By Kevin M

Random musings from this week…

Free Wi-Fi at Starbucks but you have to sign up 6700 Starbucks coffee shops are rolling out free Wi-Fi beginning July 1st. Don’t tell anybody, but you can sign up right now and get the free service immediately. I took advantage of the change late last week, and though the service is free, you do have to go through a fairly cumbersome sign up process. You have to purchase a Starbucks gift card (minimum $5) to get the card number and activation code, which become part of your permanent entry codes. A pamphlet is available to walk you through the process, which is establishing a Wi-Fi account through AT&T. One tail though—the free service is limited to two hours per session, after which charges will apply. Still, that’s a minor limitation in exchange for having access to free internet at thousands of outlets.

Healthy snacks. When we take our family to the movies, we stop at a store and buy any candy that we want, since the same stuff they sell for $3.50 to $6.00 at the movies can easily be had for about a dollar a box on the outside. Walgreens is offering a new and healthy twist: right there with the movie sized candy boxes are snack sized boxes of dried fruit.

Wow, snacks that look almost like junk food but are actually good for you. On my last trip in a got a box of raisins for a dollar—and somehow it just tastes better coming out of one of those candy sized boxes. Whoodda thought? I guess someone did—brilliant idea!

Is alternative energy impossible? In light of BP’s Gulf oil crisis…we often hear that alternative energy is impractical, unworkable, too costly, and too far into the future to help us now. Yet Denmark has been making quiet but steady progress in generating electricity from windmills, most of them privately owned. Despite being oil rich, Denmark now generates nearly 20% of its electric power from windmills. It’s something to think about as crude gushes into the Gulf of Mexico or the next time oil/gasoline prices spike to uncomfortable levels…

All good things come to an end, and so has Blockbusters No Late Fee policy This may not come as news to some people, but Blockbuster has quietly ended their much celebrated no-late fee policy. We don’t rent videos often, but did a week or so ago, and found that they’re back to their get-it-back-within-five-days-or-else policy. It was nice while it lasted, but we won’t be renting too many movies there from now on—once we’ve watched them a couple of times we kind of forget we have them…

Save your left over coffee! I left the following comment on a post at Provident Planning this week, but didn’t realize at the time that it might represent money saving advice:

“Any iced coffee drinkers out there? I save our left over coffee, refrigerate it, then mix with milk and an artificial sweetener and it’s superb! It’s also been recently reported to be an effective appetite suppressant–that never hurts.”

A heartfelt thanks to Len Penzo for inviting me to post on his site this week while he’s away on vacation (Behind the Green Curtain: An Insider’s View of the Millionaire Mind, Monday, June 21). Len is one of THE most creative writers in the blogosphere, and it was a real kick not only to do the post, but also to participate in the rich commentary that follows on his site.

The round-up…

Brad at Enemy of Debt created quite a stir this week with his on-the-edge post The Cold Hard Truth: Debt is STUPID and You Might Be Too!!. While I think there are compelling reasons people go into debt that are outside the preserve of semi-permanent insanity, sometimes we need someone with the intensity of a drill sergeant to get our attention. Mission accomplished!

Jason at Redeeming Riches takes on a subject that is the source of great tension for most Christians, the dividing line between faith and money–there shouldn’t be any! In How to Live Missionally With Your Money he provides a careful analysis of why everything, including your finances, should be handled within the framework of faith and not the other way around.

Paul at Provident Planning is doing his part to bring us home to the simple pleasures of summer in Sweet Tea: A Cheap Alternative to Soft Drinks but Tastier than Water. Despite his passion for sweet tea, there’s a strong financial message in the post. How much money do we spend each year keeping ourselves supplied with soft drinks? How much can we save if we substitute our own home prepared beverages compared to the cost of buying popular soft drinks off the shelf? There’s some real money to be saved over the course of a year with this simple do-it-yourself (recipe provided!). And the mason jars DO add a nice twist.

A site coming up that’s well worth paying closer attention to is KNS Financial. Khaleef from my home state of New Jersey has a two part series this week Trying to Reduce Expenses? Sweat the Big Stuff! on major expense reduction, including Car Costs and Cell Phones & Utilities. We can only clip so many coupons and recycle so much stuff, but the real savings are going to come when we take a look at the bigger expenses and start chopping there. Car costs are one of my favorite targets, as anyone who’s read a few of my posts knows.

