was quite surprised when I held the handle in my hand and it felt solid, well built. Razors as well were solid construction and work very well. Along with the shave butter it was one of the better shaves I have had.

The Club

The club offers 3 different razor levels, a twin blade, 4 blade , and a ‘why’ 6 blade. Monthly fees depend on which razor you wish, $1, $6, or $9 respectively, plus shipping. Although I wasn’t charged shipping on my first order when I joined. It was quite Simple to sign up (even sign up with Facebook) then you receive your razors in the mail each month. Your first order will include your handle at no charge.

Figure normally you will pay up to $15 for 5 razors or first time around $10 for handle and 2 razors. Then you have the time and hassle to go out and get them when needed. Ok you normally you will get them when you are out shopping any way, but this way you dont have to even think about it. They just show up and a whole lot cheaper as well. You can also add the shaving butter to your order when you run out.

Want to upgrade/downgrade your razor… no problem, just log in and click a button. If your facial hair is not as shaggy you can even change to every other month if you wish.

This is one of those “Why didn’t I think of this” ideas that should do well. At least I hope they do because as long as they are around I won’t be shopping for a razor again! Maybe I’ll shave a little more often now…

If you wish to try them out please use my  link here Dollar Shave Club. Yes its an affilate link, I earn a small credit towards my razor purchases, so help me keep my face clean and smooth while you do the same 🙂

The video alone convinced me 🙂

[youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ZUG9qYTJMsI]

Filed Under: Savings

Saving Money with Rain Water

April 29, 2013 by Jeff Davidson Leave a Comment

rain collection barrelI have gone all in with growing my own food lately and doing most of it hydroponically. Growing this way it is best to use dechloronated water and the easiest way to do this is to use rain water or if from the tap let it set around for at least 24 hours.

So I started doing researchIn building my own water storage system and this lead me to rain water collection.

Free Water Being Wasted

As I did my morning walk I was looking around at homes and all the rain gutters just flow into the yard or worse into the street. This is a lot of water that can be used for plant watering without driving up your water bill. I’m sure we all have some sort of house plants around or a small garden and keeping them alive is adding to your water bill. Don’t know about you but ours gets in the neighborhood of $200 every other month. Hmmm maybe I should just start wearing my clothes longer.

If your roof is 1,000 sq ft (this is a small home) and a nice little 1″ rain storm comes along guess how much water you can get? The answer is about 625 gallons! Now if you captured that it would take care of the average homes house plants for quite a while.

Build Your Own Collection System

Their are commercial collection systems of different sizes and cost. I saw one at Lowes the other day for $120 and it was about 50 gallons I think. Saw another system for $400 for 205 gallons at a landscape store.

How about making your own for under $20? Worst case maybe $30-40 for a 55 gallon and the ability to expand it. You just need to get a hold of a 55 gallon drum which I found out you can get typically for free from car washes (clean it very well) or soda bottling plants or other locations. They use them and just throw them out so they may be happy to give them to you. The worst case, you can buy them for generally $25 or less.

Get a few PVC parts to connect several drums together, add a valve then connect your rain gutters to them and you are now collecting your rain water! The beauty is that you can add more capacity if you need it for a few bucks!

If you follow my other log http://hydroponicsiscool.com I’ll soon have a video and post about building one as I construct my water storage system. Mine will have some barrels for collecting rain (if it ever does again) and the others for holding tap water to naturally dechloronate before going into my hydroponic systems.

Just wanted to perk your imagination on ways you can save money on water if you like to garden or just have a couple house plants.

Filed Under: Budgeting, Savings, Ways to Save

Do You Spend More for Convenience?

April 18, 2013 by Jeff Davidson Leave a Comment

Spend for ConvenienceWhile shopping for some wood for a shelf in the greenhouse I got to thinking how much more do I spend for convenience?

Let me fill you in. I needed to put in a shelf in the back of the greenhouse for buckets (which are 12″ wide). I could go one of three routes.

1. The cheapest would be to just get a 4’x8′ sheet of plywood, muscle it into the truck and cut it when I got home. This also would have given me a lot of left overs.

2. Lowes also has pre-cut plywood at 2’x4′. A little but more in price but I could make the shelves 2′ deep and have less cutting, easier to handle and less left over.

