Recent Blog Posts
Are Subscriptions the New Junk Fees?
One of the fundamental rules of business is that companies charge customers as much money as they can get away with charging them. The difference between the amount of money needed to cover the cost of a product or to provide a service and the amount you pay is the company’s profit, so businesses… Read More »
Is Your Family Responsible for Your Debts After You Die?
On personal finance podcasts and advice columns, you often hear from people, middle aged and older, who decide to ask for advice when they realize that their debt is more than they can reasonably expect to pay off in a lifetime. Some of these consumers took out student loans in their 50s, either to… Read More »
Tread Carefully With Good Debt
You know you are rich when you can divide your debt into good debt and bad debt. There is an old saying that circulates widely in debt-free lifestyle content that says that if you have zero debts and you have ten dollars in your pocket, you have a higher net worth than most Americans. … Read More »
3 Frugal Habits to Get You Through Another Lean Summer
The summer equinox happened so recently that the daylight still stretches well into the evening, which is great if you are so young that the thing you dread most is another long school year. For many grownups, though, summer is the most stressful time of the year. The time until payday seems to drag,… Read More »
Pembroke Pines Is the Credit Card Debt Capital of Florida
Yes, credit card debt is a problem for everyone. The combined credit card balances of all account holders in the United States adds up to more than a trillion. Not all of it is evenly distributed, though. The most expensive cities tend to have the highest credit card balances. Credit card debt does not… Read More »
Is Credit Card Debt Forgiveness Real?
Debt forgiveness is usually not as simple as it sounds. It occurs when a lender declares that a borrower no longer owes a certain amount, despite that the borrower has not repaid that amount. In other words, it is a case of a debt getter smaller on its own, just as late fees and… Read More »
What Happens When Affordable Housing Promises Fall Apart?
Living paycheck to paycheck is stressful enough when employment is the source of your paychecks, even if those paychecks come through the gig economy. You can temporarily relieve your stress about money by searching for more gigs; even if a particular day’s search does not yield a new paid gig, it at least makes… Read More »
What Should Victims of Financial Crime Do to Cope With the Resulting Debts?
It is easy to feel like everyone is blaming you for being in debt. Personal finance experts smugly tell you to earn more money and spend less, even though you already spend virtually every waking moment engaged in at least one income-generating activity; at this moment, a receptionist at an apartment building or hotel… Read More »
The Trouble With Earned Wage Access Apps
“Living paycheck to paycheck” is a euphemism. Most people who fit into that category do not have enough money to make it until payday. Furthermore, there is a sharp divide between the upper middle-class paycheck to paycheck set, on the one hand, and the rest of us, on the other. The former have credit… Read More »
Can Debt Relief Make Your Retirement Plans a Reality?
For as long as you can remember, your future plans have not extended beyond the next payday. You spend every pay period scrambling to make the next installment payment on your debts. If you are among the lucky few, you signed up years ago to have your employer deposit a small portion of each… Read More »