Financial Literacy Month – Kids and Money

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Hi everyone! I hope you’re having an awesome week so far. Today I’d like to share a video with you that I think you’ll love. Last year I participated in Financial Literacy Month with Steve from MoneyPlanSOS. The idea was to create a one minute video to promote financial literacy. It was fun and one of the videos I made featuring my son (4 years old at the  time), was picked up by CBS Money Watch. I received a lot of great emails from that video so I thought I would do something with Isaac again this year. This year […] Read more »

Getting Out of Debt is About Challenging Yourself

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There are a lot of things that go into getting out of debt. You’ve got to spend less than you make, put some effort into tracking your income and expenses, and perhaps the most important thing is to change your financial behavior. With that said, something I find to be extremely helpful is taking myself out of my comfort zone in the name of reaching my goals. This can be a hard thing to do but challenging yourself to do what you don’t want to or think you can’t do is great for finding out who you really are. I […] Read more »

Do You Have the Mentality to be Wealthy?

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Winning the lottery

You may have heard that the Mega Millions Lottery has a HUGE Jackpot tonight! You did hear that right? It’s not really talked about all that much. If you are anywhere near the television, internet, radio, a store or people in general then you’ve heard. The internet is full of blog posts where people talk about all the things they would buy if they won. I wrote a post today too. I didn’t focus on what I would buy because I found out something about myself. I’m not mentally ready to be wealthy! I know it sounds weird to say […] Read more »

Uncle Sam Wants to Know: Did You Have Debt Forgiven?

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April 15th is right around the corner and that means, it’s time to pay up. For many Americans 2011 was another year of unemployment, rising costs, and underwater mortgages. In fact according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York Americans owe a combined $11.5 trillion on credit cards, car loans, mortgages and other consumer debt. So in a desperate attempt to keep their finances afloat many have turned to settling their debts. Settling a debt is certainly damaging to your credit, but to make matters worse, Uncle Sam wants his take as well. If you have a debt forgiven […] Read more »

Goals Review

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Can you believe that we are almost through the first quarter of 2012?! Insane. I feel like it just got started. I wanted to go through the goals I set up for this year and see how I'm doing so far. Below are the goals I had laid out and then I will give my progress in red. Work Set up a designated work area. I've been working a lot more in the office. Work only in work area. FAIL! While I've been working in the office a lot I've been working on the couch a lot too. I need to limit this. I've noticed I get very annoyed with my family when I'm trying to work in the living space. It's not their fault. I just need to get up and go into the office. Read more »

When Should You Give Up?

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Photo from Flickr by Brian Carlson, Houston, Texas

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about difficult situations. When is enough enough? How do you know when you should just focus your energy elsewhere? Sometimes life can really make you feel like you are beating your head against a brick wall. A lot of the articles on Enemy of Debt talk about persevering. However, there may be times when it is a smarter financial move to just give up. Here are some financial examples of when you might want to say, “Enough!” Making payments on something that isn’t worth it This could be a house, car, or something else. […] Read more »

The Not-So-Pretty Story of Paying Off My Debt

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Hundreds of people emailed, commented, tweeted and direct messaged me after this post asking to hear more of my story. The number one question: How did you do it? How did you pay off $571,817.68 in less than 3 years? The answer to paying off debt is pretty simple. Stop using credit. Earn more than you spend. Use the extra earnings to pay off debt. It’s not romantic. It’s not complicated. It’s actually very straight forward. I, however, do not typically do things the easy or simple way. In hindsight, I can see that the first year of my “debt […] Read more »

My ImpulseSave Experience: Is Saving Money Fun?

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Hello everyone! I hope you’re having a great weekend so far! A few weeks ago I did an ImpulseSave Invite Giveaway! At the time, I wasn’t quite fully setup and connected to my Perkstreet checking account so unfortunately I couldn’t share a more personal review of the site and the wonderful savings tool that it is. On March 11th, I was finally able to take full advantage of the site. Since then I’ve jumped in head first and I must say — I LOVE IT!!!! I don’t think saving money has ever been this much fun! My wife and I […] Read more »

I Do Trust You Because We Did This.

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Yesterday, my friend Travis wrote a post about trusting his wife as she left to go shopping with a spendthrift friend. He mentioned that, although he had a million questions racing around in his mind, he had to let go and trust her to stick to their budget. And you know what? She came through (I should point out here that I’m not surprised because Travis’s wife is awesome). He raised an important issue: trust. Trust in a relationship, especially in financial matters, is excruciatingly important. In fact, without trust in that area, you’re probably not going to have trust […] Read more »

Do You Trust Me?

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“Unless Vonnie wants to go along to the mall with me…” our friend’s voice trailed off. Sure, I’ll go. I can look for a spring coat for Tori,” said my wife. A new spring coat for our daughter was in the budget, as previously discussed while planning our spending for that weekend. The coat was actually the final expenditure for the weekend as it drew to a close that Sunday afternoon. In a whirlwind of activity, I got ready to go to the gym, Vonnie and her friend put on shoes, grabbed their purses and headed out door with my […] Read more »

An Act of Kindness

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Several years ago my friend and I tried to go to the zoo. Tried, as in, attempted but was unsuccessful. The plan was that me, my friend, and 5 children under the age of 6 would go to the zoo for super cheap because my friend had season passes. Sounds perfect! Before we even left the house I could tell my friend was having a bad day. Just one of those days where you wonder why you ever thought having children was a good idea. Read more »

The Danger of Listening to the Crowd

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Thanks to Brad for finding this article in the Palm Beach Post, “Why are Americans avoiding stocks? Ask a Shrink”. Since the market drop in 1987, people have been focused on the market bottom instead of the top. In general, news focuses on the negative and the financial news of the past decade has lived down to expectations. But the reality of both short and long term market performance shows a different picture. Since the fall of 2007 and 2008, the major market indices are up and dramatically. The two year returns for domestic large, mid, and small cap stocks, […] Read more »

Debt Free News #22 – Bobbie Bushman

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Happy Monday everyone! Today I thought I would share another Debt Free Story with you. It’s been a while and this series has become very popular so I hope you enjoy this one. This Debt Free News edition is actually one of my favorites. Not because previous debt free stories are any less exciting but because it so closely resembles my story. When we were plagued with debt we both worked our tails off and in the very beginning of our marriage we spent more time with our co-workers than we did with each other. We passed each other at […] Read more »

The Power of One Small Step

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A wise man once made me a shirt that says, “Debt Sucks!” And you know what, it sure does. It sucks the energy out of your body. It sucks the fun out of your life. And it sucks the money right out of your budget. Finding the courage and will power to make a change with your finances usually comes at a moment of frustration and depression. My own moment came when I was at, what felt like, the lowest point in my life. I was unemployed, living with my mother, 2 years post divorce, broke, in debt and without […] Read more »