3. Buy (2) 1″x6″x10′ pine boards. The most expensive route but no cutting, no left overs and nice and easy to load.

Needless to say I went with option 3. I don’t mind paying a bit more to make my life easier. Yes I have the tools to cut plywood myself but that’s a lot of work to lug the plywood (perhaps with a helper) measure, cut pieces, etc (maybe I’m just lazy). My time and lately my health and well being are more important to me and if I can save a little of both by spending a bit more on something I’m gonna do it!

I also dont wash my own car or do my own auto repairs amongst other things. Guess I’m not that frugal afterall.

What about you? Do you do things yourself to save every dime you can? Or do you spend a little extra for convenience?

Filed Under: Budgeting, Savings

Savings on Auto Pilot

December 6, 2012 by Jeff Davidson 1 Comment

Putting my Savings on Automatic transfers

Old enough to remember Otto?

End of the year reviewing and looking at the ways I cut back and saved money this past year. Sometimes it dosent feel like I have saved or gain ground financially but looking back there have been some concrete savings made.

Automating the Savings

The biggest one has been automating money transfers that when I did manually (keyword here is WHEN) I would often forget to do it on schedule or not do it at all, and that caused bigger headaches.

For instance a biggie is income taxes. Being self employeed I don’t have someone withholding for me. In the past I’d just wait till taxes were due then start to panic, scrambling to find the money. This year I had an auto transfer to an ING account each week so now when April 15th rolls around I will (hopefully) have enough set aside to cover it.

Another would be or home insurance. We dont have an impound account so we are responsible for the payment twice a year. In the past of course out of site out of mind till it came due, then scrambling to try and find the money. This year we set up an automatic transfer at the beginning of the month of $100 from each of our accounts to an ING account. So not only was it being put aside without having to think, but it was earning a wee bit of interest (and I mean a very little wee). So with the due date next week I have already transferred the money from ING to my checking and Im ready to pay it, on time even.

So those accounts was setting money aside each month for future taxes. I also automated the savings a bit. at the beginning of the year I set up an auto deposit to my Vanguard IRA account which was then auto dispersed into 4 mutual funds. This was done on a weekly basis so that by the end of the year I would be close to my $5K max. Also set up a weekly auto deposit of $25 to another ING account for the emergency/savings account. I know its not much but honestly if it wasn’t automatic I wouldn’t do anything so its a good thing.

Finally this year I made sure all bills are on auto pay. I n the past I was terrible at making sure bills were payed on time, I was afraid of auto payments because what if I had a bad month and couldn’t pay? Well what would happen is I would forget until I got reminder in the mail with the obligatory late payment fee. So this year I put aside the fears and every bill is on auto pay, thus insuring I will no longer have late fees!

What’s Ahead and Improvements

Continuing on that last sentence, except now I forget to transfer money from the business ti the personal account to cover the auto transactions. I then get dinged with a $25 penalty from the Credit Union. So Im going to look at setting up a minimal auto transfer between the two accounts, essentially a direct deposit paycheck to myself if you will. Its not as easy with the Credit Union as it is with say ING, I have to go through them to set it up or modify it.

Another area where automation will help is with my dividend investment account. I use BuyandHold.com and get 2 trades each month included with my $6 monthly fee. I get so busy and caught up in everything else I often forget to make a monthly trade. So when I don’t do it I not only waste that free trade but I waste opportunity to dollar cost average on my stocks. I hadn’t done an auto transfer before because I liked being able to choose the best stock that month to add to based on current price and ex-dividend dates. Im thinking it may be better to do some sort of auto transfer each month even if it is a small amount. I know I can set it up for auto investment as well but dont know if I can have it auto rotate between the stocks each month or not. I have 5 stocks at this moment so impractical to do a split between all as I would incur more fees.

Lastly I think I may be increasing the weekly savings transfer a wee bit.

What about you? Do you use automation to help with your savings?

 

 

Filed Under: Budgeting, Savings, Ways to Save

Car Emergency Savings for Piece of Mind

June 18, 2012 by Jeff Davidson 1 Comment

One of the most popular posts among PF bloggers I see is preaching about the emergency fund. Everyone should have one in case something tragic happens say like you loose your job. But what about those not so emergency things that come up like car repair? Yes you can take it out of the emergency fund but is it a true emergency? I know it may seem excessive but maybe you should create a couple other savings accounts to put money aside for those other more routine emergencies like your car maintenance and repairs.

