Archive for the 'Uncategorized' Category

Find The Best Jobs To Ride Out A Recession

Which are the best jobs and careers that weather a downtrend? Do you know which ones may not last?

Photo by rollerboogie

When you’re in between jobs or just starting out, one wise move you can make is to consider work that may possibly be immune to economic shifts. And what exactly are these recession […]

Paid Estimated Taxes, Who Sold Their Car? @ The Roundup

On Estimated Taxes
The weekend was uneventful but we did have to pay our estimated taxes a few days ago. It was the first time we’ve actually done so because in the past, as full-time employees, it was easy enough to increase our withholding amounts or adjust our deductions to reflect how much we’d like […]

Happy Father’s Day Giveaway, We Hit A Million!

Happy Father’s Day to all of you daddies out there — hope all your festivities are going well! As for us, we’d like to share an exciting milestone with everyone. We finally made it to a million! And though it would be great to say we made our way to a million […]

Buying a Diamond: Should You Finance the Love of Your Life?

Two and a half years ago, I did something that would make many personal finance gurus scream. I took out a home equity line of credit to buy a diamond ring. I put my home on the line so that I could show the woman I love that I wanted to spend forever with her.
Before […]

Celebrate Mother’s Day the Way You Think She’d Want You To

Local cable has been running a television commercial that simply rips my heart out. A young girl around eight goes into a jewelry store with her dad and her bright pink piggy bank. The dad helps her pick out some jewelry for mom and the commercial ends with everyone smiling and happy. Even though it’s […]SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: “Celebrate Mother’s Day the Way You Think She’d Want You To”, url: “http://blog.prosper.com/2008/05/09/celebrate-mothers-day-the-way-you-think-shed-want-you-to/” });

Celebrate Earth Day Everyday

A couple of weekends ago, I a good friend of mine invited me out on his boat. It was beautiful day, around 80 degrees and not a cloud in the sky. We headed on up to McCovey Cove to sit outside the San Francisco Giants stadium and enjoy the day. There’s also the small chance […]SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: “Celebrate Earth Day Everyday”, url: “http://blog.prosper.com/2008/04/22/celebrate-earth-day-everyday/” });

The Costs of Boat Ownership

Today’s post is from SF Boater, a friend of mine who chronicles his voyages. I have very little experience with boats and the associated financials so I suggested that he share that aspect with Lazy Man and Money readers.
Boats are a part of my life… they always have been. Growing up in FL on the inter-coastal waterway I loved fishing and boating and sometimes even boating and fishing. Even now that I am in the bay area I have found memories of those days.
When I graduated college and moved to the Bay area the one thing I […]

Saving Money at Baseball Games

Spring is finally here and with that comes blossoming flowers and college kids going crazy in Cancun. For me, Spring means mostly one thing… the start of baseball season. I will watch over 130 Red Sox games this year. While I love watching the game on television, it doesn’t compare to going to a game. […]SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: “Saving Money at Baseball Games”, url: “http://blog.prosper.com/2008/04/07/saving-money-at-baseball-games/” });

Why a Recession Doesn’t Have To Hurt

If you’ve picked up a newspaper or turned on a television or radio, you’ve probably heard about the recession. For a long time there was much debate, but now most analysts agree we are in a recession.
Recessions are generally have negative connotations, but there is some good that comes from it. As Baron Rothschild once […]SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: “Why a Recession Doesn’t Have To Hurt”, url: “http://blog.prosper.com/2008/04/02/why-a-recession-doesnt-have-to-hurt/” });

Five Cheap Date Ideas

My wife and I are recent newlyweds. While we tried to be responsible with the costs of a wedding, at 200 people, we knew the costs were going to add up. It only made sense to try to save as much money as possible in anticipation of those wedding bills. We found we could save […]SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: “Five Cheap Date Ideas”, url: “http://blog.prosper.com/2008/03/24/five-cheap-date-ideas/” });

The Power of Barter

Last week, I had one of my good friends from Boston contact me. Let’s call him Jeff. Jeff had heard from his friend that his website as bringing him some significant business. This didn’t surprise me. You see, Jeff is a real estate lawyer. I don’t know how familiar you are with commercial real estate, […]

The Cost of Packaged Foods

Have you noticed how your grocery store is designed? If it’s like most stores, the are raw ingredients (dairy, meat, vegetables) are around the perimeter. If you want a frozen dinner, some cake mix, or a bag of Fritos, you have to venture the aisles. It’s the food in the aisles that I want to […]

Anatomy of Prosper’s Involvement in the Recent Fraud Conviction

At Prosper Days 2008 Chris Larsen announced the 1st conviction for fraud in which Prosper as been involved. Citing this newspaper article from the news tribune (Lakewood man off to prison for bank fraud.) Many people have asked how this fraud was allowed to occur; what actions Prosper took to facilitate the conviction; and the […]

Making Money and Having Fun Helping People!

