For example, if we pay off all our credit cards, WHY should we need to keep the accounts open?? This just leaves an opening for thieves to use the accounts (identity theft is the largest growing crime in the U.S.). And it also is a huge temptation for people to use their credit again, possibly digging another hole. The only reason I’ve heard for keeping all these accounts open is to maintain a good credit score. Apparently, it’s good to have a huge amount of credit available but never use it… kinda like having a huge closet but never filling it with stuff. Seems wonky to me. I have always believed debt to be a liability, but in today’s world, it’s a good thing. Ugh, Keynesian economics.

One thing I like Clark Howard for is that he does discuss finance and investment trends. This is helpful to me, especially when he discusses the housing market and loan rates. To avoid high interest rates, I am often shifting amounts to new accounts with lower rates. Lord willing, I’ll have this kitchen renovation paid off in 18 to 24 months. Wow. So far, however, I’ve managed to keep the rates pretty low. I am in the market for some kind of consolidation, though. So it’s helpful to keep my ears open.

How about you? Do you have any special or unique techniques? How do you stay out of debt? And do you have a lot of open accounts? Do you think this is wise or does it rub you the wrong way?

For one, even though the items were listed at very low prices and the stuff got a lot of bidders, the item only brought me $5 and $10 more than my original low price. The bidders were achingly reluctant to bid very high, marking things up only about 25 cents every time. I wasn’t selling junk, either– I had a practically brand new Microsoft keyboard and two Apple aluminum keyboards among other things. Ouch.

Two, this will be the last time I every offer free shipping. Shipping costs have skyrocketed on par with gasoline prices! Holy cow, it cost me $10 to ship a 2-pound keyboard! So half of my profit — what little I got — was eaten my packaging and shipping costs! For one item, I LOST $2! Unbelievable. And then I have to pay the list fees and profit fees! So I lost even more money! GAH!

I really wonder if the online auction thing is over. It used to be a place where you could find out of print books, really neat collectibles, unique designer gametable chairs with arms and other stuff. Kind of like an online garage sale. But it’s become a place where Big Box stores and other stores hawk their wares, crowding out the little guy because they can sell stuff in bulk. I’m very disenchanted with these sites. Why the heck should I spend $50 more for a refurbished or used piece of junk at the auction site when I can get it brand new with warranty at a real online store?! And it’s kind of “iffy” buying things like electronics and healthcare products because of fraud. A real store will back up your .075% capsaicin cream purchase or at least offer a whole website of price comparison stuff and, for example, consumer chainsaw sharpener reviews before you buy. At the auction, it’s big prices and WYSISYG.

So I’m obviously disappointed. Have you had any good or bad experiences with online shopping? What do you think?

Having trouble organizing family activities, chores, money, allowances, and bank accounts? Oh, life is so much more complicated and busier than ever before. I have tried a few “family organizers” and management books and software, but nothing has ever captured the attention of the kids AND me. There really hasn’t been anything that consolidates all the family activities into one easy platform– UNTIL NOW. I just found doughmain.com! This site is really cool! It is loaded with all the family organizer tools you need to manage everything. It’s also a terrific way to educate the kids about finances and responsibility with the DoughMain financial responsibility game.

Basically, a parent signs up for an account. It’s free and takes about 3 minutes. From there, you create smaller accounts for family members. Each family member will log in to his or her account to see his/her schedule, finances, allowance stash, chore chart, and more. Kids can also play some cute games that teach financial responsibility (TheFunVault.com, SandDollarCity.com and IRuleMoney.com).

Highlights include the allowance tool, the family calendar (an ONLINE one that cannot be lost or eaten by the dogs!), and the chore tracker. The chore tracker is nice– the Boss (that’s me) creates a calendar of events (like vacuuming) and the child checks in each day for his/her assignments. He/She clicks the chore when done to mark it as done. It’s a great way to encourage the “work first, then play on the computer” habit. I made a little chore chart– what do you think? Is it too stuffed?!

DoughMain is a really incredible site. It can be a real blessing! Definitely check it out. By the way, you can enter to win a $500 Visa gift card if you use the word “dough” as the reference code!

Now that the housing industry has shrunk and investors are nervous, interest rates have been creeping down for several years. After the housing bubble burst, the banks need business. You can use this to your advantage if you already own a home. Refinancing a mortgage can save you TONS of money. As a savvy, frugal homeowner, it really helps to check the rates now and again. Mortgage companies like Aurora loan and others are eager to help homeowners refinance. It can be such a win-win situation. You get a low interest refinance loan, the lender gets your business.

