Reduce Your Financial Risk During This Recession
February 26, 2009 by Erik Folgate
Filed under Credit and Debt, Insurance, Planning
The best thing you can do for you and your family during this economic recession is reduce the risk in your life. This is not the time to be taking uncalculated risks with your money, your career, or your future. Here are three ways you can reduce the financial risk in your life today:
Eliminate As Much Debt As Possible: Put together a plan to start reducing your personal debt. There are many different strategies to reduce your debt. If you have a bunch of debts with similar balances, then start paying off the one with the highest interest rate first. If you have a bunch of debts with a large range of balances, then start paying off the smaller ones first to get them out of the way. Read my plan to get out of debt here.
How To Protect You and Your Family From Financial Ruin In A Recession
December 5, 2008 by Erik Folgate
Filed under Economy, Insurance, Planning
The media is saying we’re in a recession, because they love to strike fears in the hearts of Americans. We tune into news programs more when bad news has struck. Think about how many news programs, newspapers, and magazines you consumed during the 9/11 attacks. We love bad news. This is why the media was calling the economic downturn a recession from the beginning. Recession sounds so much darker and desolate than a “down economy” sounds. Call it what you want, but you still need to wake up every day, put your clothes on the same way, and make a living. There are three phases that all families should go through with their finances, and they are:
5 Steps To Prepare For A Natural Disaster
August 12, 2008 by Erik Folgate
Filed under Insurance, Planning, Real Estate
The Iowa floods, the California wildfires, the earthquakes and typhoons in Asia, and the hurricanes in Florida and the Gulf make us cringe thinking about them. Mother nature is a powerful beast. She does not discriminate, and she does not give warning. We can all relate to going through a natural disaster or know someone who had to go through it. Unfortunately, there are those that do no prepare for the worst. An essential part of being financially secure is planning for the worst. The emergency fund is part of this plan, and taking steps to financially protect yourself from natural disasters is also part of that plan. Here are five steps to help you prepare for a natural disaster.
Treat Your Emergency Fund Like an Insurance Policy
February 21, 2008 by Erik Folgate
Filed under Planning
Now that many of my friends and family know that I write for a personal finance blog, they tend to ask me more questions about personal finance. I always tell them that I’m not an expert at this point. I don’t have enough experience to call myself an expert. But, writing this blog and my passion for helping people learn what I have learned is what distinguishes me from the average individual. I’ve gained quite a bit of knowledge from doing research for this blog, reading books, and thinking beyond the box about personal finance. My philosophy about personal finance is that there is an emotional element and a mathematical element to it. Some personal finance bloggers focus more on the mathematical side and others focus on the emotional side. I think that a healthy balance of these two elements is essential to winning with your money.
Are You Financially Preparing to Live to be 100 years old?
May 23, 2007 by Erik Folgate
Filed under Investing, Planning, Spending and Saving
Check out this article about preparing for retirement assuming you’ll live to be 100 years old.
This is not a far-fetched idea. There’s no doubt that a positive correlation between technological advances and increasing life spans exists. The article describes how 20 to 40 year olds should plan on living a long life of retirement and planning to pursue multiple careers, because we’ll be awfully bored if we retire at 65 and live another 35 years!
Estate Planning 101: Taught by Anna Nicole Smith
April 28, 2007 by Erik Folgate
Filed under Planning
Whether you liked it or not, the media force fed us every minute of the details of Anna Nicole Smith’s death, custody battle, and estate planning nightmare. One of the biggest mistakes that Smith made when writing her will in 2001 was she put a clause that no future children would be a part of the will. Her intentions were good at the time. She wanted her son, Daniel, to take full control of her estate upon her death. However, when he died, the will lapsed and state intestacy took over and made Danielynn the sole heir of the estate. Had Daniel not died, Danielynn would have been out in the cold in terms of her estate. Although, she probably would have changed the provision eventually.
Do You Need A Will?
February 22, 2007 by Erik Folgate
Filed under Planning, Random
The answer to that is probably, YES! Generally, if you are worth over $10,000 in assets and cash then you need a will. A will takes all of the guesswork out of what you really want your assets to do when you part this life. And let’s be honest, do you really want some over-worked judge figuring out how to divide up your stuff? I will try to answer some common questions based on my limited knowledge about wills. My suggestion is that you use an attorney that specializes in estate planning to help you draft your will. You don’t need an attorney to write a will and notarize it, but this is something that you want to do right, and they can help you consider the tax ramifications.
