No Debt Plan

No Debt Plan is a blog about living a debt-free life. If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed (e-mail subscription also available). Learn more about me, or read some other popular articles. Thanks for visiting!

Mike, the author of Clever Dude, recently put a post requesting some guest posts to add to his content. I replied back almost immediately and he put up my article titled Spouses, Finances, and Teamwork. Head on over to Clever Dude to check it out; let me know what you think.

I am honored that 27,000 people have come from various parts of the web to visit this blog since January of this year. Stumble Upon has brought in a huge boost of traffic — and I hope you guys stay.

I hope you find the articles engaging and interesting… and that you take something away from each and every one.

If you enjoy the blog, tell a friend. If you hate the blog, tell a friend and tell me. I’m not a professional write. Make me improve.

Cheers.

PFBloggers.com:

• Pinching Copper has a hilarious entry on “What GTA IV Taught Me About Personal Finance.” I’ve seen it all when you can compare a video game to personal finance, but it does make sense… just think in any game you’ve ever played, there is no “credit” (at least usually) that you can use to buy upgrades or weapons. You have $X and you can only spend $X.
• Saving Savy thinks The Little Things Make a Big Difference.
• Master Your Card tells us about the first biometric credit card and wants to know what we think. I think it’s kind of scary. I don’t know if I would trust the credit card networks with my biometric data…
• Living Almost Large shares a sad story about a med student just piling on extra debt because really, it doesn’t matter.
• Girls Just Wanna Have Funds asks how we are all coping with increasing gas prices. To be honest, we haven’t changed much because we weren’t overspending to begin with.

Elsewhere:

• The Carnival of Personal Finance is up at Money Under 30 and my post 10 Steps to Avoid Becoming a Millionaire is an Editor’s Pick! This is my first time ever having an editor’s pick, woohoo!
• Get Rich Slowly talks about Rescue Time, a program to help you track where you spend your time. I’ve afraid of installing this program…
• Free Money Finance discusses an article where a family of four eats on $300/month. Impressive!
• The Simple Dollar gives us the Debtor’s Toolkit.
• Brip Blap gives the details on how to make money even without a job. He thinks we should all do it. I agree — in the past 3 weeks, I’ve earned $200+ blogging through various blogs.

Yesterday was Mother’s Day, so if you haven’t already, reach out to your Mom and thank her! You’re already in deep trouble if you forgot, but at least try to make up for it.

Debt Kid has an interesting article up about what he would tell his 18 year old self if he had the chance. That’s a very interesting take on things and sounded like a great kick off to a new article.

Six years ago I was just about to graduate high school. It’s nuts to think about that as it seems like a terribly long time ago, but at the same time it feels like no time has passed at all.

A Recap of Major Life Events, 2002-2008

• I graduated high school in 2002, and graduated college in December 2005.
• I got engaged October 2005, and married the woman of my dreams in January 2007.
• I’ve worked two real-world career jobs.
• We bought our first house last summer (remind me to write about this at some point).
• We got a dog two weeks ago.

What I Would Tell My 18 Year Old Self

These are in no particular order, lest you think me a cold hearted man.

• Get an internship for every summer between school, even if you have to pay out of pocket.
  • I turned down an internship with BMW USA in New Jersey because it didn’t pay enough to even pay rent up in New Jersey. In hindsight it was a great opportunity, but the program seemed very unorganized (no list of available corporate apartments for interns, etc.). I may have missed the boat with my favorite car company.
• Network more.
  • I was brought up to believe that hard work and good grades were what it took to succeed in life. I’ve learned over the years that a significant portion of life is who you know. It may not be fair, it may be kind of cynical, but it is definitely true. I would network with more people and put the books away more often.
• Be appropriately frugal.
  • I’m definitely pro-frugality. Just don’t let it affect your life. (Psst… take your spouse on a date.)
• Walk in the rain with the one you love.
  • Be silly. It can be fun. Branch out a bit.
• Life is short.
  • You will know people who die young. Your family isn’t getting any younger, either. Call your parents. Call your wife’s parents. Stay in touch with friends.
• Figure out how to get organized.
  • By far one of the most important things you can do. Come up with an organization system and stick to it.
• Get engaged later or marry faster.
  • You and your future wife will both agree waiting 14 months to get married is far too long, you impatient jerk.
• You can do a long distance relationship and make it work.
  • When it becomes a short distance relationship, you will truly appreciate it more. It sucks for now, but stick it out. She’s a winner.
• Don’t forget how to dream and thank God for every day. Repeat: Life is short.
• Take risks. Repeat: Life. Is. Short. Live a little.
  
