Free From Broke

A Personal Finance Blog for Regular Folks

Tips

5 Reasons Getting a Large Tax Refund is Bad

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The stress of doing your taxes is over.

You filed all of your forms and to your joy you’re getting back a tax refund.  And it’s a nice sized one too!

It’s awesome, right?

Not so fast.

Getting a lump sum payout after filing your taxes feels great.  But I’m going to show you that it may not be as great as you think.  There are better ways you can use your money (and it is your money).

Read On as I Tell You 5 Reasons a Large Tax Refund is Bad.

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ING $25 Referral Bonuses

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Have you wanted to open an online savings account?

Well here’s your opportunity to open one with ING Direct! They offer high-yield savings with no minimum to open (this includes both savings and CD’s). This means better interest earnings than most other banks. I’ve been using them since April 2003.  If you use one of the referral links below you will receive a $25 bonus. You’ll also be giving me a bonus of $10 so it’s great for us both. In fact, once you open an account you can refer your friends and receive the same bonus as I would. The catch (isn’t there always one) is that you need to open the account with at least $250. What about those no minimums? You can always open an account with any amount lower than $250 but you won’t be eligible for the $25 bonus.

And check this out – If you open with $250 your $25 bonus is an instant 10% return!

Here are the links to use:

Shoot me an email for a link!

ING Sign-up Bonus
ING Sign-up Bonus
ING Sign-up Bonus
ING Sign-up Bonus
ING Sign-up Bonus
ING Sign-up Bonus

If you get the message “We’re sorry, but the referral link within the email you received has expired and is no longer valid. We recommend that you contact the sender and ask them to re-send the referral email. Or click ‘Continue’ to proceed with the application process without the account opening bonus” then the referral has already been used. Shoot me an email and I’ll send you a new link.Like I said, I’ve been using ING Direct for years and I highly recommend them. If I had kept my savings in my brick and mortar bank I would have missed out on a lot of savings and earnings. So what are you waiting for? Go open up a high-yield savings account!

If you don’t have $250 but still want to open an an ING account please click the banner below (please note this is for the Electric Orange account not savings):


As always read the fine print from ING to make sure their online savings is right for you. You should never sign up for anything online without understanding what you are getting into.

7 Credit Card Tips From ING Direct

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I was just on the ING Direct site checking out my savings accounts and decided to check out their tips. They list seven great credit card tips. Check them out (descriptions are mine):

  • Make your payments on time – Very important! Late fees can be very expensive on credit cards and can negatively affect your credit score. If you have problems with the due date you may be able to change your credit card due date.
  • Try to pay off the full balance every month – Pay off the full balance to avoid any interest charges.
  • Avoid cash advances – Cash advances on your credit card have different rates than normal credit. Yeah, it’s gonna be more expensive than if you just charged it.
  • Shop around – Compare rates and services from different credit card companies to get the best credit card offers.  Find one that fits your spending habits.  Make sure to read the fine print as well.
  • Use savings to pay off the cards – It’s great that ING Direct exists offering high interest rates on savings but that high rate doesn’t compare with the interest on your credit card (unless you have a low introductory rate).
  • If you’d like a better rate, just ask – If you have been a good customer you can call the credit card company and ask for a better rate. Try telling them that you received an offer from another company with a better credit card rate; odds are they can lower it for you. Make sure you understand what the new rate is though. It may only apply to new purchases not your outstanding balance.
  • Don’t be left holding all the cards – If you have a lot of cards it means you can do a lot of spending damage. This is bad for both you wallet and your credit score. Get rid of credit cards you hardly use or ask that the credits limits be lowered (a high credit limit can hurt you for some credit card companies).

Of course you should also watch your spending as well.  Don’t abuse your card and know what you can really afford.

Do you have any credit card tips to share?

Loose Change Gets Us Free Meals On Vacation

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So we usually go on vacation in the Summer.

Every time we get free meals from loose change!

Let me explain – We have two change jars in the house: one for quarters and one for all other change. This gets filled up whenever we come home for the day with change in our pockets. The quarters are for laundry so those get used pretty quick and isn’t part of our free meals. The other jar though slowly fills up over the course of the year and is usually filled to the brim by the Summer.

All year we watch the jar fill up higher and higher. It almost becomes a calendar for us to tell when it’s time for vacation! The week before our trip my wife and daughter will go to the local Commerce Online bank (yeah, it says online but they have a ton of brick and mortar locations where I live) and use their coin counting machine which is free for anyone! [This is better than Coinstar since Coinstar charges 8.9% to count your change (though if you convert your change to a gift card or eCertificate the counting is free)].

Now with cash in hand we’re ready to go on vacation.

We can usually get anywhere from $60-$100 depending on the change that’s in the jar. Maybe this only covers one special dinner or maybe this covers the first few meals for us. Either way we look at the meals as being free, paid for by change that accumulated in our pockets over the year.

Of course we understand that the meals aren’t really free.

What’s important is this is another small, disciplined way for us to save some money that we get to use on vacation. What’s more is it’s fun to watch the change grow and fun for our daughter to pour the change in the counting machine (extra bonus here is that she gets to see how saving small amounts can turn into large amounts in time).

What small tricks do you use to save money? Let me know!

What Is The Opportunity Cost?

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The term “opportunity cost” is thrown around a lot but many people don’t fully understand the concept.

Opportunity Cost can be defined as

the cost of something in terms of an opportunity forgone…or the most valuable foregone alternative (Wikipedia).

Basically, everything you do has an opportunity cost which is what you are giving up for what you are doing.  If you sleep late, the opportunity cost is whatever you may have done in the morning instead.  When you buy something the opportunity cost of the item is whatever else you could have done with that money (or even with your time shopping for the item).

Why is this concept important? Whenever you make a decision, be it with money, life, whatever, you should look and see what the opportunity cost of that decision is.  This makes you stop and think about whether what you are about to do is worth it.  Is there a better action?  Is my time better served?  Can my resources be better used?   These are questions that should cross your mind.

In terms of personal finance this is looking at what you do with your money and figuring out it’s true worth to you.  See, an important aspect here is what your values are.  Is it better for you to redo your kitchen or put more money away for retirement?   There isn’t necessarily a “right” answer for this.  The decision is yours.  You should be aware of what other opportunities you will miss when you make your decision.

Try to think about the things you do today and figure out the opportunity costs.  Will it change any of your decisions?

Let me know.