Peter at Bible Money Matters offers one of the most comprehensive posts I’ve ever read on the costs of having a baby in What Expenses Should I Expect When Having A Child?. It’s a subject close to his heart as he and his wife await the arrival of their new baby boy. Having had two myself (well, my wife helped) it’s obvious he’s done some extensive research on what to expect, and I’d recommend the post to anyone who has a baby on the way or plans for one in the near future.

Sometimes the simplest things have the greatest impact on our lives. Kevin at Financially Poor introduces a single one word question (from youth) that might eliminate the need for all of the will power you never had in This 1 Question Will Change Your Spending Habits. He speculates that the perceived need to spend money is often driven by deep emotional issues that can be successfully challenged with this one word question. I think he’s on to something.

John at Rich and Fulfilling Life asks a serious question “where do you get your financial advice?” in Money and Sex. People often get their advice from common sources like friends, the internet and the media without any critical analysis of their validity. So where should we get financial advice? Check out the post and see.

Jacob at Early Retirement Extreme had a thought provoking post this week, On the universally declining standards of living. While we focus heavily on micro strategies to squeeze more out of each dollar on personal finance blogs, my own thought is that it’s close to meaningless to do so unless we have some understanding of the big picture factors affecting our finances. Probably the biggest of these is the flat (or declining by some measures) standard of living that been happening since at least the early 1970s. Unless we know what it is we’re truly facing, there’s no way to adequately prepare ourselves.

Speaking of big picture, I’d recommend virtually anything written by my friend Matt and his partner George over at The Online Investing AI Blog. If you like your reality even if it hurts—and I do—there’s a wealth of wisdom on this site. Good posts this past week included Why now may not be such a Great Time to Buy a House and Six Tips for Running the Millionaire Marathon, and while I recommend these, the site is rich in hard hitting information and opinion posts throughout.

That’s it until my next round up—which could be a few weeks in coming…

By Kevin M

For only the third time (am I lazy or what???) in the brief history of OutOfYourRut, herewith is yet another attempt to capture some of the most inspiring posts from the personal finance blogosphere.

Canadian Finance Blog staff writer Alan Schram tackles credit card rewards programs in Reward Points, Loyalty Cards, and Lies. Though I’m not a big fan of rewards programs, Alan does an intelligent job of looking at them from both sides.

Age discrimination—is it real, or just something some to lean on to justify dissatisfaction with our position in the corporate pecking order? Sam at Financial Samurai does his usual expert job of thoroughly dissecting the issue in Over The Hill At 40 – Age Discrimination In The Workplace. You may have seen similar discussions of age discrimination elsewhere, but until it’s been covered on Financial Samurai, you haven’t read the whole story.

Over at Kickoffdebt, Joe opens a can of worms on an aspect of the recent healthcare legislation that could become a ticking time bomb no matter how the plan is implemented. In Medical Identity Theft Rising Joe calls attention to the significant potential that healthcare reform has to increase the amount of personal information that will be developed and disseminated in the name of efficiency.

OK Len Penzo fans, Len drills down deep to find the best options in the increasingly complex travel labyrinth in Expedia, Orbitz, Priceline and Others: What’s the Best Travel Search Engine? There are so many options that we’re blinded, but Len cuts through the crap and provides some direction—which is why we like to go to his site in times of confusion. This is well worth a read.

I confess that Jason at Redeeming Riches is probably my favorite PF blogger, but if you haven’t checked out What Is Your Credit Card Payoff? now is an outstanding time to do so. Jason introduces a web tool that will enable you to calculate how long it will take you to payoff your credit cards under different payment scenarios. If we can get past the idea of credit cards as “revolving” arrangements and fix them into loans with definite terms and durations, they become more manageable and we can get rid of them that much quicker.

Lakita at Personal Finance Journey steps into an ongoing debate among Christians with Should I Tithe Off my Income Tax Return? Though the post centers on the specific question of whether we should tithe a portion of our income tax refunds, it wanders into the broader question of should we tithe based on gross income or net income? The comments that follow make for a lively analysis.

