Everything You Need To Know About Selling Your Car Privately

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My high school aged son has been working for almost two years now, and saving his money. Buying his own car has been on his wishlist, and his potential first vehicle fell into his lap this week as one of his coworkers is selling his car. It’s a nice car, 6 years old, with low miles. We’ve got a lot of work to do to make sure it’s affordable and worth the asking price, but if we do purchase the vehicle it will be a private party sale. Buying a vehicle from a dealership is easy, as they take care […] Read more »

Fist Pump Friday: I Love You Like A Blogger Roundup – 2/10

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Technology can make our lives easier.  My wife found a great example of this a few days ago when trying to schedule a hair cut for my son.  Instead of calling the salon and asking what times were available, she was able to view open time slots online and get our son on the schedule.  The tool required we pay a certain percentage of the service to reserve the time slot. $8 was charged to our debit card, and our son was off to get a haircut later that day.  Unfortunately, when it was time for him to pay the […] Read more »

Save Money On Your Tax Preparation Software

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Tax season is upon us as W2s, 1099s and interest statements are flooding inboxes and mailboxes.   Some people choose to have a tax professional do their taxes, while many are able to save a little cash by doing their own taxes using tax preparation software.  But just using tax preparation software may not be the end of the saving money train.  You might just be able to save some extra cash just by choosing the right place to buy your tax preparation software. On my way home from work, I stopped by the electronics retailer Best Buy to pick up […] Read more »

Fist Pump Friday: I Love You Like A Blogger Roundup – 2/3

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Superbowl weekend is here!  Many people will go to a sports bar to watch the game, but that’s just not my kind of atmosphere.  We’ve hosted large Super Bowl gatherings in the past, but I’m just not feeling that either.  We do plan to get together with some friends and cook up some yummy finger type foods and hopefully enjoy a good game.  I’m not hopeful about the commercials, they’ve been subpar the last few years.  What are you doing for the big game? Oh, and don’t forget to get those fists up for my favorite posts of the week! […] Read more »

Score Sweet Rewards at Walmart with Diet Dr Pepper

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This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #ColorMeSweet Earn a $5 Walmart eGift Card when you buy $10 worth of Diet Dr Pepper®! Simply upload an image of your Walmart receipt at DrPepper.com/Walmart showing purchase of $10 worth of Diet Dr Pepper in a single transaction. Earning rewards is sweet! You know what else is? A FREE digital adult coloring book. Check it out today! Read more »

Will Boredom Bust Your Budget?

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Has the unthinkable happened to you? You created a budget, even talked about it with your significant other. You determined the amount of discretionary funds available and how much you wished to spend, and carefully matched those funds to wants and needs. Yet end of the weekend analysis reminded you that somewhere along the way a decision was made to use funds outside the spending plan. How could that possibly be? The answer is simple; you spent out of boredom caused by lack of planning. This exact thing happened to my wife and I this weekend. We wanted to have […] Read more »

Fist Pump Friday: I Love You Like A Blogger Roundup – 1/27

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Tax documents are arriving, and being promptly put into this year’s manila tax envelope.  This is the first year in several that I’m not dreading doing our taxes because I’m confident that we’ll be extremely close to even.  For the last few years we’ve owed a significant amount of money because I never accounted for the fact that my blogging activity is not taxed up front.  Midway through 2015 I made a significant change to my withholdings resulting in our tax bill being much less last year.  This year that withholdings change will have been at work throughout the entire […] Read more »

Process Over Outcome: You Should NOT Be Focused On Paying Off Debt

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If your focus is to pay off debt, you may be focusing on the wrong thing and headed down the path of failure. This is the conclusion I’ve come to after listening to countless hours of motivational speakers combined with a handful of books I’ve read recently written by people who struggled their way to success. They all say the same thing, and unless they got together and decided on a common underlying message, maybe there’s something to their method.  What they emphasize is actually quite simple; focus on the process, not the outcome. To be successful, focus on the […] Read more »

Fist Pump Friday: I Love You Like A Blogger Roundup – 1/20

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I went with my son to renew his driver’s license yesterday as he turns 18 next week.  The person who helped us at our local government center asked if he had incurred any driving violations, to which he answered, “No.”  This gave him a small break on the price of the renewal fee.  I didn’t know this discount existed, and apparently it’s a one time thing. It wasn’t a huge discount, somewhere on the order of $6 or $7 bringing the total down to $21 and change.  But saving money is saving money, right? Get those fists up, it’s FRIDAY! […] Read more »

4 Tips To Get Cheap Airline Tickets

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My son is planning to fly to Texas twice within a 4 week period later this spring. He wants to go once to attend a video game tournament in Auxtin, and again a few weeks later as he was asked to prom by one of his friends who lives in Houston. I used the word, “planning,” because he has some work to do in determining whether he can really afford it (he has to pay for it himself). The price of his airline tickets will be the largest determining factor in whether he can do both trips or not. Fortunately, […] Read more »

Fist Pump Friday: I Love You Like A Blogger Roundup – 1/13

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Christmas is making one last appearance for my family this weekend, as my wife’s family holiday gathering is on Sunday.  It’ll be nice to see everyone, even if it is a few weeks past the actual holiday.  You’ll find me on the couch, with a rum and coke, watching the NFL playoffs with other sports fans.  Because isn’t that what holiday gatherings are all about? Fist pump for alcohol, NFL playoffs, and my favorite posts of the week! Posts That Make Me Fist Pump 10 Tools that Help You Budget from Young Adult Money 7 Money Mistakes To Avoid This […] Read more »

Teaching Teens The Cost Of Real Life

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I’m a huge advocate of increasing financial education for our children. I don’t feel our school system currently does enough to prepare students to manage their finances successfully. But I certainly don’t think schools should be the only source of financial education. Parents need to play a significant role as well, including ensuring kids have a grasp on how much things cost. I had two wonderful opportunities to do just that over the weekend.   Car Repairs As my son was backing our car out of the garage on his way to school, I heard a loud noise. I opened […] Read more »

Fist Pump Friday: I Love You Like A Blogger Roundup – 1/6

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Welcome Friday!  My son is about to get his very first car repair bill.  I thought I heard a noise when he was backing out of the garage to leave for school yesterday, but when I opened the door, I didn’t see anything.  A short time later, I received a text message from my son stating he was a little closer to the side of the garage than he thought, and snapped the passenger side mirror off the car on the garage door frame as he backed out.  I don’t have any idea how much it will be to fix […] Read more »