Posts Tagged ‘Personal Finance’

As our income has gone up we’ve allowed some lifestyle inflation to creep into our budget. It’s fine to indulge a guilty pleasure or to spend more on something you really enjoy, as long as it’s within reason.  Here are some areas I’ve identified as potential budget busters: Cable We don’t watch a lot of…

This was my intro post for the now defunct Moneyville blog, where I wrote a column twice per week for 2 years.  The blog was folded into The Star’s personal finance section in January, where I continue to write a bi-weekly column.  Enjoy. As a thirty-something, single-income, two-child family, we are faced with plenty of…

The Financial Post featured a story recently about a man in his late 40’s who had the luxury of two defined benefit pension plans.  The first pension was earned at the young age of 38, after twenty years of military service; the second plan is from his current employment with the federal government. In total,…

Sadly, the end of August means that summer days are dwindling.  For families it also means that, if the kids aren’t already back to school, they soon will be. That means shelling out lots of dollars on everything from new sneaks to binders to backpacks. According to the National Retail Federation, the average U.S. family…

It seems everywhere I turn I see books and articles about the rules of money: Money magazine has the “20 rules of money” Forbes magazine has the “new 20 rules of money” Both articles are more about how to invest rather than general money management information, however, and they often contradict each other, so they…

After writing about money for three years you’d think I’d have my own finances on auto pilot by now, but I don’t.  I still have a household budget and track my expenses every month, and I don’t pay myself first (gasp!). While I can appreciate the forced discipline of automatic saving plans, I’m not a…

“Less is more.” In the last few months I’ve been on a major decluttering kick.  It took a while to work up the motivation – I’ve been putting this off for years – but once I got started, the process became positively therapeutic and very liberating. The original view was towards eventually downsizing our home,…

Personal financial management is a challenge for many couples and there are really not many places to go for help. Financial advisors want to show you how to invest.  Banks want to consolidate your debts and lend you even more money. Related: Can You Trust Advice From Your Bank? Fortunately, there are hundreds of books…

I did some financial daydreaming after my net worth update last week.  I took our current financial trajectory and projected out 10 years from now to see how that might look.  I was surprised by what I found, and the exercise gave me the inspiration for a new objective – becoming financially free by 40.…

We would all be very wise if we could act on hindsight.  I am not too dissatisfied about the way I’ve handled our finances over the years, but here are three things I wish I had done differently knowing what I know now. 1.  I would have joined my company pension plan. When I started…