After months of providing brilliant commentary on Twitter and on various blogs Chris Moore has finally opened his own blog for business. Check out Fickle Finance and read some of his posts. In How to Obtain Your Credit Report Chris gives a detailed, step by step how to that leaves us all without excuse. We should be checking our credit reports at least annually if for no other reason than to stay on top of erroneous information that DOES find it’s way to our reports from time to time.

Matt at Debt Free Adventure takes on one of my favorite topics in Job Loss – Save Money or Get Out of Debt?. Despite all the talk of economic recovery, the unemployment rate continues to hover near 10% and no one is certain where it will go. Even if you haven’t lost your job in the recession, this discussion is very relevant in preparation for a what-if scenario. There isn’t much time to think when the job ax falls, so having some loose strategy–preferably already in process–will help take some of the sting out of the loss.

One of the things I really like about Clare at Money Energy is the way she looks at big picture issues—ones that often seem beyond comprehension—covers them in an easy to understand fashion, then brings it all down to a plan for personal action. If you’re not a regular visitor of this site you should be! She takes on an issue that’s been in the news much of late, but curiously one we seem to prefer to avoid. The US Will Never Again Run A Balanced Budget makes an ominous but hardly incredible assumption, then tells us what we can do about it closer to home. Now that’s positive thinking at it’s finest!

Finally, in the MUST READ category we go to Online Investing AI, where Matt brings us Keeping The Joneses Down: How Envy Can Hurt the Economy and Your Financial Picture. We don’t often realize how much the desire to have what others have affects economics, politics, tax policy and especially our own finances, but the effect is real. We can so easily get caught up in possession arms races to have the biggest, the best or the most—and that can drag our finances down as quickly as any career disaster or investment miscalculation.

There’s so much outstanding content in the personal finance genre that there isn’t time or space to cover it all. But for this week, here’s a small sample of it from my little corner of the world wide web. Thanks for reading!

By Kevin M

It’s been one of those long, involved weeks in my corner of the universe, and though I’ve been planning all week to post only the second Friday Round Up ever on this site, it’s taken me nearly the whole day to pull it off.

And I’m really glad I did because there’s some really incredible stuff out there that’s well worth the read. Below are some of the material I thought to be top notch this week.

Check out Passive Income – How to Supplement Your Retirement at Canadian Finance Blog. Economic recovery or no, I think this will be crucial issue in the coming years as jobs offer less security than at any time in recent history.

Lakita at Personal Finance Journey brings us don’t miss Interview with Peter Anderson, founder of Bible Money Matters. In one of her comments she mentions Peter was “…the obvious choice for the FIRST interview here on Personal Finance Journey.” She’s setting a high bar on the interview circuit, but for those who have been following her site and her comments around the web, we can expect a continuation of superior content in the years ahead.

The (Dead)Beat Generation from Len Penzo takes a serious look at the impact of abdication on the mortgage foreclosure epidemic. Len’s guest author takes aim at those who opt for “strategic default” and an excellent comment thread follows.

Wojo at Fiscal Fizzle has begun a new tell all series about his experience in buying a new car with Our One-Car Experiment and Car Decision. Now that the typical middle of the range car costs as much as a house used to, following his struggle is time well spent for us all.

Matt at Steadfast Finances opens up the prospect of what could be accomplished by leveraging big numbers in What Industry Could You Bankrupt if You had 400 Million Users? I won’t give away the ending on this post, but the power of numbers is always fascinating, and somehow it seems finding that kind of leverage is at the heart of making real money.

Paul at Fiscal Geek is offering something EVERYONE of us can use in Start your own Paper Investing Portfolio for Free. He presents a video that’s well worth the time, and the price isn’t to hard to take either!

Kyle at Suburban Dollar qualifies for Best Post Title of the Week in Are you Sure you Want to be Your Own Boss? Most of us are pretty sure we’d be perfectly suited to running the business we work in—or at least some business, somewhere, but are we really sure about that? There are some critical questions here that need to be considered before we ever take the plunge.

Jason at One Money Design offered Options if You Can’t Pay Your Income Taxes this week. Since I prepare income taxes seasonally, this one is near and dear to my heart. Jason details enough suggestions on how to address this troubling issue in a common sense manner that should take some of the panic out of it.

