Savings secrets do not exist in Europe and Asia, but in the good ole U.S.A trying to put together a savings jar of $400 or $500 is elusive. With most families today, it is matter of falling back on credit cards for emergency expenses, which easily leads many into the great credit card trap. Senior…
Smart savings begins with cultivating daily behavior like cutting back on the morning lattes, skipping happy hours, and savings with friends. Savings is more than just keeping the emergency cookie jar full with $400 or $500 in cash. It’s should include other goals like vacations, an automobile or house downpayment. The new Dobot app users…
Best credit card is an oxymoron. There has never been the “ten best credit cards,” or even the “one best credit card” you gotta have. Four decades ago there were two choices: “classic” and “gold.” To get a “gold” card with a minimum $5,000 credit line, you had top be making at least $25,000 per…
Professor Cardworthy, the “Money Explainer” of all things financial, was resurrected by Senior Payments Analyst Robert McKinley, reprising his role first developed in 2007 as the actor in a series of 50 “Cardworthy” YouTube consumer instructional videos. The 2007 project was shelved while Mr. McKinley was in a cancer battle and later placed on hold…
Holiday season closes amidst a blockbuster turnout for small retail businesses globally. Even though the shortened holiday season may have pushed retail sales down a tad, business owners remain confident about their businesses going forward. Scrooge remained with us as organized crime hijacked truckloads of holiday stuff and gift card scam artists manifest themselves bigly…
Southern credit unions offer single digit interest rates and are nearly devoid of fees, except for reasonable late payment fees. Besides the extremely competitive pricing, nearly all credit unions in the South offer a rewards program and/or generous unlimited cash-back programs. From the huge Suncoast Credit Union in Florida to the tiny Bayer Heritage Federal…
Having a money talk with your children can pay off handsomely when they reach adulthood by delivering a higher level of confidence in their finances. The “birds & bees” talk may help prevent unplanned pregnancies, but the “dollars & cents” talk, or more correctly, “dollars & sense” talk, may avoid boomerang adult kids who move…
Grads prefer cash or gift cards as a token of appreciation for their accomplishment this year. For thirteen consecutive years their preferences have remained unchanged. This year the average person buying graduation gifts will spend $102.51, on par with last year’s $104.92. The National Retail Federation and Prosper Insights & Analytics reports its recent survey…
While a gargantuan number of Americans handle their finances reasonably well, there are 10 dollar destroyers floating around, wherein some consumers fall victim to their own personal financial mismanagement or find themselves in circumstances possibly out of their control. The secret to successfully navigating around these ten hazards to the health of your wealth is…
The Mastercard World and the Mastercard World Elite credit cards are getting a boatload of more U.S. benefits this summer. Mastercard, previously known as the credit card making “The World Your Oyster,” is adding more automatic digital shopping benefits, as well as cell phone insurance coverage and identity theft protection. The new insurance and protection…
