Test Blog

Greetings to all new readers from the Radical Personal Finance podcast !  I thoroughly enjoyed being on Joshua's show because it helped me distill some of my thoughts into bite-sized chunks of information.  Thanks for suffering through my spotty Skype connection and stream-of-consciousness yammering.  If only I could deliver my message as smoothly as Joshua!  I will shoot for a smoother performance on my next podcast appearance. Here some of my most popular blog posts over the years: How We Saved $250,000 by Taking "Crappy" Jobs Federal Income Tax: How to Determine Your FREE Money How Were Saving $20,000 by Kickin' Cable to the Curb Our Story Let me know what you think of my ideas.  I look forward to your comments and questions. Good luck achieving your financial and life goals. Ed [table id=76 /]

Greetings all!  With 2015 right around the corner, it's time to start our tax planning.  It looks like the standard deduction and personal exemption amounts are going to increase in 2015*.  It also appears that the child tax credit will remain at $1,000 per child.  These increases in the standard deduction and personal exemptions mean that the government will allow us to earn more money before it expects us to pay federal income tax.     2015 Free Money for Federal Income Taxes Standard Deduction Married Filing Jointly $12,600 Personal Exemptions $4,000 * 3 $12,000 1 Child Tax Credit $1,000 / .10 $10,000 2015 Total Free Money $34,600 As the box shows, the three of us will file for the standard deduction of $12,600 using the married filing jointly classification.  We will also claim three standard deductions for a total of $12,000.  Since our son still qualifies for the child tax credit, the first $1,000 of federal income tax will be credited back to us.  That means that we can ...

The Old Homestead Warm Cancun greetings to all! Over the last few months I have received comments and questions regarding my ridiculously high 5.875% mortgage rate. Currently, I owe $59,568 on the mortgage; I also owe around $21,500 on our HELOC (home equity line of credit). Many people recommended that I refinance the balance to a lower rate; others suggested that I pay off the mortgage by making additional payments to the principal. These are great suggestions, but I have my own plan to slay the beast. Here is a brief look at my financial ball and chain in financial calculator format: PV = $59,568 (originally borrowed $125,000 on $157,000 home) I = 5.875% PMT = $811 (including additional principal payment) N = 7.5 years / 90 months (originally a 30 year loan) FV = $0 (that's the goal of every homeowner, right?) Refinancing I have looked into refinancing my mortgage, but I have not been impressed with the options. Sure, I could get a lower rate, BUT I do not w...

Mexico or Bust! Greetings from Cancun, Mexico to all my loyal Millionaire Educator readers (Mom and Honest Abe)!  Two weeks ago I bought one-way airline tickets from AirTran for the Atlanta to Cancun flight.  Two days later my wife, son and I landed in Cancun and began our family adventure.   We decided to come to Mexico for two main reasons.  First, my wife and I both agreed that an extended family adventure would benefit all of us.  We could all work on our Spanish, see lots of interesting sites, hit the beaches, and escape the suddenly cold Georgia winter.  Second, we also wanted to see what it would be like to live in Cancun as a local, not a tourist.       Let's face it, most U.S. news pertaining to Mexico is very negative.   Friends and relatives advised us not to go, and my wife and I had our own reservations.  We agreed that if we didn't like it, we would return home after two weeks.  So far, we have really enjoyed our trip, and we plan on staying for two full months. A...

Credit Card Debt...Be Gone! This post will be brief...I just wanted to share some good news.  This week we paid off the last $500 balance on our Visa credit card.  We had carried a balance on a number of 0% rollover cards since 2009.  At its peak, the balance was $10,000.  By rolling our credit card debt to 0% rollover cards, we were able to avoid most credit card expenses:  interest and late payment fees.  Every month we automatically sent in payments using our bank's Bill Pay service.  However, owing anything to a credit card company is NOT good; thinking and worrying about credit card debt definitely affects your psyche. In the future, we plan on using our credit cards sparingly.  That shouldn't be so hard since we make most of our purchases these days with our debit cards.  We prefer debit cards because they seem to moderate our spending and encourage us to be thrifty.  (Watching our checking account balance steadily diminish over the course of the month seems to keep our s...

Happy New Year to all; may 2014 be your year!  Okay, it’s time to see how we did with our 2013 goals .  Let me start by saying my wife and I only worked five months each this year, so we came up short on most of our financial goals.  Nonetheless, 2013 was still a great year for us. Savings Goals Our 2013 savings goal was to save $102,050 in our various retirement and education accounts:  IRA, 403b, 457, HSA, Coverdell ESA, and 529 plans.   Unfortunately, we did not hit our goal; we actually came up $23,328 short!  However, we still managed to save $78,722 in our five months of work. Result:   We missed our goal, but we're not ready to call saving over $78,000 a failure.       2013 Savings Results Accounts Self Wife Total 457  $15,512   $17,500   $33,012  403b $11,200 $13,460  $24,660  IRAs $6,500 $5,500 $12,000 Health Savings $6,450 $6,450 Total Retirement  and Health Savings $76,122  Educational Savings  Son Others Total Coverdell ESA $2,000 $0 $2,000 529 Plan $300 $300 $600 Total...

  Swayback #1 December 26th, 2013 marked the 10-year anniversary of a very special relationship.  The old girl in question has been so good to me and my family.  She's reliable, hard-working, and still a little pretty in spite of her advanced age.  Sure, she often has a "rode-hard-and-put-up-wet" look to her, but I don't mind.  Even though at times she feels unsteady and rickety, she still delivers one heck of a ride.  While I don't really "love" this aging wench, she does have a special place in my heart. Yeah, my 2002 Mitsubishi Galant has been very good to me!  Ten years ago we paid $10,500 for this "sweet" ride.  Since then, I have replaced the tires thrice, the timing belt twice, and the air condition once.  (I might have changed the tires four times, but I wanted to use the word "thrice.")  When I bought her, she had 46,000 miles on her; today she has over 257,000 miles!  Here she is:           The Chick Magnet Earlier this year...