Donna Freedman

How we use credit: A new federal report.

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A recent report from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau contained a couple of concerns and a big surprise. For me, anyway.

“The consumer credit card market” states that both the total amount of credit line and the average amount of card debt have gone up over the past few years. No surprise there, given our national preoccupation with spending.

Here’s what got my attention: More people are signing up for secured credit cards, which require cash deposits. The number of secured cards provided by mass market issuers was 7 percent higher in 2016 than in 2015.

Until fairly recently most financial institutions haven’t put a whole lot of oomph into marketing secured cards. That’s changing, the federal agency notes, as consumer groups and the media suggest these cards as a good way to build credit scores.

What’s in it for the banks? Loyalty.

 

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High food bills? The Grocery Budget Makeover can help.

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Erin Chase, the woman who proved that $5 meals can be  both healthy and appealing (even to kids), is at it again. To promote another session of her five-week “Grocery Budget Makeover” online course, Chase is offering a free video workshop.

The entrepreneur is mom to four boys and also the creator of (among other things) the $5 Dinners concept, a class on Instant Pot cooking and a series of cookbooks. The goal of her Grocery Budget Makeover is to teach consumers how to cut their food spending in half.

Specifically, she wants to “change the way you shop for groceries – forever.”

The free workshop – actually a handful of short videos – is designed to give you a taste (so to speak) of the course.

 

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5 money lessons from ‘Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle.’

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They say the badness of a movie is proportional to the number of helicopters in it. Happy to report that “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle” has just one whirlybird, and is as much fun as the previews indicated.

The film owes a huge debt to “The Breakfast Club,” with its “detention for disparate high-schoolers” theme. This time around the teens are a nerdy hypochondriac, a gorgeous and shallow blonde, a football jock who scorns academics and a loner who’s hyper-focused on getting into Princeton.

“Detention” involves cleanup duty in a cluttered basement room. Guess what they find? An old-school video game setup. Before you can say “exposition,” they’ve been sucked into a potentially deadly game in a world that looks a lot like Oahu.

And of course I found personal finance lessons there. You would have, too.

 

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Can’t get ahead? Try a “savings challenge.”

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th(I’ve decided to re-publish articles now and again in honor of what the kids call Throwback Thursday. Given that some of us can expect higher-than-usual credit card bills in January, these savings options might help.)

Years ago I moderated MSN Money’s Smart Spending message board, on which people would post frugal hacks, recipes and other tips to stretch a buck.

The boards went away some years before the Smart Spending blog did; when that happened, some of the most loyal commenters created an alternative universe.

“Not MSN Money Proboards” is a place for veterans of Smart Spending and other message boards to stay in touch and keep sharing the wealth. Or, rather, the road to wealth. (Edited to add: The Not MSN Money Proboards has morphed into something called Your Money and More, which includes money, lifestyle and other board options.)

One post I checked in on today, “2014 Savings Strategies,” brought up the old custom of “savings challenges.” Those were popular during the worst of the recent recession; you couldn’t swing a virtual cat in the PF blogosphere without running into someone’s post on challenges.

Stuff like:

  • Spare Change Challenge – Every night put all your coins in a jar
  • Dollar Bill Challenge – Like the above, except with paper instead of specie
  • Five-Dollar Bill Challenge – Pretty ambitious, but a little too rich for some bloods
  • Random Number Challenge – Pick a number and every night check the bills in your wallet; if one has a serial number ending in the chosen digit, into the jar it goes

But the Proboards posting also mentioned a couple of new ones.

 

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A life-changing holiday gift: Personal finance books.

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th(Note: This is an update of an article that ran in 2016, with some new books to go along with ones I feel confident re-recommending.)

Some people are into experiences rather than gifts. Physical presents take up space and need to be dusted, whereas a massage or a theater ticket is a one-and-done event.

I suggest that a personal finance book is both a gift and an experience. Sure, it takes up a little space – but it can lead to life-altering changes and literal enrichment. And if you get the Kindle or PDF version, it doesn’t take up any room in your domicile.

When you give the gift of personal finance, you’re giving people tools that can get them out of current money troubles and/or help them build the lives they want. Doesn’t that beat the heck out of a scented candle or a cheese log?