The following is a guest post by Prosper Lender Steven Grimes.
I’ve been bidding out money as a lender on Prosper for awhile now, and I find it a great hobby. Some people like skiing, some people like remote control airplanes, I like making money!
I own rental property and it’s a little worrisome at times to […]

Grameen Bank Opens Branch in US

This is guest post by Prosper member ChrisFS
Just as credit seems to have tightened for many Americans, The Financial Times reports that microcredit pioneer Grameen Bank has opened their first US office in New York city.
According to FT, Grameen banks lent $50,000 to groups of immigrant women in Queens in the last month. The bank, […]

Prosper Roundup — The Week After Edition

Prosper Days was an amazing success.  Good time were had by all.  Meeting new people, engaging Prosper staff, and a genuinely entertaining keynote by Freakonomics author Steven Dubner about incentives, money, food, and sex.
Here are some of the blog posts by community members in attendance:

NetBanker wrote about Social Capital after 1st Day of Prosper Days. 
Prosper […]

Living Paycheck-to-Paycheck? Top Five Ways Get Ahead

Has your wallet been so empty that you thought, “There must be something cheaper than Top Ramen. Isn’t there a Middle or Bottom Ramen?” When the technology bubble burst eight years ago, I had that problem. While I felt alone at the time, I now realize that I wasn’t.
I was talking with Joseph Sangl […]

Prosper Named Fast 50 2008 by Fast Company

Fast Company has named Prosper a Fast 50 2008.  The acknowledgement is in the March issue and on their website.
What if people could borrow and lend money to each other without any banks in the middle? That’s the idea behind two-year-old Prosper.com.

The idea melds the debt market with online social networking. Lenders can log on […]

Lending on Prosper is Exciting! & Bid or Not to Bid

2 Guest Posts Today From Prosper Members.
Lending on Prosper is Exciting!
by vegetable_lasagna
Sure I could invest money in CD’s, mutual funds, bonds etc. But how boring is that?!?! With Prosper, I feel like I am running my own business - the bank of ME. Except, I don’t have to deal with hiring any employees, answering the phones, […]

Thinking of Financing a Movie?

I’ve always dreamed of being a movie producer. That’s not true, exactly. Always would imply that as a chubby-cheeked infant I was clutching my rattle and thinking about who to cast in the sequel to Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas, The River Bottom Nightmare Band Strikes Back. But as I’ve gotten older I realized there were […]

Prosper Roundup — 1 Week to Prosper Days Edition

Prosper Days is right around the corner.  Steven Dubner of Freakonomics is the keynote speaker.  It will be 1.5 days of fun and p2p lending education in beautiful San Francisco, CA.  Join the fun sign up for Prosper Days today: register now.  Bloggers get in for free.
From around the Prosper and Personal Finance blogosphere:
RateLadder wrote […]

Friday Finance Findings For August 31st

August has come and gone in what feels like record time, but since this Friday Finance Findings comes at the very end of the month I’d like to take the time to highlight and thank the top five readers who submitted comments throughout the month:
Brad (8)
Steve Austin (8)
Webomatica (5)
Chief Family Officer (5)
MoneyNing (5)
I’m […]

To Rollover Or Not To Rollover To An IRA, That Is The Question

Having worked at a total of ten jobs throughout the last couple of decades, I’ve happily collected some friends, fun workplace memories along with a few 401K accounts. What I can’t believe is that even after all these years, I’ve held on to these 401K accounts as if they were special souvenirs of each […]

The Credit Card Arbitrage Game: Making Money from Balance Transfer

A couple of days ago, I received an email from Mike regarding my credit card arbitrage:
I was just wondering how you were able to get 100 K onto your credit cards (cash advances??) … I transfer every $ from my credit card bills (i buy everything i can with credit) to a 0% card then […]

The Worst Credit Card I Have Ever Seen

I often wonder about the irony of subprime lending - whether it’s made available through mortgage or through credit cards or through any other source of credit. I mean, people with bad credit are the very people who should be staying away from subprime borrowing. These people are already in the subprime category […]

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