Sometimes, when I have a few spare seconds in my day, I let my mind wander about various things financial.  Recently, I was looking back on how things were for me, in general, when my finances were a mess.

Of course, the biggest motivating factor in getting myself out of debt was me. Had I not had the internal willingness and desire to do it, it never would have happened.  However, running a close second in the motivation department was my mother.  Maybe it was out of filial love, or maybe it was because I owed them (my parents) a boatload of money!

But what I remember the most is that in tandem with giving me some pointers on how to get out of debt, she always made sure that I was organized.  She told me, “If you can’t manage your time, how can you expect to manage your money?”

So as my mind was looking back on these great and wonderful days, it made me think…

How many people do a great job of managing their time but do not manage their money well?

I think the answer is self-evident. As I see it, it is virtually impossible to do one well without doing the other well. They go together like hand and glove.

I guess one thing that I never thought of was this-if managing my money took some huge chunk of time out of my daily/weekly/monthly life, would I still do it the way that I do?  I think the answer is a resounding NO.  The reason I say that is because I know there are some things that I could do a better job of but don’t because of the time factor. No need to mention them, but at this point in my life, there are other things I would rather spend my time on.

So, if you are going to take the plunge and finally fix your finances, keep in mind that some time management skills will need to be factored in as well.  If not, I would imagine there would be a greater chance of one giving up. Simply because, people feel, it would take too much time.

Just a few quick steps here on some things I see as necessities to managing your time in this day and age (as it relates to financial management):

First, organize your bills.  A basic accordion file might do or a small filing cabinet.  In addition to physically organizing them, try organizing your payments as well.  It took me a little time, but I adjusted my payment dates to where I only pay my bills one time per month.  This is huge compared to the hodge-podge way I used to pay them.

Second, eliminate ALL unnecessary things from your life.  This includes unnecessary phone calls (solicitors come to mind), unnecessary emails (your Spam folder and Empty buttons are your friends.  Plus, these emails could be security risks as well).

Third, limit your social networking time.  Unless you have all the free time in the world, this will probably need your attention.  I have a simple question to ask-how was your life before Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc?  Did you still have friends?  Were you still able to keep up with what was going on in their lives?  OK, then limit that stuff.  Personally, I think it is all mindless anyways.

Organizing and impacting you finances will take a decent amount of time in the beginning. And lesser amounts as time goes by.  However, if you see it as some cumbersome process or something that you don’t have time for, if you ever do start, you’re re likely to give up.  Follow these steps, and it should free up enough time for you to give you the time you need.

As always, your comments and suggestions are greatly appreciated.

In the course of my time creating and developing this blog, I have learned so much more than I ever thought possible in the field of personal finance.  Recently, it occurred to me that it might be worth looking into becoming a Certified Financial Planner. 

I know a few CFPs, but don’t know anything about the certification process.

Now, if any of you know anything about me or may have read my book, you know that I come out firmly against the use of any kind of debt consolidation companies to get yourself out of debt.  Initially, I thought that CFPs would fall under this same category, and therefore, should never be employed.

However, in my small amount of internet research, I found this not to be the case.

In a nutshell, here is what I found out about how to become a CFP, and whether or not you should employ one, in my opinion.

The certification process is much more extensive that I ever imagined.  Originally, not knowing any differently, I thought that becoming certified was similar to becoming a certified home inspector.  If you didn’t know, basically, there is NO certification process involving home inspectors.  Basically, you can just wake up one morning and decide to be a home inspector, and poof!, you’re a home inspector.

This is far from the case with Certified Financial Planning.   A Bachelor’s Degree is a pre-requisite.  There are other educational requirements.  But apparently, any CPA, any licensed attorney, and people in a few other professions can get around these educational requirements.  For those not in these professions, there are a variety of courses available at universities to take which would satisfy this part.

Additionally, there is a 10-hour exam that must be passed. It covers a variety of topics, but basically tests your knowledge in just about all areas related to financial planning, and your abilities to communicate this knowledge to clients.

