Before we start looking ahead to the new year, reflection on the past year is always a good exercise when evaluating your financial goals for the coming new year. Don’t dwell on the past, rather reflect on your accomplishments and failures and learn from them. Here is a list of some of our [...]

Coincidentally, my favorite story about giving involves a gift I gave to someone, but don’t take this as a self-serving story to build myself. The summer before my senior year of high school, I went on a mission’s trip to Cuenca, Ecuador with my church’s youth group. Cuenca is a quaint town nestled [...]

We all had a rough year with the stock market, and we all know how much money our 401(k) and IRA lost this past year. We’ve also seen our home values drop, and we’ve watched our friends and family go through painful foreclosures. So, where do we invest our money? CD’s? [...]

I don’t like to dwell on the past, but I was curious how much you all lost in your 401(k) this year. Obviously, this is personal information, so you can share with us the percentage lost rather than an actual dollar amount. My money was pulled out at the end of October, because [...]

This is the busiest time of the year for the post office and other package shipping companies. One of the hidden costs of Christmas is shipping costs, and we often overlook the extra expense. I know you have all experienced the shock of going to the post office to ship a few packages [...]

Over the weekend, Bernard Madoff of Madoff Funds, was arrested for securities fraud, and he has admitted to swindling hundreds to thousands of investors out of $50 billion dollars over an undisclosed period of time. Madoff has been in business managing investments since 1960, but he also ran a hedge fund that was basically a [...]

Here are a few articles from the archives to check out from last December:

Your Guide to Holiday Tipping
What I Would Do With $1,000 on the Holidays
Seven Gift Cards to Buy for College Students and Teenagers
Should You Refinance Your ARM to a fixed rate mortgage?
Have a Happy Monday!

Here are some holiday theme articles to check out from some of the best personal finance bloggers on the internet:

My Dollar Plan shares with us 10 amazing frugal gift ideas under $20
Free Money Finance has 10 ways for retirees to save this holiday season
The Lazy Man has rolled out his gift giving [...]

My wife and I just realized that we did not plan adequately for Christmas gifts this year. The reason is that we bought a house in October, and we’ve been putting a lot of time, thought, and money into some home projects that we wanted to get done before we started entertaining during the [...]

Social media is here to stay. Many people thought it was a trend with web 2.0 that would slowly fade away in popularity, but it hasn’t faded away, and it’s become a stronger presence on the internet. Why is social media so popular? Because we are social creatures, and we like to [...]