Festive Link Love Carnivality #20
Posted on August 10, 2008 | 4 Comments
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I’ve been a bad blogger! I haven’t been updated as often as I would like. It’s only going to be more spotty for the next week as we’re heading off on vacation for a few days. We’re keeping it relatively since we just bought a car. We’ll be driving down to Virginia Beach. I’ve never been there before but I hear it’s fun.
Haven’t taken part in carnivals as much either. Here were the last ones I was involved in:
You Need A Budget hosted the Carnival of Personal Fiancne # 163 - Quotable Quotes. My article Recession Or Not - The Challenge The Fed Has Has included.
Stop The Ride hosted the ABC’s Of Money - Carnival of Money Stories #70. Dealing With Financial Problems With A Loved One was included.
Can I Get Rich On A Salary hosted the Money Hacks Carnival #23 - It’s Gotta Be The Shoes. Goals Are Great Motivators was included.
Now for some posts from my reader and such:
Personal Finance Bloggers Credit Card Survey by Ask Mr Credit Card. AMCC sent out questions to a number of personal finance bloggers regarding their credit cards and use and 45 responded (including myself). Go check out the results.
As a thank you to all of the bloggers who participated, Ask Mr Credit Card wrote a follow up which included his favorite credit card post from each of the bloggers. Check it out - Ultimate Collection of Credit Card Posts.
19 Free Personal Budgeting Spreadsheets by Financial Ramblings. Different spreadsheets you can use to track your finances.
Planning a Staycation or Frugal Vacation? Here’s Help! at MSN MoneyBlog SmartSpending. Thanks go out to Karen Datko who wrote about the Money Life Network’s Frugal Things To Do In… series!
Frugal Blog Network. The Money Life Network is certainly not the only group that’s out there! I just discovered the group but I’ve read many of the blogs. Go check them out.
I Get Frugal With A Little Help From My Friends by Can I Get Rich On A Salary. G Blogger asks his friends on Twitter advice on digital cameras and gets quick answers. A great example of how networking can help you make a better decision.
118 Twitter Users Who Blog About Money by Mighty Bargain Hunter. By no means all of the money Twitterers but certainly a good place to start if you’re looking for some folks to follow. Check out my profile.
Extra Income Guide by Moolanomy. A great resource of different forms of extra income you can work on.
The 2008 Economic Stimulus: First Take On Consumer Response by WSJ Economics Blog. Could the stimulus checks be helping?
Now for the Money Life Network:
Milk Your Money - Comments on Proposed Credit Card Rules
MIB Smarter Money - Introducing MiB SiteStock Check out what your site is worth!
Sense To Save - Calling An Expert Was The Right Thing To Do
Bible Money Matters - An Expensive Mistake To Make
Prime Time Money - Build A One-Sheet, Dashboard Style View Of Your Finances
Remodeling This Life - Less Is More
Let’s not forget our Frugal Things To Do In… series! If you have a site and want to contribute to our map then write a post of your own, mention us and contact us and we’ll add you to our map!
Until next time - Read, Learn, and Enjoy!
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photo by m o d e
Friday Franklin August 8th, 2008
Posted on August 8, 2008 | 2 Comments
Welcome back to Friday Franklin!
Today’s quote is a classic that everyone should take to heart!
A penny saved is a penny earned.
Benjamin Franklin
Does it get any simpler than that?!? Make sure you build up your savings!
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photo credit: jepsculpture
Credit Report Versus Credit Score
Posted on August 6, 2008 | 8 Comments
I hear a lot of people interchanging the term credit report with credit score. I do it myself. But there’s a big difference between the two. Let me show you…
Credit Report
Your credit report is really a snapshot of your credit use history. It shows potential lenders:
- your personal information (name, address, social security number,
- what kinds of credit you use (credit cards, mortgages, loans)
- how long the credit line has been open
- whether you have paid your bills on time (including any collection information if a debt had to be passed on to a collection agency)
- how much of the credit you have used and what is outstanding
- whether you have been looking to open new sources of credit (any credit inquiries that have been made)
- banking information
- public records (such as bankruptcy or a court-related judgment).
Lenders, such as credit card agencies, look at your report to determine if they should extend you credit (like a credit card). Basically, your credit report gives a lender a view of whether you pay your debts back or not.
By law, everyone is allowed free access once every 12 months to their credit report from each of the three national credit reporting agencies (Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion). You can order them from AnnualCreditReport.com. (Watch out for other companies that say they can give you a free credit report but they are really trying to sign you up for a service or get you to buy something else.)
You should check your credit report yearly to make sure all of the reported information is correct and that there are no fraudulent accounts that have been open in your name.
Though lenders use your report to determine if they should extend credit to you, the report won’t tell you what you can expect as an interest rate from the lender. That leads us to…
Credit Score
Credit scores use the data in your credit report and assign a number (usually ranging from 300-900) which shows lenders how much of a risk you are in paying back a debt. The higher your score the less of a risk you are (that’s why a high score is important in getting a good finance rate). The most common score used is the FICO score calculated by Fair Isaac Corporation. There is one FICO score for each of the three reporting agencies. The agencies may also have their own version of a credit score but FICO is the most widely used.
