Within the past decade, the concept of cash back has become the norm with almost every new credit card offering some form of cash back. Most cash back cards, like the popular Capital One Quick Silver card, offer 1.5% on all purchases. The Citi Double Cash Card offers 2% cash back on all purchases. 1% when you buy and 1% when you pay your bills. Then there are the 5% quarterly bonus cards from Discover where the limited 5% cash-back…
Credit scores are important if you ever want to get a good job, get a loan to buy a house or pay for a car, or get a new credit card. It scores your borrowing power among other things. The credit score oddly ranges from 300 to 850. The higher the score the better. Anything above 720 is considered a great credit score, giving you the best rates on loans and the best credit card offers. There are many factors…
For those unfamiliar, a Roth IRA is a retirement investment account where you invest after-tax dollars that grow tax-free. Unlike a 401k or Traditional IRA, you can withdraw your investment at any time without paying a penalty or taxes. For example, if you contribute $15,000 over 4 years and you made $4,000 in that time, you can withdraw your contribution of $15,000 any time you want. However if you want to withdraw your $4,000 earnings, you will pay a 10%…
When budgeting, the hardest costs to reduce are your necessary costs, especially the recurring fixed costs. Here are some ways you can reduce your monthly and annual expenses. 1. Lower your Utility Bills This step is easier than you think. There are many ways to lower your utility bills without changing your habits or lifestyle. Consider buying LED lighting. Look for the lowest Watt bulbs you can find. Switch to a low-flow shower head. You can save hundreds of gallons…
Industrial Engineering, synonymous with Manufacturing Engineering and Systems Engineering, is an engineering degree broadly defined as a field involved in the design, development, use, improvement, and retirement of products, processes, and systems. In short, engineering is the field of problem solving. Industrial Engineering is one of the most popular engineering fields offering a broad body of knowledge with flexibility in career choices and higher than average pay. History Industrial Engineering derives from Mechanical Engineering. In fact, the Industrial Revolution and…
Growing up watching HGTV's hit shows Property Brothers, Income Property, and Fixer Upper, I always wanted to own multiple properties. HGTV stands for Home and Garden Television. Unfortunately that means they don't cover commercial properties. The only TV show I know of that somewhat covers commercial properties is CNBC's The Profit, hosted by Marcus Lemonis. In the Profit, Marcus invests in several troubled businesses and helps turn them around, whether it's a restaurant, e-commerce, or manufacturing. There are 4 categories…
This past weekend I was at a 5 year old's birthday party. Her parents are around my age and they have an income property. Two other couples at the party also had investment properties. All of them used a management company to manage their properties. My wife and I always wanted an investment property. We have had roommates in the past helping to pay down our mortgage but we never had a dedicated income property. Over the years we have…
If you have been through a few employers over the years, there is a good chance that you may have a 401k or Pension plan that you don't know about. Maybe you forgot about. This is what happened to my wife when she recently received mail from her employer 10 years ago in reference to her 401k Plan. Her employer contacted her because of changes coming to the allocations in her plan. We found out where her 401k was held…
The 529 Account is an Educations Savings and Investment Account. Any money you contribute is tax deductible and the money grows tax free as long as you spend it on qualified educational expenses like tuition, school supplies, dorm rent, or even a laptop. Read all about the 529 Account on my blog post Saving for College with a 529. Now let's work on answering the question in the title of this post. What happens with the money left over in…
In 2020 I heard about the $1000 challenge between the online Finance community. It is a 1-year challenge where you invest $1000 in any way you want to see who makes the most money. Since the $1000 challenge has been around for a while, no one has done this challenge in recent times. I thought it would be an interesting experiment to try during the Pandemic. Because I run a personal finance blog, I decided to expand my experiment. I…
