Personal Finance and Money

2011 Average 401K and IRA Returns And 2012 Performance Outlook

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I recently received my 2011 401(k) performance statement and was disappointed to see a -3.2% performance for the year. This is especially the case after my 2010 return of 13.5%. Because my 401k is pretty diversified, the S&P 500 is a good proxy for the level of returns I should be getting. In 2011, the [...]

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Saving for the Future: College Tuition vs. Retirement

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Despite the skyrocketing costs of a college education, a bachelor’s degree, at the very minimum, is an essential requirement to get ahead in this world. With few, notable exceptions, gone are the days when you could make a healthy, livable income right out of high school. But for parents, the increasingly unaffordable cost of a [...]

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Middle Class Doomed as Millionaires Boom – How You Can Join the Ranks of the Rich

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According to a recent report from the Deloitte Center for Financial Services, the total number of US families with a net worth of over $1 million will double by 2020. All this while the unemployment rate hovers around 10% amidst a tight job market undergoing significant structural reform. Overall, the U.S. and Europe have the [...]

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What Gym Fees and Interest Payments Have in Common

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Ever been curious about the seeming universality of the desire to purchase goods and services without paying for them immediately? Many credit card users fall victim to this desire for instant gratification knowing full well they can’t actually afford what they bought without going into debt. Deferring payment until tomorrow allows for a surprising amount [...]

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Selling Your Gold For Cash – How, Where and Beware

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With gold prices rolling past record highs on a regular basis, a number market pundits feel that we are entering a gold bubble.  Like the housing and financial bubbles many have gotten swept away with the lure of easy money, only to coming crashing to earth when the bubble pops. So if you have golden [...]

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Dave Ramsey, Suze Orman, and Other Financial Gurus – Is Their Advice Really Worth It?

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In today’s flip-flop economy, just about everyone has an opinion about what you should do with your money. From the din of these many opinions a few financial “gurus” seemed to have emerged. Some have become bona-fide celebrities by advising people on how to escape financial ruin, while making millions for themselves along the way [...]

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How to Save and Make Money with New Social Media Coupon Sites Like Groupon and LivingSocial

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One of the hottest new trends to hit the internet over the past few years is social media coupon sites. These websites offer incentives to people to make it easier for them to save money, as well as to share and earn coupons for products and services with friends. These websites will often use social [...]

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How to Choose the Right Financial Advisor

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In light of the recent stock market roller coaster and financial service company meltdowns, it’s hard to know who to trust today for guidance about investing. Yet, even with all of the uncertainty, as each day passes, you still grow closer and closer to retirement. And with that, you need to know where to put [...]

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Teaching Your Kids How to Care For Cash and Manage Their Personal Finances

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As adults, we’ve seen what a lack of financial knowledge does to managing our finances. That’s why we need to teach our kids early on how to care for their cash, so they are less likely to make the financial mistakes that we did. If you don’t talk about money, lessons learned and how to [...]

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No Preset Spending Limit or Reward Credit Cards: The Excellent Credit Debate

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What does No Preset Spending Limit (NPSL) mean to you?  Many consumers, normally with excellent credit, take this popular credit and charge card feature to mean “no limit.”  They think that NPSL products—such as the charge cards offered by Chase and American Express as well as Visa Signature credit cards and World MasterCard credit cards—provide [...]

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2011 Updates – Tax Brackets and Rates, Government (GS) and Military Pay Scales, 401K and IRA Limits and Stimulus Payments

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I have made a number of updates to popular topics on this site and in case you missed them, here is a quick recap with a link to the detailed information. 2011 Tax Rates and Brackets Following Bush-era Tax Cut Extensions With approval of a two-year extension to all the Bush-era tax cuts, the 2011 [...]

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