The federal government has a terrific website called USA.gov. They maintain a list of mortgage programs, mortgage calculators, articles, tips and more for squeezing out every last buck of your loan. There’s also information on veteran’s loans and rural housing assistance. Good stuff. I was listening to Clark Howard over the weekend, and he was talking with a lady who refinanced her 7.9 percent mortgage for 3 percent!! The clincher is qualifying for such low loans. Your credit must be really good.

Check out the websites and see if refinancing is helpful. In this day and age of shaky Wall Street investing and political upheaval, it’s best to get out of debt ASAP.

We’ve slowly incorporated more cell phones now that the kids are older. We now have five cell phones and one VoIP phone, and I’ve really enjoyed the relative quiet. Before, our landline would literally ring off the hook with calls from telemarketers and bill collectors. But the calls weren’t for us- they were for the people who had our phone number before us. Apparently, those folks had bad financial problems. When their debt collection calls got too pervasive, they ditched the number and got a new one.

…and our lovely telephone company promptly dumped that old number onto us. Sweet. Fun. SO now I was not only getting calls for OUR telemarketers, I was getting calls for THEIR telemarketers and debt collectors. My heart would always skip a beat when the phone rang. I discussed with my phone company how we could stop collection harassment for good from these calls, and the company said they’d give us a new number… but this would be our THIRD number because the one we had previously was bad, too! So we ditched our landline altogether and got a funky VoIP (Internet phone) number and I got the kids cell phones. The silent bliss lasted a few months and it was wonderful. But since September, we’ve all been bombarded with calls. Solicitors, wrong numbers, even some stop collection harassment California requests or some such stuff.

I’d heard about some Do Not Call list that the government maintains. I did a little research and found out that, according to the DoNotCall.gov website,

The National Do Not Call Registry gives you an opportunity to limit the telemarketing calls you receive. Once you register your phone number, telemarketers covered by the National Do Not Call Registry have up to 31 days from the date you register to stop calling you.

Now correct me if I am wrong, but I thought cell phone numbers did not need to be placed on the list. Isn’t it illegal for telemarketers to call us on our cell phones? We get so many calls so often that I would consider it harassment.

Anyway, I put all our numbers on the list. I find it very discouraging that we have to go to such extremes to opt out of such things. Junk mail is another thing. Why aren’t we all just “opted out” automatically? Well, we all know the answer to that: because NO ONE would ever sign up!

Here’s more information about the DO Not Call list that you may find interesting or helpful:

• After you sign up, telemarketers have 31 days to remove your number from their list.
• Charities, political organizations, and businesses with whom you have done commerce are exempt from the Do Not Call list. A business can keep calling you for 18 months after your last purchase! And if you sign up to “win” products, these companies have permission to call you because you voluntarily released your phone number. I always believed that those “contests” promising new windows, new siding, new cars, and new shoes are more like information farms that harvest your data for marketing later.
• Your phone numbers in the Do Not Call registry are “shared” with law enforcement to “assure compliance with federal and state law.”
• The Do Not Call registry applies to telemarketers calling from within the U.S. and from foreign countries. So, even telemarketers from Russia or China are not supposed to call you. How the U.S. government is able to enforce that, I don’t know.
• If your number has been on the list for more than 31 days and you are receiving telemarketing calls, you can file a complaint with the government at DoNotCall.gov.

Anyway, YOU can. I know some of you guys are interested in learning more about hosting your own blog, especially after hearing about JB Bean‘s horror story– her entire Blogger blog, Gmail account and checkout profile were deleted by Google. Google deleted the site because it thought JB Bean’s blog was a spam site, spewing malicious attacks. Yikes! You can imagine that a whole lot of people ditched their Blogger blogs.

I like Blogger, I have been with them for over a decade. But I moved all my important blogs to my own web hosting space on Hostgator. When I found out that Google essentially owns the content and can erase your work with one swipe, I changed over. I have never looked back, even though it does cost me about $120 a year. I can’t praise Hostgator enough. My blogs are up almost 100% of the time (I use Pingdom to track downtime), and the customer service is superior to all.

Anyway, if you have been wanting to get your own blog pad, here’s your chance. The sale will begin just after midnight, Friday, November 25th CST. I am an affiliate of Hostgator, so I get a commission if you click this Hostgator link or the Hostgator graphic below and buy something. It costs you nothing but means everything to me! I also offer basic tech help when setting up your blog, so if you have questions, leave a comment here and I’ll send you an email response.

I’ll have more details coming up about the Black Friday sale. So far, Hostgator has not released any details but last year, the price of annual hosting was slashed in half! That’s an amazing deal!