There is also an experience requirement of three years in work related to certified financial planning.  You must also pass a background check and pays fees that look to be in the area of $1000 and then also some annual fee to maintain your certification.

What I did learn was that I think that CFPs are a group that can be trusted (as opposed to the home inspectors I spoke of earlier).  Would I ever consider becoming one?  Maybe, but not right now.  It seems that your income is based almost solely on your ability to market, network and build your client base, which I would not have enough time to do effectively.  However, I would consider it as a future endeavor.

I guess more importantly, the question remains:  Should you consider using one?

My answer is this:  if you are in need of some advice on how to get out of debt, then I would absolutely NOT use one.  The only reason that I say this is that all the advice you need is out there for you to learn through either experience or research.  I did it strictly through experience.

On the other hand, should you need advice on just about any other topic regarding personal finance (investing for the future, retirement planning, estate planning, etc.)  I would consider utilizing the service of a CFP. 

So, depending on what you r needs are, you may want took into the use of a financial planner.  I think that they can be trusted and could prove to be helpful in a variety of areas outside the realm of debt management.

Comments?  Suggestions?  Feel free to do so below.

I have written a lot in the past about what finally motivated me to straighten out my finances and get out of debt.  It certainly wasn’t any “light bulb going off” moment.  It was more about being tired of stressing out all the time about my bills, tired of not having enough money to do the things I wanted to do, etc.

So anyway, I made it out of debt.  It took quite awhile, but I made it.

Now I know that most people who are in debt are certainly not going to wake up one morning and say to themselves “Gee, I think I’ll start to get myself out of debt today.”  There is going to have to be more than that for most of us.

I think what most people need is a “financial kick in the pants”.  They need something that is finally going to wake them to wake up and smell the coffee.  To finally see what a difference being out of debt can make in their everyday lives.  How many more financial doors it can open up, etc.

Of course this kick in the pants is probably going to be different for everyone. But I was beginning to think of some possible scenarios that might work for those of  us who truly want get out of debt.

This is what I came up with:

Recently, a friend of mine and I were looking at flat screen TVs.  He was thinking about getting one, but after awhile he just decided that he didn’t have enough money to do it.  I knew that he was in debt, didn’t pay his credit card balances in full each month and so forth, and this is what I was dying to say to him.

“Would you like to see how could afford it without adding one dime to your income?  Go home– get out your credit card statements for the last three months. Add up all the money that you paid in interest on these credit cards.  Multiply this times 4.  You now probably have enough for 2 or three flat screens.”

This is what is needed is most people’s lives.  A huge, can’t miss, glaring example of how much more money you will have at your disposal by not living in debt.

Here’s another one.  At my job, the majority of my co-workers go out to eat their lunch every day.  What I want to say to them is “How would you like to get rid of your electric and water bill each month?” OK, let’s say you spend $6 per day for lunch (a very conservative number), five times per week.  That’s $120 per month.  Switch to bringing your lunch with you, which would probably cost about $10 a week (leftovers, homemade sandwiches, etc).  There is a savings of about $80 per month.  About the cost of the average power and water bills combined, I would guess.

One more.  Most people I know still have home telephone service.  What I want to ask them is “Why?”  Then I want to ask them if they’d like to start getting free internet service.  If you have a cell phone, why do you need a home phone?  The only legitimate reason I can think of is if you still have dial-up internet.  If that is case, upgrade your internet and get rid of your home phone.  There are a variety of companies out there that can provide you with a phone line ran through your computer for a fraction of what you pay in monthly residential phone service.  I’d guess the average home phone bill is about $40 per month.  I would also guess that is the average bill for monthly internet service.  Drop your home phone, get internet for free.

It is these kinds of “punch in the mouth” examples that I think people need to motivate them to do something about their finances.  It didn’t take that much for me, as I said; it just took being tired of being in debt.

As always, your comments and suggestions are appreciated below.

Hey guys…because of the resounding   success it has had, I have decided to extend the special offer for my book to my readers and visitors.

