Dilbert's Personal Finance

We found a very pithy article (at fool.com) by Robert Brokamp about Dilbert's views on personal finance. The essence of the article is quoted as:

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Wish you a Happy Summer!

We wish you a wonderful summer ahead. Officially summer begins today and ends on September 22nd. Summer has sweet memories for most of us. As school children, summer was a time we looked forward to. We all know the best part, "no school!" Summer vacations involved travel to distant new places. We loved to travel though it was hot. It was a fantastic way to see new things and be amazed at the beauty of our planet.

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Three Quick Steps To Get Out of Debt

At present we are debt free. It's a great feeling to have no financial debts. In fact it's said that the first step to save is to get rid of our debts. We agree.

Your lifestyle can siphon off cash faster than the rate at which you earn it. More so if you lead a fast life where you are conscious of status symbols, social image and can spare no time to manage your finances. Such a life puts one in a perennial race to update stuff to keep up with the latest trends. The result is debt, debt and more debt. Credit card debt, car loans, housing mortgage, student loan(s), insurance payments and more. Consequently you are weighed down by a mountain of debt which can suck fun out of life.

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Happy Father's Day

Our heartiest best wishes to all fathers on this special day. We are indebted to our dads* for taking such good care of us. At an early age they laid a foundation for a strong character by leading from the front with integrity. That played a major role in shaping our characters and personalities based on solid values and principles.

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Top 10 Dollar Store Buys

Shopping at a Dollar Store is really fun. Over years we have observed that certain goods are definitely cheaper at dollar stores. So we created a dollar store game plan to cash in on low prices. We often wondered how they kept their prices so low. Later we discovered that dollar stores, whether mom-and-pop shops or local franchises of a national chain, get some inventory from product lines created just for discount stores. The rest come as remnants from wholesalers, which explains why we see such a wide variety every week.

However, we are suspicious about the quality of food and kitchenware sold at these stores. So as a policy we never purchase edible stuff or anything that has to do with cooking from them. Barring that we've found tonnes of useful goodies at rock bottom prices. Here are our top ten dollar store buys:

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Check Scam - Don't Be A Victim

We received a letter in the mail which had a check and a notification. It said that we'd won a foreign lottery! So far so good, after all who does not like free money especially lotteries. The next step was to deposit the check but there was a catch which raised our suspicion. We're told to keep the portion representing our winning and wire transfer $3000 back to cover the taxes so that we could collect the rest of our winnings! Our inner voice whispered "Scam, Scam, Scam!"

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Why do we get laid off? A complicated corporate work culture ....

Every morning a small and simple ant arrived at work very early. Without wasting any time he started his work immediately. He produced a lot and was very happy about his contribution to his company :).

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Save Your Wallet With These Penny Hacks

Every couple of months our wallets wear out due to the stress of bulging coins on the soft leather. Often the cost of replacing a wallet varies from $10 to $25. We're wondering about ways to optimize this expense. One possible solution is to increase the life of the wallet. Another one is to do away with the use of a wallet! Since we need a wallet, we chose to go with the former one :).

On close scrutiny we found that pennies dominated the coins' section of our wallet. So getting rid of the pennies would leave the wallet flatter thus extending its life. On that note here are some cool ways of getting the pennies out of our way:

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10 Frugal Travel Tips for Your Summer Vacation

The summer is upon us, as evident by the children who were cartwheeling out of school this past Friday. Like many people, you are probably hoping to take a vacation sometime in the coming months. The economy certainly isn't travel-friendly at the moment, however. Most of us have trouble buying gas for work, let alone a road trip! Below are 10 frugal travel tips that might make a vacation more sensible for your budget.

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Mutual Fund SAI - Should I Ask For It?

We own multiple mutual funds in our investment portfolio. These mutual funds' parent companies send us their prospectuses and annual reports on a regular basis. It is mandatory for them to do so. In this context we discovered "SAI."

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Top 7 Energy Saving Tips for this Summer

Every summer as the heat steps up so does our utility bill. This year we are planning ahead on cutting back our energy consumption for the summer. It will do good to our environment and help us pocket a nice saving as well. After all, it makes sense to invest our hard earned dollars rather than giving them away to utility companies. Each dollar saved can help us go a long way if a rainy day comes along. So it makes all the more sense to maximize savings and optimize our energy footprint.

Energy savings during the summer revolves around its optimization in three main zones, namely:

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Wealth Creation Needs Thought and Common Sense

GoodDayThere are people who think they are wealthy because they have an expensive house and travel abroad for exotic holidays. If they have large mortgage and credit card balances that they find difficult to reduce, then their thought of being wealthy is far from the truth. Others measure their status by their ability to pay their bills. Who do you think is better off?

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