10 High Yield Savings Accounts: July 2008 Update
By Daniel | July 4, 2008
High yield savings accounts are providing interest rates that are worth taking a look at. Your money is FDIC insured and can be accessed usually within just a few days. We have been using Emigrant Direct for two years now and they have worked out well for us. I have provided a list of high yield savings accounts with the rates current as of 7-4-2008. The rates are always changing, a year ago several of them were over 5.00% APY. I did not list them in order by interest rate because the highest one today may be the lowest next week, and there are other factors that can determine which one is best for you. The rates that have changed are highlighted in yellow and you can see the previous rates here. Compared to the April rates, the first 4 highlighted banks have lower rates, the last 3 highlighted banks are higher, and only 3 of the 10 stayed the same.
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>$10k - 3.50% APY |
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>$10k - 3.65% APY |
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Must have WAMU Free Checking |
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Topics: Banking, Personal Finances, Saving | No Comments »
Subscribe to comments (RSS)Free Credit Report and Score
By Daniel | July 3, 2008
This free credit report and score is available at Quizzle.com Your credit score and report is provided by Experian. As you may know, you can get a free credit report from each of the three credit reporting bureaus each year, Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion.(annualcreditreport.com) The advantage Quizzle provides is a credit score to go along with your report. Furthermore, you are able to check and compare your home value, compare mortgages, evaluate your monthly budget, and track your rainy day fund. The sign up is easy and the interface is simple to use.
- The Credit Overview provides you a score between 360 and 840 and gives you a full credit report from Experian. Getting this report will not affect your credit score, it’s considered a soft inquiry. They provide help to improve your score, which is very general: review your credit report, dispute inaccuracies, and pay off debt.
- On your Home Value Report you get an estimate of how much you can afford and recommended mortgages. This is where the note about the site being powered by Quicken Loans comes into play. I do not have a mortgage but they say your home value will be compared to other homes sold in your area.
- The Budget Analysis will break down your finances into income, living expenses, and debt. You can add your individual categories and view a summary showing a break down of where or not you are saving money or headed into further debt.
- The Rainy Day Fund is very simple. They set a goal of having 5 months of gross income as opposed to 3-6 months of living expenses and give you a bar graph to look at.
Quizzle is worth signing up just for the curiosity of seeing the credit score they give you and reading your credit report. The budget, mortgage report, and rainy day tracker provide an easy way to get a summary of your financial situation and track it with ease.
Topics: Budgeting-Planning, Debt, Real Estate-Homes, credit | No Comments »
Subscribe to comments (RSS)IRS stimulus tax rebate check has arrived
By Daniel | June 20, 2008
Our stimulus tax rebate check has finally arrived and only 4 days late. According to the schedule and the confirmation letter, it stated we should receive our check by June 13th. It arrived on the 17th, and the 13th was actually the day the check was written. While we’re relieved to get it without any issues, there are many people who have received TWO checks or are missing their child rebate. If you want to know when you should receive your check, click here to check out a previous post I wrote on that subject.
For those who have received their stimulus check and it did not include the portion for their eligible child, the IRS will mail out 350,000 additional economic stimulus payments starting in early July. All extra checks will be mailed as a paper check only.
For a few(1,500) people the IRS sent them two checks. Once you know the second check is a mistake, the IRS is requesting that you write void in the endorsement section of the check and mail it back to them with a note that explains the check is erroneous.
Related Information:
- Where Is My IRS Stimulus Rebate Check? - A Financial Life
- Spending the Economic Stimulus Rebate Check - A Financial Life
- Check the status of your payment online - IRS
- IRS stimulus payment FAQ - IRS
Supplement:
Here are a few more details about our situation with taxes and the stimulus payment. We filed our taxes on April 1st and used Turbo Tax. We owed a little in taxes and had that amount debited from our checking account. Turbo Tax had us fill out a form for the stimulus payment that let us choose to have the check deposited into the same account. As we learned later, that is not how it worked. By owing taxes we were automatically going to get a paper check. We used e-file and paid for the e-file with a credit card. Our taxes were very basic; married - filing jointly, no kids, no mortgage, standard deduction.