If you haven’t checked it out yet, I wanted to spend just a few minutes on why I think it can add value to your life.

Don’t Be a Mule is written in a down-to-earth, easy to understand voice. It is based purely on personal experience.  It briefly details my not-so-wonderful plunge into the depths of credit card debt, and the road I managed to take out.

It offers ways to improve your personal economy in three key areas:

Saving More Money

Spending Less Money

Generating Extra Income

The biggest problem that I had when I was looking for answers about how to get out of debt was that I could never find any real, practical advice.  I either came up against debt consolidation companies who I think were just out to screw me (or at the very least, put me deeper into debt), or I got a bunch of “book” answers from people who had never really been in my situation before and therefore could not relate to it.

Then I thought that if I asked rich people about it (who would know more about money, right?) then I might be able to find some decent advice.  Wrong again.  Most of them had forgotten what it was like NOT to be rich and therefore were not of much help.

Writing Don’t Be a Mule was a joy for me because it made me realize that getting out of debt is so NOT about some ABC list of things to do.  Rather, it is simply about changing your mindset and attitude about how money comes in and goes out of your life.

My journey out of debt was not an easy one and it was not a short one.  But once I got on track with the right attitude, and a true willingness to get out of debt, it was then merely a matter of staying on track.  And there was much less actual “sacrifice” involved then I would have thought.

Once I finally managed to get completely out of debt.  I was at a crossroads.  I didn’t know what to do.  But, after I realized ALL the avenues that become available for generating income for people that are not in debt, and that have good credit scores, I kept the momentum rolling.

I currently own and maintain this blog and have another successful side business.  None of this would have been possible were I still struggling with debt.

My book is currently available here for the recession-busting price of $2.99.  Add shipping and you can get your hands on a copy for $7.  And it ships straight from me, so I promise to get it to you fast!

If you decide to check it out, I sincerely hope you like it and it provides value to you.

As always, comments and suggestions are appreciated below.

I must admit that I owe most of my frugal nature to my mother.  Well, actually, my mother and my father.  They were both raised during the tail end of the Depression, so that should give you a little perspective.

I would imagine that back then living frugally was a necessity, not a voluntary lifestyle for most of us today.  Regardless, that’s where most of it comes from.  Oh sure it took me a few decades to realize that living frugally could allow me to spend money on the things that I really want to, but I think I’ve made up for a good bit of lost time in the last few years.

The reason why I mention my mother is because just when you think you’ve thought of all the frugal ideas…..

She emailed me the other day, and although you cannot read emotion into emails, I could tell there was a bit of pride shining through on that message.

She told me that she was re-doing the kitchen cabinets.  Not remodeling them, just basically emptying them out, cleaning them and then slapping a fresh coat of paint over them.

But of course, she couldn’t undertake this little project without a dose of frugality thrown in for good measure.  In a nutshell, she went to the local wallpaper store, and found some outdated wallpaper that they were basically just giving away (wallpaper is fairly expensive if you didn’t know).  So, she saved quite a bit there.

On top of that, rather than wasting a bunch of paint on the deep dark crevices of the insides of the cabinets, she decided to just touch up the insides of the doors and the little edges that show.

Now there’s a double whammy-saving money and saving time.

Without belaboring the point I did think it was pretty ingenious.  And if you’ve ever tried to paint the insides of kitchen cabinets before, you are probably kicking yourself for not coming up with that idea.  It’s a ton of work and all that paint you use for the insides will basically never be seen.

So even though I think I am getting pretty good at the old frugality game, every once in awhile, she writes me with these little ideas to remind me who the real Zen Master of Frugality is.

That would be my mother, of course.

Y’all take care and have a great weekend.

As always, your comments and suggestions are welcome.

As you know, I am all about finding the best deals that are out there for just about everything you buy.  Recently, I have come to fully understand the true power of EBay when it comes to my purchases.  Obviously, I m not referring to things like groceries and so forth, what I am referring to is just about everything else.

