The Money Writers

A quick post on a couple of new bank account bonuses.
Bank of America is offering a $50 bonus when opening a new MyAccess Checking Account with promotion code GROUP50 and a minimum initial deposit of $25. According to the offer page, there’s no monthly fee for MyAccess Checking Account opened with the above promo code. [...]

Original Post on The Sun’s Financial Diary

Special bonus offers

• Ohio CollegeAdvantage 529 Plan $25 Bonus
• Lending Club $25 Sign Up Bonus

Band Bonuses: $50 Bank of America Checking and $50 Capital One Savings

I’ve been a follower of Dave Ramsey’s baby steps methodology for a while now. And whenever I can, I try to catch one of the weekday radio shows of this financial guru and popular talk show host with Fox Business News. Here, Dave Ramsey gives advice on how to make a budget full [...]

If you are saving for your retirement using vehicles such as IRA and/or 401(k), there are limitations on when investments can be withdrawn from these accounts. Since these are tax deferred accounts, either contributions (401(k) and Traditional IRA) or growth (Roth IRA), or both (401(k) and Traditional IRA) will be taxed at the time when [...]

Original Post on The Sun’s Financial Diary

Special bonus offers

• Ohio CollegeAdvantage 529 Plan $25 Bonus
• Lending Club $25 Sign Up Bonus

What You Need to Know about Early Withdrawal from Retirement Accounts

Money Magazine’s big headline this month is the 7 New Rules of Financial Security… and Why You Need to Know Them. I have to admit it’s a pretty sweet headline – it certainly caught my eye. I flipped right to page 50 to see what I needed to know why. With that in [...]

This is a guest post by Trisha Wagner. Trisha is a freelance writer for DestroyDebt.com, a debt community featuring debt forums. Trisha writes regularly on the topics of getting out of debt and personal finance.
Using a treadmill as part of your exercise regime can be a helpful tool in keeping your body active and healthy. [...]

About the Author: Jeremy is a retirement planning specialist and founder of Generation X Finance and the guide to Financial Planning at About.com. To learn more, follow Jeremy on Twitter.

Getting Off the Debt Treadmill – Stop Running In Place and Start Making Progress

What can you learn about money from March Madness? You can take a lesson from most experiences in life if you sit back and observe long enough; the NCAA basketball tournament is no exception.  I shared a few things I learned in my series on personal finance lessons for sports fans:
Ignore the Analyst’s Hype 
Just like the [...]

Ever since the Making Home Affordable Program was rolled out I’ve been very intrigued with the plan. Do we need a loan modification? No. Would it be nice? Sure.
In a weird twist of events, it looks like we qualify (on paper) for the loan modification program.
Home Affordable Modifications
To find out of you are [...]

This is a guest post from The Canadian Tax Blogger who has taken the time to answer common reader questions regarding leveraged investing and filing income taxes.
The process of saving and investing can be a rewarding experience.  However, when it comes to taxes and reporting your savings to the CRA, the experience can be frustrating.
If [...]

Today’s “Ask the Reader” post presents an opportunity for me to learn from you, the audience. I received this question over at SideHustleBlogging.com, but because I know many of you run your own business, or blog full time, I hoped you could provide some real world help for a fellow reader.

Robert writes in with the [...]

I remember visiting a small city in Siberia during my time in Russia, and making a one-day visit to a former gulag village to inspect a branch location of the bank we were auditing. At one point during the trip, we passed a sign that said (roughly) “for the next 10 miles, roll up your [...]

During my life, I’ve hit a few speed bumps along the way, as I’m sure, most of us who are middle-aged (or older) will testify to. Facing pink slips, repossessions, foreclosures, and a sinking economy may force some of us to take on any job available. More than once, as a college graduate in my [...]

This is a comment left by nt on my post on Citi stock purchase:
I heard that citi group is reverse splitting the shares. Is this good for the investors?
Before talking about what a reverse stock split is, here’s a story of one stock I used to own which did a reverse stock split in the [...]

Original Post on The Sun’s Financial Diary

Special bonus offers

• Ohio CollegeAdvantage 529 Plan $25 Bonus
• Lending Club $25 Sign Up Bonus

Citi Reverse Stock Split: Is It Good for the Stock?