Late last week I noticed my ‘check engine’ light popped on and idling a little rough. That of course triggers the o crap moment of how much is this going to cost. So took it in this morning and turned out it was a bad air control valve, a $300 bad air control valve. Now that is not that bad, could have been much worse. Luckily this month has been a good improvement over last month at the studio so I was not worried and it was covered, in fact got the oil changed as well since it was a bit overdue.

Of course while it was in they recommended a fuel injector cleaning, another $120, and they noticed my valve cover gasket was leaking a bit, another $600. These are things I will have to put aside for another month at least. Now if I had another savings account designated for auto repair and maintenance I might of had that covered. With a bank like ING its pretty easy to set up one and have $10 or whatever amount you wish automatically transfered to it monthly or even weekly. That way you dont even have to think about it and its there for the next time your car breaks down or its time for  tune up. With my car being almost 10 years old I’m thinking I may want to get this account to $1000 and that should cover most anything.

Some of you have pretty large savings account and may not worry about things like this, but for others it may be a great peace of mind knowing you have some money socked aside just for your car. Face it most of us couldn’t live with out our cars and putting a little aside for it is better than monthly payments on a brand new one. Worst case in can be  down payment on a new one if your car ends up beyond repair.

How do you handle those unexpected car moments?

Filed Under: Budgeting, Savings

Smart and Safe Ways to Shop Online

March 30, 2012 by Jeff Davidson Leave a Comment

net voucher codesSmart and Safe Ways to Shop Online 

Online shopping is quickly gaining popularity as a way to get the things we want and need. Why fight the crowds at a mall or shopping center when we can order right from our home computers, tablets, or smartphones?

While using online retailers is convenient, fast, and and easy, it can also be difficult to know where to shop or what sites offer the best deals. Online shopping can also be dangerous – anytime you enter personal information, you’re at risk for identity theft or credit card fraud. How can one make online shopping a safe and money-saving experience?

Shop Smart

You’d be amazed how many net voucher codes you can find to save money on your online purchases. A simple web search could help you find coupons, free shipping, or even promotional items when you make a purchase from a particular retailer.

Some of the codes you find online may be expired or invalid – it’s important to test the discount codes before you finalize your purchase. Most sites will allow you to input the code during the checkout process, giving you time to look for another code if the first one you try doesn’t work.

Time your online shopping close to major holidays. Just as brick and mortar stores offer substantial discounts at those times, online stores generally allow shoppers to save on purchases made on a holiday weekend or in the weeks leading up to one. Shopping at the end of a season (for instance, buying bathing suits for next year at the end of summer) can also net significant savings.

Shop Safe

Make sure you shop only at reputable online retailers. Some sites may promise lower prices, but if you’ve never heard of the company before, it’s hard to know whether your information will be protected. To be on the safe side, stick with the companies you know and trust.

Some credit card companies offer temporary card numbers that can only be used for one purchase. These are a great way to stay safe online – even if someone got your information, s/he wouldn’t be able to use it.

Consider a third-party payment system like Paypal to further protect your personal information when shopping online. These systems allow you to log in and send payment through them instead of inputting your credit or debit card number.

No matter where you do your shopping, it’s important to save money and protect your identity. Online shopping can be a great way to do both of those things from the comfort of home.

Filed Under: Savings

Helping with College, How Far do You Go?

December 30, 2011 by Jeff Davidson 10 Comments

collage loanThis has been a hard post to write (struggled on a title for quite awhile). I write it mainly to get all my thoughts out, secondly if anyone wants to chime in that would be great. Those of us that have children always want whats best for them and we want to help whenever we can. It hurts when you can’t but sometimes you also have to draw a line and consider yourself and the rest of the family.

Preface

Through out my son’s last year of high school I had talks to him about college and I thought he was settled on going to a local JC then transferring to a 4 year local college. You see we are not that well off that I can just pay for his college and we discussed the best route would be to go to a JC while working. He could get his general ed out of the way and be saving money for the transfer. Also, by going through his general ed first, he can look at his future course listings and decide which route he wants to take in college.

I would also be better off helping him at that level as it is not that expensive, compared to Washington State where he wanted to go. He would also save money by staying at home by not having to pay room and bored. Even if he decided to transfer to Washington Sate after JC he would hopefully have some money saved up and would be easier to start on his own out of town.