 I am not here to promote EBay.  What I am trying to do is to explain to you that you can save a lot of money by checking out EBay before buying a lot of the things that you buy.

Before we continue, I want to let you know that quite some time ago, I was very leery of buying anything from EBay.  They had quite a few problems in the past (a lot of them valid) and had gotten a lot of bad press and had really developed  quite a BAD reputation.  As far as I can tell, most of these issues have been solved.

The  biggest concerns I previously had regarding EBay were as follows:

Buying on EBay is not safe.  Actually, it seems to me that it couldn’t be safer now.  Any purchase done thru PayPal is fully protected and EBay itself offers buyer protection.

You cannot trust sellers on EBay.  I have bought numerous items on EBay over the past several months.  By numerous, I mean hundreds.  During that time, I had a total of ONE problem with a seller, and had I checked his feedback more closely before buying, I would have known better.  This problem was fixed almost immediately by PayPal.

PayPal is too difficult to set up.  In all honesty, a PayPal account can be set up in about 5 minutes.

EBay is best used whenever you are buying anything that cannot be found just about anywhere.  It is difficult to explain, but most of your out of the ordinary things that you need can usually be found at a cheaper price on EBay.  Especially specialty items.

Once I started researching different things, I came to find out a lot of things about EBay:

They have almost EVERYTHING for sale there.  Type in just about anything, and I’ll be you can find it.

They have things you never would have thought they would have.

Their prices are almost shockingly less expensive.

I think your chances of finding something for a cheaper price on EBay goes up depending on the availability of the item in mainstream retail outlets.

The best example I can give you is that a friend of mine recently was trying to purchase some waterproof seat covers for his SUV.  If I were buying those, my first thought would be the only place to go to find them would be a car dealership.  My friend priced those at the dealership and a set of four would cost him a little less than $400.

He was able to find the same set of four on EBay for right around $50.

In the past, I have used EBay to find great deals on almost all computer accessories (laptop chargers, mouses, etc).  In addition, books can usually be found at very reasonable prices too.

And honestly, just about everything else.

I could go on forever with this post, but let’s leave it at this.  When you are buying just about anything in your daily life that is not groceries, I would at least check out EBay.  What can it take—2 minutes?  You will probably be very surprised at what you find.

As always, your comments and feedback are greatly appreciated.

One of the things that I have been seeing more and more of these days is the teaser offer by banks to open up a checking account with them.

The most effective ones offer you straight cash, but I have seen them offer anything from gift cards to just about anything else you can think of.

Of course, the first thing that comes to my mind is to open up the checking account, fulfill any requirements they have for the free money, get the free money and then forget about the account.  That’s not what the bank has in mind but so what.

Several months back, I went ahead and applied for three separate offers for these accounts, and I just wanted to let you know how my experience went.  I think I ended up making $250 cash from all three of them combined. In short, you can obviously make free money with these deals, but you have got to be careful.

Listed below are just a few of the things you need to be aware of before diving in.  When weighed against the $250 that I made, it is worth it, you just need to stay on top of it.

Here goes:

Affect on your Credit Score:  I did not track this as a before and after thing, but there will be a minor effect on your credit rating.  Sometimes, these accounts can be opened without a “hard pull” on your credit, but those I think are few and far between.  It probably takes six months or so for your score to recover.  In the interim, you may have some difficulty if you try to open up any other new lines of credit, as I did.  No long term and no major effects, just something to be aware of.

Direct Deposit Requirements: Some of these offers require at least one direct deposit to qualify for your cash reward.  I would be wary of these.  I only say this because the process of switching my direct deposit information with my employer was much less than an easy process. You may want to ask your employer about this before doing so.  And if you forget to switch it back, you may find yourself with not enough money in your regular bank account to cover your bills.