For folks who may have delved a little too deep, maybe you’d want to look into rmcn credit services. That link goes to a video explaining the services and how to get started. Credit services can actually help, if you choose the right one. We were on a program once many years ago. My husband had lost his job and things were very difficult for a time. The credit service did help us reduce the percentage rates and pay off the debt. But you have to read the fine print and choose very wisely.

Don’t go overboard this holiday season with gifts and debt! It’s just not worth the heartache and stress.

My husband used to work in the insurance sector– both property and casualty and life insurance– so he knows the ropes. He also saw the sometimes tragic consequences of people who died and left their families in debt and without life insurance, and homes that were not insured and were later damaged or destroyed. It’s heartbreaking.

If you live in the San Ramon, California, area and need some caring attention and excellent insurance advice, check out Joanne Bryant Life Insurance San Ramon. Her reviews on Yelp are outstanding! Gee, she’s almost as well-liked as my husband was. ;)

Seriously, it’s not fun going through tough times. It’s even worse when tough times destroy your finances. Joanne Bryant is ready and willing to talk about life insurance and make sure you and your family is covered. Believe me, it’s such a relief to know that things are taken care of!

Our car insurance is also updating. I know, big whoop, insurance. The Hubs worked in insurance for awhile, and thankfully can untangle the “insurance-ese” language of the policies. It’s all very dry to me.

Did you know that, in the olden days way before insurance, when someone was hurt or their house burned or someone died, the neighbors would pass a hat for a collection, to help the family? Such a practice was a precursor to the affordable life insurance today. I think it’s a wonderful gesture. But what if you lived in a tiny neighborhood, or had uncaring neighbors, or didn’t even LIVE in a neighborhood? And what about plans for kids or other stuff? That’s where the idea for insurance companies grew, like Allianz Life Insurance– they managed the money for folks who wanted to set aside cash “just in case.” Especially if grandpa wanted an elaborate funeral, say. BurialInsurance.org, for example, would cover the expense, instead of having his kids and grandkids go bankrupt to pay for it. When my grandma died, I got some of her old letters and papers. One of the papers was an old receipt for the funeral for her father, in 1962. It has a list of all the expenses. Whew. My great-grandma couldn’t pay for it, so my grandma did (which is why I have the receipt).

And when we got a loan for the renovation expenses, they offered me life insurance. I was floored when they said I could get life insurance with no medical exam! All the previous policies mandated it. The times, they are a-changin’.

So. February. *sigh* Taxes and insurance policies. Fun times…

I’ve been with SponsoredReviews for almost two years now. It’s one of my higher-paying blogging companies, although jobs there can be scarce sometimes (especially if your blog does not have Page Rank).

Basically, after signing up for SponsoredReviews, you enter in your blogs that you want to market. The folks at SR will review your blogs and calculate your blogs’ worth. This blog, thank God, has a pretty high metric- 4 out of 5 stars. SP will calculate things like your traffic, your RSS subscriptions and readership, Page Rank, and etc. Some companies also include your Alexa Rank score. Because of time and space limitations, I won’t get into all the ranking details here– you can search these things online or shoot me an email if you want more information. It usually takes a day or to until SR gets back to you to tell you whether your blog is approved or not. It is VERY IMPORTANT to build your blog and establish a good readership with lots of quality posts before you submit it to any company. The competition into these companies can be stiff, so make sure your blog is ready. Most advertisers like a clean, neat template (not too many glitzy buttons and such), good grammar skills, and Page Rank. Those seem to be the defining factors in getting work.

After approval, you can browse the opportunities at SR. I have found some gems in the pool….. but there are some of the seedier advertisers in the mix (casino/porn/plastic surgery). You can remove these ads from the list so you don’t have to sift through them. Some sites are very good– Billy.com, CafePress.com, high-end cruise travel websites have submitted ads there. And some advertisers will seek you out to write stuff, too (and they usually pay top dollar for it!). When I first started with SR, I earned about $7 per post. I now earn about $15 to $30 a post. That’s a nice progression. And most blogging companies will split the payment 50/50 with their blogger, but not SR. SponsoredReviews is a little more generous– they give you 65% of the payment.

The help desk at SR is very good. I had a bout of technical problems a year ago, and I always received an answer the same day.

I like SR. The only complaint I would have is that there isn’t always a lot of work. But that is the nature of blogging for pay, I think. At some times, I am clobbered with posts; other times, I have nothing for weeks. To survive, you really must diversify. I have monetized 8 of my 12 blogs so far. All my blogs are in various niches (tech, personal, travel, cooking, etc). Advertisers like to tailor their products to a particular blog, so it helps to branch out.

I hope I’ve helped you learn about at least one blogging company. :D SponsoredReviews is more low-key than many out there. They are paying me for this review of them. I like working for them. If you want to earn a little cash from your blog, check them out.