Well after graduation he decided he wanted to stay with his mom so he moved up with her (about an hour drive north of here) Hadn’t heard much from him since, poked him and commented his Facebook now and then. Didn’t make into the local JC there so next thing I know he is applying to Washington State, which he didn’t get in but he did get into Idaho State. Next think I know he is up there (his grand parents live close to the campus) and I get a phone call from his mom talking about the money situation.

Parent Loans

Yes they have things called ‘Parent Loans’, if the student doesn’t qualify for enough then the parents can borrow on their behalf. My son qualified for so much in financial aid and I think a small student loan but not enough to cover the $15,000 a semester. So they are asking me to do a parent loan to cover the rest. I went ahead and applied because if I am turned down then he can get an extra $5k in financial aid. Figured my FICO score was about 630 no way Id get approved. Forgot this is a Federal loan and of course they are just dishing out money, they approved me…

Now comes the dilemma I’ve been struggling with for the past week. Do I take on a $10k loan so he can go to Idaho State? I mean he’s my son and I should do everything I can to help him along right? But I just started trying to get out of debt this year and nearly done with the credit card debt. That is just me, the wife still has student loans as well and she is on a teachers income. Do I take on another monthly payment for what could be up to 19 years, paying over $9k in interest.

After much thinking I have decided that I could not do the loan. If there were other ways I could help out I would but I have to think about the family at home as well. Im 20 years away from ‘retirement’ and I am self employed with income having its ups and downs. I just got my emergency funds at a comfortable level and have restarted my retirement investing in hopes that I will have an income in 20 years as well.

Be prepared

I guess the lesson here for everyone and myself is to be prepared. I did have a college fund started for him at one time. It got used elsewhere, and I do regret that, but even if it remained it wouldn’t have been more than a thousand or two, as it was started quite late and then the crash occurred. I am also thinking of refinancing the house, for one to get a lower rate but also perhaps I can get some extra out to help him with what ever route he ends up with. I am a bit more comfortable taking some out bundled with the house at 4% rather than the 8% of the parent loan. If it happens it won’t help now as he needs it by the 4th.

I also have a daughter that is currently 8 yo and need to start something for her, even if it ends up just being a thousand or two it will help her out.

It hurts me not being able to help him and Im sure he’s not to happy with me at the moment. I hope I am doing the right thing and that he will see that in the end. I am curious what some of you would do in this situation..

Filed Under: Savings

Christmas, A Nightmare for the Frugal Minded

December 20, 2011 by Jeff Davidson 2 Comments

christmas_lightsOk I don’t want to come off sounding like the grinch here. I like Christmas, not my favorite time of year but I like it. I enjoy spending time with the family and seeing the joy and happiness in my kids eyes on Christmas morning. BUT for those that are budget minded and trying to save or just be frugal for what ever reason it can be a tough time for you.

Oh the Pretty Lights

I love taking my daughter out looking at Christmas lights and see them sparkle in her eyes. It dosen’t stop there though, from thanks giving on its “when are we putting up our lights”. Even more pressure when your whole block is decorating the day after Thanksgiving. If you are one with a competitive streak you of course are buying more lights and that jumbo inflatable santa for your lawn. Of course you just got your utility bill down to a manageable level and now your house is a beacon for all alien aircraft in the area lighting up the sky every night till at least Jan.

On the somewhat positive side, the big bulbs that make the cool popping sound when you break them are gone. Most lights now are better on the energy then those old classics and you can even get LED lights with even a better energy draw to keep the costs down a bit. that inflatable snowman though will still be and energy hug. so we’ll keep it to just a small heard of reindeer and one santa.

The Fresh Smell of Pine Tree

Yes the age old tradition of bringing in a dead tree in to the house for Christmas. I do this for the wife and daughter and I hope when the daughter moves out we can do away with this one but I don’t see that happening. Its at least 10 years away and I have a feeling we will have grandkids from the other two by then. Its just the idea of Spending $60+ on a tee for 2 weeks and then throwing it out that gets me, doesn’t that seem like a waste of money to you? I know we could go the fake tree route but the kid in me says if we are dong a tree it will be real and smelly (I do like the smell of the Christmas tree).

Lets not Forget the Gifts

The one time of the year we all scramble to buy that perfect gift for everyone. There is something about the season that drives us to spend more than any other time even though we know we can’t afford it. You could be very disciplined all year but then Christmas comes around and provides us with the excuse to spend more. Oh since we saved all year we have so much more we can put on the credit cards! Like So Over Debt I think the gift thing is great for the kids but for the adults not so sure. Don’t get me wrong I like getting gifts but for the most part when I need something I go get it, leaving very little room for others to get me something.