Don’t forget about them!  As I said, I opened up my three accounts, fulfilled the requirements, got my cash reward, withdrew most of the money out of the account and forgot about them.  Another requirement may be that you leave the account open for a certain period of time to qualify for the reward.  Forgetting about them can be dangerous.  With two of these accounts, I recently received overdraft notices.  They charged me an “inactivity fee” which put my accounts at less than zero balances, triggering more late fees, and two big messes in general.  It took a lot of phone calls and fast-talking to straighten out.

Ease of closing:  Do not think that these banks are unaware of the people out there like me-who are only really in it for the cash reward.  They know we exist, and they will make it as difficult, time-consuming and annoying as possible when it comes time to close these accounts.  In general, it cannot be done with a simple phone call.  Plan on investing a good deal of time on the back end to close this stuff out.

Overall, I would say it was definitely worth the money I made by signing up for these offers.  I only wish I was a little better informed about a few things, and had stayed a little more organized on the back end.  This would have made my life quite a bit easier.

Had an experience, good or bad, with this type of thing?  Let my readers know about it below…

Do you currently have a membership to a fitness club?  If so, that’s a great start for your physical health!  But the more important question is…do you use it?

I would love to know the statistics on the number of people who sign up for a gym membership with every intention of getting into shape and losing weight and then at some point in time afterwards losing the motivation to do so.  Or falling back into their old habits.  Regardless, they end up in a contract for a membership that they are no longer using, or even worse, not even in a contract but still getting charged a monthly fee.

I know many people like this personally.  I can also attest to what happens every January at the gym I attend.  Every January, I guess because it’s tied in with New Year’s Resolutions, attendance at my gym spikes up.  There are all kinds of new faces there, people brimming with the anticipation of turning over a new leaf and shedding those unwanted pounds.  January turns into February, and these faces slowly start to disappear.  By the time Spring arrives, the gym is for the most part back to its same attendance level.

But how many of these people either signed a contract, or will still pay the monthly fee and never go?

The easiest way to save money on your gym membership is just as the title states-use it or lose it!

If you are paying for a membership, then go!  Go to the gym!  If you are paying for a membership and not going, then get out of it!  Close your membership or find out when your contract is up and get out then.

I think the worst example are the people who have the membership, don’t use it, but when asked about it or when they themselves think about it use the lame rationalization that “I’m going to start going next week…or next month… or next whenever.”

These fitness clubs must be getting rich off of these rationalizations.

Personally, I pay $35 per month for my gym membership.  Of course, by trying to live my life as frugally as possible, I could easily give this up and save the $35.  I could find a way to get my exercise outdoors in some fashion for free.  However, I keep it for the following reasons:

–I view it as an investment.  An investment in my physical health.  This should lead to less medical bills and a longer life. Two things which can save me money or even make me money.

–My visits to the gym (4 times a week) I actually do on my lunch hour.  I could not do outdoor exercise during this time unless I had somewhere to shower afterwards, which I don’t.

–Finally, as long as I stay on my schedule of four times per week, this works out to about $2.19 per visit to the gym. I spend 40 minutes there during each visit, which I think is a steal of a price. So, rather than being a waste of money, I look at it as a great deal!

If you currently have a gym membership and are not using it, you need to take a good long look in the mirror and decide…are you going to get up off your behind and honestly start using it?  If so, then do it.  If not, then cancel it.  It’s as simple as that.

If not, you’re just giving your money away every month, and not doing anything about health-a lose-lose situation if I ever heard one.

As always, your comments and suggestions are appreciated below.

Looking back on things, I basically categorize my life into two main sections-BD and AD.  Before debt and After Debt.

When I was in debt, I managed to motivate myself to get out of debt by using simple logic.  I knew that if I didn’t do something about my financial situation, that I would struggle with my finances for the rest of my life.  I also knew that if I fixed my finances, there would be a tremendous strain lifted off of my shoulders.

I knew I would have more freedom to do the things that I wanted to do, but I never really knew what that feeling was going to be like

I wish I could have gotten a little taste of it back then…

I guess what I am trying to say is that if I knew how many doors of opportunity would be opened up to me once I solved all of my debts, then I would have motivated myself to get debt-free much quicker then I was able to.

