May 24 2007 Edition of the Carnival of Financial Planning

Carnival of Financial Planning - May 24, 2007 Edition

Welcome to the May 24, 2007 edition of the Carnival of Financial Planning.

The Carnival of Financial Planning takes a long-term view of personal financial planning for individuals and families. We focus on efficient and sustainable personal financial planning practices that can lead to lifetime financial security. This edition is arranged by subject heading, so that you can browse efficiently.

The Skilled Investor has made parenthetical comments beneath some listings. These comments are the opinion of The Skilled Investor and not of the blogger.

Blogroll Picks**
To increase the breadth of article links in each Carnival of Financial Planning, The Skilled Investor, proactively searches blogs to find articles that could be of interest to those interested in long-term financial planning. Each week, The Skilled Investor searches our blogroll in alphabetical order until we find several interesting posts in addition to those that other bloggers have submitted to this Carnival. Next week, we will start again where we left off in the alphabetical rotation. Blogroll Picks are marked below by a double asterisk (**).

Enjoy!

Budgeting

Eric Stanley presents How to Create a Household Budget posted at Personal Finance Blog Articles.

Consumption

**Nina presented God Made Me Buy It: The Virtue of Consumption posted at Queercents
(Nina discusses the marketing of Christian consumer products to a Christian audience. Personally, the Jesus that I, (The Skilled Investor), remember hearing about when I was growing up in Iowa had the consumer instincts of Gandhi. I remember seeing a picture of all Gandhi’s personal possessions about fifteen years ago — a cloth to wrap his body, wirerim glasses, a pen, and some paper. No bling. Jesus undoubtedly wore clothes, but I do not know if he needed glasses or could write. I also doubt whether Jesus had any designer labels in his clothing.)

Debt Management

Tim Ramsey presents 2 Debt Tips for Improving Your Credit Score posted at My Debt Relief Blog.

Abdulrasool Sumar presents Differentiate Between Good Debt and Bad Debt posted at 3 Debt Consolidation Community, saying, “”When you buy something that goes down in value immediately, that’s bad debt.” He adds, “If it has no potential to increase in value, that’s bad debt.” For example, buying a 21′ inch monitor for your computer for $1000 and putting it on your credit card is a form of bad debt. Why? Within 1-2 years, this monitor will be worth only $200. This means it has lost over 80% of its value in a matter of 2 years!! What’s even worse, if you do not fully pay off your credit card balance of $1000 by the due date, you will be paying additional interest on this amount.”

Financial Planning

Josh presents Why start saving for retirement now? posted at The Mad Money Analyst, saying, “Many people procrastinate having to mow the lawn or get out of bed in the morning. But why do so many people procrastinate saving for retirement? So many reasons exist as to why you should start saving now for retirement. Just think about the costs for food alone that you will incur in retirement. It’s…”

KRG presents Our Short Term Financial Goals posted at FIL-AM WORDS, saying, “The post discusses selected short term financial planning that applies to our specific situation.”

Home Buying

**Nick presented Adventures in First-Time Homebuying #8: Countdown to Closing posted at Punny Money
(This is an extensive and useful list of the particulars involved. The careful and rational purchase of a home sooner or later is almost a requirement for long-term personal financial success. The process is not trivial and the first time you do it almost everything is a surprise. Nick’s list should really help the first-timer.)

Income

Cade Krueger presents Find People Who Are Looking To Help Financially posted at Write To Right.

Sarah Kashani presents Rule Four posted at Easy Steps to Making Money.

Insurance

Mr Credit Card presents Importance of Disability and Long Term Care Insurance (Ask Mr Credit Card’s Blog) posted at Ask Mr Credit Card’s Blog, saying, “Disability and Long Term Care Insurance is one of the most underlooked elements in financial planning. While we all have life insurance, health insurance, auto and home insurance, not all of us have disability or long term care insurance. Mr Credit got to know two people whose life events made him realize the importance of both disability and long term care insurance.”

Investing

**Russell presented Indexes: What you should know posted at Russell Bailyn’s Financial Planning Blog
(In this article, Russell provides a clear overview of some of the major investment indexes used as benchmarks. If you like Russell’s article and want to learn more about indexes, you could also pop over to the IndexUniverse.com and Journal of Indexes and browse there. IndexUniverse.com contains a wealth of information about index funds and ETFs. In particular, it provides a sophisticated index fund and ETF screening tool. For guidance from The Skilled Investor on how an individual investor might use this screener, see our article: Screening index mutual funds on-line with IndexUniverse.com)

FMF presents Two Ways to Protect Yourself in a Market Downturn posted at Free Money Finance, saying, “How to protect your investments from a market downturn.”

FIRE Getters presents Mutual Fund SAI - Should I Ask For It? posted at FIRE Finance.

**John C. Bogle presented New Videos - NICSA Miami 2007 posted at The Bogle eBlog
(John Bogle posted four video clips of his keynote speech at the 2007 conference of the National Investment Company Service Association. These clips address 1) mutual fund turnover, 2) retirement, 3) mutual funds versus ETFs, and mutual fund board independence (or lack thereof)

(Also, for those of you paying close attention, this is a repeat from two weeks ago, but I liked these videos. John Bogle is one of the very few fully honest men in the world of investing. For decades, he has consistently championed what the scientific finance literature has repeatedly proven — low cost is much better. In delivering products and services to individuals, John Bogle has argued that the financial services industry is only justified in putting its fingers into our coin purses infrequently, because that is the true level of the industry’s value-added. Unfortunately, most of the industry frequently puts their fat mitts into your wallets and takes away your large denomination bills. For more, see The Skilled Investor’s numerous articles on Controlling Investment Costs. Also, see the series of graphics comparing the lifetime inpacts of average versus low investment costs in the VeriPlan Financial Forum. You may be very startled by how much even average investment costs can damage your lifetime financial plan.)

Allen Young presents Cybersavings-Online Savings Accounts posted at Living the Dream.

WBL presents Is Gold a Good Investment posted at Wealth Building Lessons, saying, “WBL talks about whether its a good time to invest in Gold”

Mortgages

R.Pettinger presents Mortgage News: Top 10 Financial Tips for saving Money posted at Mortgage News, saying, “Tips on how to reduce financial outgoings. Advice for credit cards, mortgages and managing debt”

Steve Faber presents Bad Credit Mortgage Options posted at DebtBlog, saying, “If you want to leap into the ranks of the homeowners but are a wee bit credit challenged, all is not lost. There are mortgage options available to you, even with your bad credit. Be advised, however that due to the recent problems in the sub-prime mortgage market, lenders are tightening their requirements for mortgage lending.”

Savings

Ruby presents 7 ways you can join forces with friends to be more frugal posted at Frugal Aussie, saying, “7 ways you and your friends can help each other save more by leading more frugal lives”

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of Carnival of Financial Planning using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

Technorati tags: carnival of financial planning, blog carnival.

Related Personal Finance Reading:

Fund Spy: Morningstar's Inside Secrets to Selecting Mutual Funds that Outperform

Think Single: The Woman's Guide to Financial Security at Every Stage of Life

Personal Financial Plan : Theory and Practice

You Don't Have to Be Rich: Comfort, Happiness, and Financial Security on Your Own Terms

Financial Statement Analysis and Security Valuation (3rd International Edition)

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