It seems to be great for the economy, providing lots of temp jobs and an influx of cash. If we could spread that out for the year maybe we wouldn’t be in such bad shape. At least spread the joy and caring that we suddenly get around this time to year long we would defiantly be a lot better off

 In the End…

…I do put up the lights, went out and got that tree and will be braving the stores this week to get that perfect gift (just with a little thought to budgets in the back of my mind). This year will be the first I don’t use a credit card myself so its a step in the right direction. As I said it makes my daughter happy and to me that is what Christmas is for and I will do what I can to make it a great memory for her every year.

This year will be a little different as well as my step sisters will be coming over. I have not seen any of them for years (decades?) and 2 of them I really haven’t met. I guess in the end that is what this time is for really, spending it with family…

Hope everyone has a joyous holiday however you celebrate!

Filed Under: Savings

Rolling the IRA: Step 1

November 18, 2011 by Jeff Davidson 4 Comments

vanguard investmentsFinally did it!! I initiate the transfer of my IRA to Vanguard by sending in the paper work earlier this week.

The old busted…

I was in a SIMPLE IRA from my previous employment. It was great then, I was new to this and it got me started. I should have put more in, I wasn’t taking full advantage of the employer matching. While I am entirely thankful for the my employer for the program it wasn’t without its issues. In hindsight  The choice of Waddell might not of been the best (this is from my point of view as I don’t know all the ins/outs of setting it up, may have looked good from that perspective). For starters we were limited to Waddell mutual funds. I won’t go into all the history or how most funds under perform the market, lets just leave it at not a whole lot of choices.

The next  issues was that they were load funds, paying a commission up front, also the annual fees were quite high. This is one reason why they underperform, you have less money invested. Finally the big kicker to me, especially now that Im on my own, is they make it difficult in this day and age to add funds to my account. With the internet today they really need to improve here. I could set up automatic investments I guess but they don’t have any way to do this online so no way to control either. With no online set up I can’t make lump investments either, have to go to their office or mail in a form and check. How 20th century is that?

The new hotness…

So this week I talked to Vanguard and opened an account (online!), filled out the paperwork and mailed it in. Takes about 2-4 weeks I guess but that gives me time to determine what I will be investing in (part 2). One of the main reasons I went with Vanguard as opposed to an online broker like share builder (another I was considering) was the fees, or lack of 🙂 As long as Im doing Vanguard funds their are no commission fees, so all my money goes to investing. Also the annual maintenance fees are the lowest out there, averaging .21% compared to waddell’s 1.7%+.

I will be setting up an automatic weekly or monthly transfer in but the cool thing is Vanguard while being one of the oldest funds out there has welcomed the 21st century, I can transfer money in online! I can make changes online! I am in total control which a control freak like me really enjoys.

Whats next

While I wait for my money to arrive into my account I will be looking at Vanguard index funds and deciding where I’m going to a lot my money. Im leaning towards this instead of the target retirement funds again because I want more control. I have a good idea of what I’m going to do based quite a bit on what I read in Ramit Sethi book, made a lot of sense and gonna try it out. More on that in a future post. After I get that set up then I will set up an automatic investment each week or month. Each quarter or annual I will see where I am at compared to the max investment allowed and any extra money I have and do some lump investments.

Oh that brings up another point. I was un able to roll it over to another SIMPLE IRA because apparently there is an OCT 1st deadline to do one this year so I just did a traditional IRA which has a max contribution of $5K a year. This is ok because when I was first looking at doing this thats what I was looking at and I see no problem making it out. If by chance I start making even more money  and that 5K becomes to low I can then open a SIMPLE IRA with my business and have an additional $16.5k to work with.

How about you, where do you park your retirement money? are you paying to much in fees?

Filed Under: Investing, Savings

Tracking your Financial Status with Mint.com

September 12, 2011 by Jeff Davidson 5 Comments

Couple posts ago I mentioned a new service I started using to track all my debts and more. This service is mint.com now owned by intuit, yes same company that makes quicken. A lot of those in the PF community already know and use this service but incase you dont here’s the scoop. This online service is free of charge and allows you to track all your accounts, debts, investments as well as budgets and goals. Not only does it give you one place to view your financial status but it analyzes your spending and make suggestions as well as send you text/email alerts that you set up. I started using this service when I was looking up quicken, hoping to get my finances in order again.