On June 9th we received a confirmation letter that stated the amount we would receive by June 13th, and as stated above, it came on June 17th. If you are past your scheduled date and have not received a confirmation letter, start with the economic stimulus payment calculator to verify that you qualify for the stimulus payment. It you do qualify, the next step is to check the online status at the IRS website.(information about your Stimulus Payment will not be available until about one week before your payment is scheduled to be sent.) The final step is to wait 6 weeks(according to the confirmation letter) after your scheduled date and then contact the IRS to inquire about your payment. The information on the IRS website states, “If you don’t receive your refund within 28 days from the original IRS mailing date shown on Where’s My Refund?, you can start a refund trace online.”.
Topics: Economy, Taxes | 3 Comments »
Subscribe to comments (RSS)Sleep and Save Money
By Daniel | June 18, 2008
How can sleeping 8 hours a night save you money? In a report by Lesley Stahl of 60 minutes, she explores the latest research on sleep. Sleep deprivation has been linked to serious problems such as diabetes, obesity, and heart disease. A full night of sleep is also critical for us to perform our best. You may not directly save money or instantly save money by getting more sleep, but over time it could make a difference. Below is a list of the areas where 7.5 - 8 hours of sleep could save money.
- Reduced medical costs
- Lower grocery and food bills
- Earn more money at work
- Lower car insurance premiums
- Making rational decisions
With sleep deprivation linked to health issues you will incur more medical expenses including office visits, medication, or insulin supplies. Your health insurance may also be affected by having a higher premiums due to being overweight or having diabetes. In some cases people are denied health insurance if they are overweight.
Researchers are finding that people that don’t get enough sleep often indulge in excessive snacking. The horimone in the brain, leptin, that tells us we are full is lacking when we don’t have enough sleep. By getting enough sleep you will buy less food.
When sleep was reduced to only 4 hours per night in a study, the memory and performance of the brain suffered drastically. Poor performance at work could cause you to make a mistake that costs you money, a promotion, or your job.
When you are drowsy due to a lack of sleep it can be as dangerous as driving drunk. If you’re in a car accident you will have expenses or higher premiums.
In sleep deprived situations your emotions are not kept in check by the logic portion of your brain, the frontal lobe. This emotion could play a part in how you spend money or invest it. If you’re investing money late at night and have had a lack of sleep you might make decisions based off emotion rather than logic.
I encourage everyone to watch the entire show below. Watching people who are sleep deprived shows how important 8 hours is.
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Topics: Personal Finances | No Comments »
Subscribe to comments (RSS)Book Review: The Smartest Investment Book You’ll Ever Read
By Daniel | June 16, 2008
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The Smartest Investment Book You’ll Ever Read by Daniel Solin describes how to be a smart investor and steer clear of propaganda, media, and professionals that do not have your best interests in mind. Daniel Solin is a leading securities arbitration lawyer and a Senior Vice President of Index Funds Advisors. He is also the author of Does Your Broker Owe You Money? In this book he shares how using index funds and asset allocation will outperform the majority of professionally managed funds. He lays down a 4-step plan to follow and how to avoid the biggest mistakes that investors make. I found this book provides a great foundation for investing and provides a lot of information about brokers and advisors and why you can successfully invest without them. He does however, encourage the use of investment advisors for people with large portfolios(over 1 million) and how advisors can provide extra fine tuning to a portfolio. The book is easy to read and the chapters are kept short. You can find Daniel Solin’s website here. |
The 4 parts covered in this book are:
- Become a smart investor: change your investment life forever
- Your broker or advisor is keeping you from being a smart investor
- Smart investors know better
- The real way smart investors beat 95 percent of the “pros”
The 4 step process:
- Determine your asset allocation
- Open an account with a fund family
- Select your investments
- Re-balance your portfolio
Stocks, bonds, and cash. Allocation accounts for 90% or more of the expected return.
Vanguard Group, Fidelity, or T. Rowe Price.
Invest in the entire market, domestic and international, with index funds.
Performed twice a year to keep your asset allocation where you want it.
ISBN: 0399532838 | 192 pages | The Smartest Investment Book You’ll Ever Read @ Amazon
Topics: Books, Investing, Reviews | No Comments »
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