It is a shame that the “non-debt” people couldn’t invite the “debt people” over to their side of the fence just to sit down and have a chat. I bet the “debt people” would really see the light.

They would see that by being out of debt, you obviously create more income for yourself (i.e. no money paid in interest and fees, etc).  They would see that you save yourself money through lower interest rates on just about everything.

They would also see the other opportunities that come your way in the ability to MAKE money from your credit cards.  By signing up for a credit card with a cash back option, you can get your credit cards to actually generate income for you, rather than costing you money.

They would also get a true sense of the phrase “stress free financial living“.  Although living on this side of debt does not have its challenges, it is nothing compared to the monthly strain of waiting till payday so you can pay your bills at the last minute, always running behind on things, etc.

I really wish I had gotten the opportunity to just spend a few minutes on the right side of debt way back then.  It would have been exactly the kick in the pants that I needed to do something about my financial woes much earlier.

If you are less than thrilled with your state of financial affairs at this point in time, why not sit down and talk with someone who is?  Better yet, talk with someone who used to be in your shoes that is not any longer.

I can guarantee you that they will have a wonderful story to tell.  They will be able to see things through your eyes, but they will also be able to explain to you how much more fun life in general is without all of the constant  worrying and stress that comes with living in debt.

As always, your comments and suggestions are appreciated below.

I wanted to speak a little today about the mindsets and attitudes that go along with living a solid financial life.  Back when I was in debt, in the beginning, I thought I could solve my debt problems by simply creating some A B C list of things to do.  Complete the things on the list and boom; I’d be out of debt.

Eventually I came to realize that this is not the right way to go about doing it. Rather, it is by changing our thought process and our handling of how money comes into and goes out of our life that will bring us real, long-lasting financial success.

I could write on this topic for days (and did so extensively in my book) but for today, I just wanted to outline a few of the behaviors that I began to put into place in my life that made for some real financial progress.

Here we go, in no particular order:

A Willingness and Desire to Get Out of Debt.  This is first on the list for a reason.  You could follow a hundred other steps to get out of debt, but if you don’t  really, truly want to get out of debt, it will never happen.  This includes a willingness to put measures into place in your life, and sticking with them, which will solve your financial shortcomings.

Some degree of organization.  I would say it’s a pretty fair bet that most people whose finances are a mess are not very organized by nature.  This was definitely the case with me.  Note, I did not say something like “Be Completely Organized”.  Simply getting some sort of organization wrapped around your finances would be a good enough start.  Specifically, organize how and when you pay your bills, organize how and where you file them, etc.

Improved Attention to Detail. The statistics are shocking at the number of people who don’t even look at their credit card bills or their utility bills before paying them.  They don’t even look.  Are you kidding me?  In the beginning, you have got to take a good hard look at all your bills to make sure there are no hidden fees that you shouldn’t be paying for, that they aren’t services on your bill that you’re paying for and not receiving, and that there are not charges on your credit cards that don’t belong there. Once you get used to doing this, the process really turns into a quick scan of them, but you’ve got to know what you’re looking for.

Increase Your Awareness Level.  What does this mean?  Let me pose some questions to you.  Is there a cheaper gas company out there that you could get your gas from? A cheaper internet company? Cable TV? When you shop, do you know a good deal when you see one?  Or, do you mindlessly wander the aisles, casually throwing the same overpriced stuff in your cart as you did the week before.

And finally, the Ability to Act. If you can find a cheaper way to get internet, will you take the time and energy to call up and switch?  Or will you maintain your status quo because of laziness or apathy or whatever?  If you see a charge on your credit card that doesn’t belong there, will you call up and dispute it?  Or just let it go because the thought of standing up for yourself scares you to death?

As you can see, this is a list of behaviors and habits, rather than a concrete list of things to do to solve debt. I learned early on in the process that by instituting one of these behaviors in your life is the same as doing ten things off of some laundry list.

Please comment below on my words and tell me what you think.  I always appreciate your honest and direct feedback.