Speaking of income taxes, Ben at Money Smart Life covers the pit falls of an old favorite around this time of the year in Tax Refund Loans – Costs & Alternatives. Ben doesn’t really like them (and neither do I), but he goes a step further in telling us how to avoid them.

Some of the best topics in the personal finance web are coming out of Online Investing AI, where Matt takes on a subject that has almost universal appeal. In Signs of a Legitimate Work-from-Home Job he provides some direction in separating the real opportunities from the scams masquerading as the real thing. This is a problem that’s all too common, but this post is a good place to investigate before starting the search.

There’s a bunch of other great stuff out there, and I only wish there was time and space to include it all.

By Kevin M

This week opens voting on the Plutus Awards in the personal finance blogging world, which makes it the perfect time to launch OutOfYourRut’s first ever Friday Round Up. There are some great sites out there, with many brilliant posts, but here are the ones that really caught my interest this week…

Jason at ***Redeeming Riches brings the Sermon on the Mount to Main Street in the 21st Century with Overcoming Anxiety – How Worry Reveals What We Worship. Worry enough, and you’ve elevated your problems to the level of idols. Don’t think it’s possible? Read the post!

Craig at ***Money Help For Christians has produced quite possibly the most comprehensive single post on the entire topic of personal finance with How to Afford to be a Stay at Home Wife or Mom. He makes the case for the mechanics of enabling a wife and mother to stay at home, but the advice in the post will help anybody improve their finances. If you have time to read only one personal finance post this week, this would be the one.

Be sure to check out The March 2010 “Manage Your Money” Challenge: Featuring Pocketsmith – Are You In Or Out? Brad at ***Enemy of Debt offers an open invitation to participate in a money management program beginning this Monday, March 1st, and it’s generating some real excitement. Free programs and prizes any one? Seriously, check this one out!

Sam at ***Financial Samurai has made an art form of provocative personal finance blogging—if such a thing were ever possible. And I guess it must be because it’s what he does in all of his posts. In The Government Is Sexist And Nobody Seems To Care, he offers his own view from out-of-the-box on why the so-called “marriage penalty” still exists. No other site on the web could put such an edge on something as dull and complicated as the tax code.

Clare at Money Energy is quite possibly the very best strategic thinker/planner on the web. In Five Things You Should Have In Your Emergency Cash Stash at Home she focuses that thinking on the question of “what if” in the case of a lost wallet—from someone who lost hers. She makes a convincing case that a lost wallet is about a whole lot more than just money. Don’t wait until you lose yours to read this post.

Paul at Provident Planning has a series following his progress in the trials, tribulations and costs of raising “Bambi” the calf in Raising a Cow for Beef: Month 6 and it’s predecessor Raising a Cow for Beef: Month 5. Title aside, there’s an even more compelling reason he and his wife have taken on this project, but you’ll have to read the posts to find out what it is. (Hint: it’s even more compelling than home grown beef.)

Many bloggers have tackled the buy vs. rent debate (including me), but few can do it with the depth and clarity that Matt at ***Debt Free Adventure does in Is It Better to Buy or Rent? Also check out Matt’s Feb. 17 post, One World Currency – New World Order. It’s not for the faint at heart, but Matt writes from heart and doesn’t sugar coat his posts. Which is why Debt Free Adventure got my vote for Blog of the Year (see Shameless Self-Promotion below.)

Nickel at Five Cent Nickel takes on an issue with increasing importance in an environment of high unemployment and uncertain careers. With so many now involved in non-traditional work arrangements, Independent Contractor vs. Employee: What’s the Difference? is especially relevant.

Shameless Self-Promotion…

This past Wednesday, voting began on the Plutus Awards. If you’re not familiar with the awards (I’m new at this too!), it’s kind of like an Academy Awards set up for personal finance bloggers. This site has been nominated as one of the finalists for Best Kept Secret Personal Finance Blog.

If you like what you’ve seen here on ***OutOfYourRut, I’d appreciate your vote. The category is way down near the bottom of a very long list of various other categories.

Also, the sites listed in the Round Up above are among the very best the personal finance blogoshere has to offer and some are also Plutus Award finalists in different categories—please show your appreciation with your vote for them as well.

***Plutus Award finalist—please support with your vote! Thank you!