 

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Shopping the office potluck. Plus: Book discounts.

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The following post is based on an excerpt from “Your Playbook For Tough Times, Vol. 2: Needs And Wants Edition.” I’m offering holiday discounts on this book and the first one; see the end of the post for details.

Many years ago I dropped into a different department at my workplace, to ask a question. That section’s holiday potluck was winding down, and the ebullient partygoers invited me to help myself.

My eyes lit upon the nearly empty ham platter. “Has anyone claimed the bone?” I asked.

Apparently no one had. “Go ahead and take it,” I was told. “Do you have a dog?”

“No, but I’ve got a pound of pinto beans and an onion.”

 

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Customer service: How to get the answer you want.

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My daughter, who has a chronic illness, often deals with bureaucracies. Once she told me something very wise: If you don’t get the answer you want, ask it again – just in a different way.

This is an excellent tactic for all sorts of customer service issues. Here’s how it shook down for me earlier this week.

Some time ago DF and I bought a set of flannel sheets on clearance. DF thinks it was early spring, because he seems to recall that snow was still on the ground. Since our current linens weren’t yet completely raddled, we put the new set on a closet shelf.

Fast-forward to seven or eight (or more) months. Time to use the new sheets! But when DF opened the package, planning to hang them on the clothesline to air, he noticed one edge of the top sheet was ragged. Not just badly sewn, but torn and scraggly.

And of course we didn’t have the receipt. Taping it to the package would have been intelligent.

 

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7 ways that Black Friday is like sex.

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Some years back my blogging buddy J. Money ran “10 reasons Black Friday is like sex” on his Budgets Are Sexy blog. I was immediately inspired to comment with some reasons of my own, whereupon he dared me to run them on my own site.

So I did, with an article called “Black Friday and sex” about why the two aren’t alike. Such as:

You won’t be offered coffee and doughnuts.

Finishing early is NOT a plus.

The women generally end up more satisfied than the men.

Revisiting that literary tradition this year – but as reasons that the two are alike. The following material is not suitable for work, and possibly not for anyone afflicted with taste and refinement.

 

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Black Friday 2017: Are you in or out?

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I have given birth to boring. My daughter put up a blog post today that testifies to tedium:

“I check the leaked Friday ads for what the Walgreen’s site-wide discount will be – so that I can buy really exciting stuff like toilet paper and garbage bags.

“Last year, I made a whole Excel spreadsheet to find the best price for loading up on the aforementioned toilet paper and garbage bags, plus hand soap, body wash, a couple of skin-care products and…Ugh, it’s all a boring, boring blur.”

Truth is, my own tastes are fairly plebeian this year. In fact, I have only two things I really want to get:

Butter. It’s $2.29 per pound, limit five, at Fred Meyer. That’s noticeably cheaper even than Costco, and since DF and I are all about the holiday peanut brittle and sea-salt caramels, I plan to limit out on this greasy goodness.

Bedclothes. Sheets are on sale but I’m not sure I’ll get them; will depend on how they feel. I’m more interested in the micro-plush blanket sale, also at Fred Meyer. Right now we’re sleeping under a mass of loosely connected blanket molecules; it’s a machine-crocheted number that’s so old DF can’t remember its exact age. Still warm, but the crocheted holes are turning into gaps in spots so I want to get one of those blankets, which are limited to stock on hand.

Speaking of which: I may or may not go there at 5 a.m. Friday. Yes. On purpose, for a handful of reasons:

 

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Giveaway: “You Can Retire Early!”

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Early retirement has spawned a subset of personal finance blogging. Those who write on the topic call it the FIRE movement, i.e., “Financial Independence/Retire Early.”

Their readers tend to be younger, but it’s also possible to construe “early” as earlier than you thought, as in “maybe you won’t have to work until you drop dead.”

Understand: Not everyone wants to retire early. Some of us like what we do so much that we can’t quite imagine ourselves not doing it. That said, some people who love what they do would like the option of changing the way they do it.

Members of both groups should be interested in “You Can Retire Early!: Everything You Need to Achieve Financial Independence When You Want It.” And one of you will get this book for free, because I’m giving away a copy.

 

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