Here is a breakdown of how your credit score is calculated:
Your score could be used for credit card applications, auto loans, mortgages, insurance, and by potential employers. Insurance and employers? Yup. Insurers treat a high score as being more responsible and can get you better rates (if you have a good score make sure to mention it to your auto insurer). Employers use the score in the same way. They look at your score as a measure of how responsible you may be with your work.
You should check your credit score if you plan to make a big purchase that would require financing such as buying a car or a house. Try out this calculator from myFICO to see how different scores will affect your financing. (By the way, I used myFICO to purchase my three credit scores before we bought our mini-van. By checking my scores I knew I would be able to qualify for a low interest rate).
To Recap:
Credit Report - shows credit history. Check it yearly to make sure the information is correct
Credit Score - a number that indicates your credit risk; what a lender will use to determine your interest rate on your financing. Check it to gauge what kind of financing you can expect from a lender.
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We Did It, We Bought A New Car
Posted on August 5, 2008 | 6 Comments
We did it! We broke down and decided it was time for a new car. We bought a brand new 2008 Honda Odyssey EX. We picked it up last week and we love it so far! I feel a little guilty saying that since hey, a new car costs money, but I think we did it as cost-saving as we could.
See, we could have stuck with our 2004 Toyota Corolla, which was a great car. It had a relatively good number of miles on it and it ran well. Thing is, it was getting too small for our family. We’ve been getting by finding ways to fit everything into the trunk of the car on various outings. Shopping at BJ’s was always fun since we had to get things like diaper and wipes boxes into the trunk as well as the stroller (remember, we have two kids one of which is a toddler). On some days we got real close to not fitting everything. The other things was we really couldn’t fit any more people than the four of us. Maybe we could squeeze a friend of my daughter’s in but that was it. We wanted to be able to transport more people if we wanted (and hey, there’s always the possibility of more little ones too).
Let me show you what we did to keep costs down:
- We traded in our Corolla. We considered keeping it but we didn’t need two cars. We were better off putting the car toward the cost of the Odyssey.
- We researched and then researched some more and then shopped around. We checked Consumer Reports, Edmunds.com, the official Honda site, the Official Toyota site…We looked everywhere we could to make sure we understood what the dealer costs were and what prices we could expect to get for both the new car and our old car. With this information we shopped around until we found the best price from a dealer. In the end, after an odyssey of our own, we received a price that we were happy with (much less than MSRP and lower than dealer invoice).
- We added some luxury but not the works. I wanted power side doors which put us up higher than the base model. After that we didn’t go for any other options. As much as we would have liked them we didn’t get the navigation system, the DVD player, the leather seats, etc… We looked at what we knew we needed and wanted and stuck with that.
- We got a great financing deal. I know, buying a 2-3 year old car and paying for it in cash is what a lot of experts say is the best thing to do. We’ve had bad experiences with older cars already and we know we are going to use this car for as long as we are able (many, many years we hope!). We considered a used car but in the end we wanted new. One thing that helped decide was the fact that Honda is offering 0.9% financing right now (Toyota was offering 0% but we preferred the Honda overall). Financing for 0.9% is real close to free money (a great reason to make sure your credit score is good). So you know, we have enough put away that we could have paid the car off entirely but since the rate is so low we can keep the money in our ING Direct account and let it earn interest while we pay the fianancing. I did some quick calculations and our financing is costing us less than $300 while we could earn around $1800 keeping the money in our savings. For a used car the fianncing would have been much higher.
- Our insurance will be lower. As an added bonus I found out that our insurance premiums will be lower since the Odyssey is considered a safer car.
- Our vacation will be more local. We were undecided on what to do for vacation this year. We were strongly considering flying off somewhere that has Caribbean water. But now that we have a new car with more storage space we’re going to do a driving vacation and travel within a day or two’s distance and check out the sites. Yes gas is expensive now, but we’ll still be saving more than if we flew somewhere.
We have a little bit of buyer’s remorse knowing that we have a debt to pay off but we’re really happy to have gotten the car! We’ve already taken a couple of small trips and we plan to do some more (there’s a frugal list of things to do somewhere out there isn’t there?).
A car is a great big expense. But I think we purchased ours in a way that’s financially responsible.
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- Glenn said: You're basically getting Sprint Navigation, Sprint TV Premier(all the channels) and Sprint Music Premier(150+ streaming radio stations) and BlackBerry Internet Service for $30 more than the original SERO 500. on Sprint SERO Meet Everything Plus
- David said: I used to live on that beach in a house on stilts at the north end, in college at ODU. Good times, thanks for the reminder! on Our Vacation To Virginia Beach And Such
- James said: I had a very interesting experience just recently while trying to buy a car. After they pulled my credit, I was informed that I had too many collections and could not get the financing I needed. What they were telling me made no sense because I shouldn't have had any collections. I've always paid my on BUYING A CAR - KNOW YOUR CREDIT SCORE AND GET FINANCING BEFORE HAND
- PT said: Glad you made it back safe. Sounds like a fun trip. Thanks for sharing the experience. on Our Vacation To Virginia Beach And Such
- Jeff@MySuperChargedLife said: Sounds like a great trip! I'm really sorry to hear that you got into an accident in your new van. I hope getting it fixed goes smoothly for you! on Our Vacation To Virginia Beach And Such
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