I thought I’d have a little fun today and go with some humor. It seems appropriate since I missed posting this on the weekend. It’s not always my strong suit (which is why I don’t write a comedy blog), but every now and then, you have to do something a little different. [...]

Last week, when I was writing the article on reward checking accounts, I noticed that some banks not only require a number of debit card transactions in a month in order to get the higher yield, but also explicitly say qualifying transactions must be PIN (personal identification number) based, while others insist only signature based [...]

Original Post on The Sun’s Financial Diary

Special bonus offers

• Ohio CollegeAdvantage 529 Plan $25 Bonus
• Lending Club $25 Sign Up Bonus

PIN vs. Signature Based Debit Transactions

The Make Working Pay tax credit was included as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Beginning in the next few weeks, you’ll begin to see the money in your paycheck.
Make Working Pay Tax Credit
The credit is $400 for working individuals and $800 for married filing joint. The refundable credit is available [...]

A reader, who is just starting out in the finance world, wrote me an email asking me to explain self directed RRSP’s.  More specifically, here is the email:
I was wondering if you could write something about self-directed RRSPs -
what exactly they are and how to open and manage one, where we can hold
them, etc.
I thought [...]

When my wife and I had our first child we made the decision she would stay home with her until school age, and then possibly rejoin the workforce. We were young parents, and had only been married about a year when we found out my wife was expecting.
Of course we were elated to be starting [...]

We took our daughters 65 miles east today to visit The New York Botanical Garden, where there’s a Orchid Show going on right now. It’s the first time we have ever been there (though we lived on the other side of the city for years) and the kids really enjoyed the trip.
With the kids running [...]

Original Post on The Sun’s Financial Diary

Special bonus offers

• Ohio CollegeAdvantage 529 Plan $25 Bonus
• Lending Club $25 Sign Up Bonus

Weekend Linkage – March 22, 2009

Why Monitor Your Credit? My Id Theft Story
I know someone who would have benefited greatly from some form of credit monitoring, even if it seems like a waste of bucks for many people. He’s someone in my family who doesn’t follow his finances too well — someone like him would benefit from putting things [...]

Win a Free Copy of Turbo Tax Premier ($85 value!)
April 15th is rapidly approaching and you only have a few more weeks to file your taxes. I know, taxes aren’t any fun, but we don’t have much of a choice. That being said, Intuit has stepped up to make this year’s taxes a little more [...]

About the Author: Jeremy is a retirement planning specialist and founder of Generation X Finance and the guide to Financial Planning at About.com. To learn more, follow Jeremy on Twitter.

TurboTax Premier Giveaway Contest – Two Copies Up for Grabs

A few days ago a stranger stopped me outside The Home Depot and asked how old my van was.  Apparently, it reminded him of a work van his father drove. “1990,” I replied. “Wow, 19 years?” he said with a surprised look on his face. “Does it still run good?” I could see him checking [...]

Since closing at 6,547.05 on March 9th, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained back more than 11% in the past 9 trading sessions to recoup some of the losses. The rally was partly fueled by financial stocks after two of the nation’s three largest banks, Bank of America (BAC) and Citigroup (C), made bullish comments [...]

Original Post on The Sun’s Financial Diary

Special bonus offers

• Ohio CollegeAdvantage 529 Plan $25 Bonus
• Lending Club $25 Sign Up Bonus

Is This Rally Real?

If you listen to personal financial advice very long you are bound to hear the term “sinking fund” tossed around.  Unfortunately, it is usually mentioned in passing as if everyone knows that a sinking fund is, and how to use one to improve the management of your personal finances.
A sinking fund, in the context of [...]

The consequences of the buy and hold investment strategy.
During volatile periods like we have right now, the standard advice I’ve pretty much followed as a long-term investor boiled down to the following points:

Perform asset allocation.
Diversify.
Evaluate your portfolio and rebalance it regularly.
Stay in the market for the “long term” or until you finally address your financial [...]

Today’s guest post comes from Hike Camp Fish. Hike Camp Fish blogs about what you’d imagine: hiking, camping, and fishing. You’ll notice that he has a very snazzy theme (yeah I helped him with it ). He’s also got a Hike and Camping store.
In these difficult economic conditions across the world, [...]