• In fact, don’t forget to live.
  • You’ll end up writing a personal finance blog and focusing on money a lot. Don’t let it take over your life. Life each day to the fullest. Take her to Brusters. Get ice cream. Rent a movie. Don’t be an old fuddy-duddy.

That wraps it up for now. What if we turned this into a meme?

What would you tell your 18 year old self, Cash Money Life, Being Frugal, and Master Your Card?

Is it May already? Good grief! Time flies…

PFBloggers:

• Girls Just Wanna Have Funds had an expensive weekend. At least she got a cat out of the deal.
• Get Rich or Die Trying is fighting the urge to invest. That sounds backwards, but makes sense for his situation. And congrats on the house buddy!
• Master Your Card starts a new series called Life or Debt: The Psychology of Consumer Debt.
• Our Fourpence Worth explains why she and her sister share an AMEX card. We started the discussion on No Debt Plan, switched to e-mail, and now she gives a full explanation.

Elsewhere:

• Yawns: Young and wealthy, but normal (USA Today)
• The Carnival of Debt Reduction is up at Rocket Finance.
• Free Money Finance had a reader question regarding insurance for rental properties. A very good discussion in some of the comments took place regarding LLCs, S-Corps, etc.
• Gather Little by Little has some money saving tips from his readers.
• Broke Grad Student is sporting a new look for the blog, take a look.

There were a bunch of other great posts out there this week, but I’ve only got time to put these together. Cheers!

We had a lot of good discussions over the past few weeks that I wanted to highlight and respond to.

From Our Homeowners Association Was Worth Something This Week:

Wide Open Wallet: You would hate our association. We pay $1,200 a year. They maintain everyone’s front yard which is nice cause it cuts down on yard work but it stinks too cause you can’t make any changes at all to the landscaping in front of your house. We also have to have a parking sticker to park in our own driveway!! How dumb is that?! We are rebelling against that one. I would like to see them try to tow my car off my own property.

devil says: After being part of an HOA for ten years, I will NEVER do it again. It’s the only time American citizens are required, in their own country, to waive their constitutional rights. Even convicted criminals don’t have to do this.

$1,200 per year for a HOA is absolutely nuts, plus car stickers? No way. That really plays to devil’s point about people giving up their rights. Good grief.

From the discussion of how much money we’ve earned from AMEX:

Our Fourpence Worth: My sister and I have this card too (we share an account) and we use it everywhere AMEX is accepted. I even used it to purchase a single postage stamp once. Every little bit adds up.

We earned $316 last year. But I we’re earning a lot less this year (so far only $78 since July or August) because we’ve cut out almost all non-necessity spendings.

MyMoneyAdventure: I agree! I use my citi card to help pay off my student loan! So far, about 220 in 3 months!

That’s the way to do it … we do the same thing and use it on every purchase. We love that cash back!

From Marginal Propensity to Consume and Your Rebate Checks:

Jonathan and JB had the same question: Is it possible that America could actually have an mpc of OVER 1, after taking into consideration the massive levels of consumer debt (and as you say, the negative savings rate)?

You guys are absolutely correct. It can be greater than 1. It really shouldn’t be so, but unfortunately you can finance that level above 1.

Thanks to everyone for the comments recently. Let’s keep the discussions going!

I’ve been out of it for a few days and am still not caught up. These are some articles I’ve seen thus far in my RSS reader and elsewhere that were really enjoyable.

PFBloggers.com:

• Living Almost Large wants to know what we would do if we came into $1,000,000. I’d love to expand on this post in the future. Long story short? We would pay off the house
• Girls Just Wanna Have Funds has an excellent guest post from Master Your Card about stretching your food budget during hard times.
• Pinching Copper wants us to calculate how much our purchases are actually costing us. We pay for our groceries in about 7 hours worth of work per month.
• Savy Saving calculated her net worth and has cracked the $100,000 mark — congrats!

Elsewhere:

• Darren Rowse knows that PR is being updated, but has a key reminder for all us aspiring blogging millionaires.
  • If some of the toolbars I’ve seen are correct, No Debt Plan has jumped from Page Rank 0 to Page Rank 3! Awesome!
• FIRE Finance has updated their list of the Top 100 Personal Finance Blogs. I’ve finally made the list at #91 overall, and #41 via Site Meter. Woohoo!
• Wal-Mart is going to offer free rebate cash checking and discounts on specific groceries. I think this is a brilliant business move. Bring those customers into your store, give them something for free, put money in their hands, and have them go spend it in your store.

I missed having a post for today, and it is doubtful I’ll have one ready for tomorrow.

But I have some exciting news to share on Monday morning.

More later! Appreciate your understanding.

The Carnival of Debt Reduction will be hosted here tomorrow. Get your posts in!

This is pretty much how I feel every time you come back and visit my blog.

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