Is it Really Free?

Yes it is free to sign up and use. The way they make their money is by analyzing your spending and your accounts and then making recommendations to you that will help you. For instance they may notice your savings account may only pay 1% interest so they will recommend some others that pay more. Im sure they also do analysis of all the data of their users to see trends in spending and such but your info is not shared. Im ok with this, dont matter to me if someone uses how much groceries I spend money on for a report somewhere.

Getting Started

You start off by entering each account and the online access info you use to normally view your information. Almost every financial institute allows you to access your account online and mint.com has these already in their system. Just do a search and then enter your log in info for that site. You enter your banks, investment firms, mortgage, credit cards, all of it. If you own property you would also enter the address for each one and it will use Zestimate to find an estimate on its value (if you have a loan on the property you also tie it to the loan). Once that is done every time you log into your mint.com account you have all your accounts visible on the overview page, showing all the balances and values with your net worth on the bottom.

Not only that your overview page will show you alerts, upcoming bills (it automatically finds the due dates) budget graphs, goals and portfolio highlights. And of course at the bottom suggestions for improvements.

Transactions

You can click on any of your accounts or the transaction tab up top and it will show you all your transactions, or just ones associated to the account you choose. When I did this it went back to May getting transactions so it gets a good history when you start, not sure if this limit is Mint’s or my Banks. It will also categorize all your transactions, and do a pretty damn good job, but you can of course add your own then set up rules to make sure it gets the right category. I look at it like quicken but I dont have to do any data entry. Whats neat is if you click on a transaction, say my insurance payment, in the upper right it gives you a little snapshot of what you have spent on this payee in the past few months with a comparison to the national average (seems I’m paying a little more)

mint.com budgets

mint.com budgets

Budgets

One of the keys to financial planning and debt reduction is budgets. With mint.com you can set up budgets for any and all of your categories and it will be automatically tracked with the transactions. This is displayed in a nice graph on the budgets page and color coded of course (green, yellow, red) to track you progress. There is a snap shot on the right shows your total income/spending/goal budget progress as well. These are all monthly budgets and reset on the 1st for you.

 

mint.com goals

mint.com goals

Setting Goals

This is for more of your long term goals and it has a few wizards to help you in setting them, like credit card reduction. You would activate this goal, it will find all your credit card accounts and show you a payment schedule based on minimums (you can increase) and sets it up with the snowball plan. Pay off one and apply its payments to the next credit card until all paid off. It will even calculate an estimated date for pay off based on this, and based on your current payments. It also has goals for emergency funds, retirement, saving for college and of course custom goals.

mint.com trends

mint.com trends

Trends

This area gives you nice little pie charts and graphs that show you how are spending your money, how you are making it, assets, debts, and net worth. If you have your categories all set up the way you want these graphs will come in handy to see were your money is coming and going and help you make decisions on where you need to cut back.

mint.com investments

mint.com investments

Investments

The investments tab is pretty self explanatory but worth mentioning. Again it takes  all your investment accounts that you entered and draws in all the data to give you daily status of value and charts comparing your investment to the Dow or S&P plus much more. If you have multiple accounts for investments this is a great way to get a snapshot of your total portfolio, again with no data entry which is my favorite. (ya thats a rough patch for me this month).

 

 

mint.com iPhone app

mint.com iPhone app

Going Mobile and Alerts

They do currently have an iphone app (I believe droid as well) that allows you to view key items on the go. The big use for it is to enter cash transactions that wouldn’t normally come through from your bank, they can then be analyze with other transactions for your budgets and trends.

You can even set up your alerts for items like bills due, low account balance, unusual activity, even credit score changes. These can be emailed and/or texted to you. You can even set up a weekly summary to be emailed to you showing you where your money went that week.

 

 

Conclusions

As mentioned earlier in the post this is a lot like quicken but without the hassle of data entry. Almost everything is done automatically. You can tweak things as needed and once everything is set to your liking its a great way to just log in and see your whole financial picture on one page, from any computer. Safe and secure it will help you keep track of your financial life and thus help focus on the debt pay off and maximizing your savings.

 

Have you tried Mint.com? Whats your thoughts?

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Filed Under: Articles, Debt, Investing, Savings Tagged With: budget, debt, income, savings, tracking

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