It’s that time of year again… time to throw away your money! Okay, I mean, it’s time to get ready for Christmas! For many Americans, spending can get out of control during the holidays. According to the American Journal of Psychiatry, compulsive spending affects one in 20 Americans, leaving many men and women feeling worse […]
Tomorrow is the infamous Black Friday in America, where shoppers go out in throngs in the wee hours of the morning and scrabble, kick, and run for the best deals around. Whenever I think of Black Friday shopping, I envision a newscast from my childhood that showed fresh-faced young mothers beating the crap out of […]
You choose how to pay every time you make a purchase. Sometimes you can choose from several methods of payment, and other times, you’re limited by your location. My wife and I use a combination of credit cards, debit cards, checks, and cash, depending on where we’re making our purchase. What methods of payment do […]
One of the many gimmicks car dealers use is the promise of paying off your old car loan. If you trade in your car, the dealer agrees to pay off the loan on the vehicle. You end up with a new car, and you don’t have to worry about making payments on both the old […]
While we’re all sick of the retail creep of Christmas — remember when we didn’t see yuletide items in stores until after Thanksgiving? — it does serve one useful purpose: it can help us remember to start budgeting for Christmas earlier. According to the National Retail Federation, the average American is expected to spend just […]
One of the biggest changes our family has made over the years is cutting back on Christmas spending. When we first had kids, we felt it was necessary to fill the floor beneath the tree with gifts. It wasn’t unusual to spend between $200-500 on each kid for Christmas. A week after Christmas, most of […]
