Saving and Investing

3 Big Problems with Your Retirement Savings and What You Can Do About Them

April 25, 2013
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Did you watch “The Retirement Gamble” on Frontline Tuesday night? (If not, and if you’re interested, it’s available to watch online.) This wasn’t one of my favorite Frontline programs, but it did raise some interesting and important points. After watching it, I dug further back into the Frontline episodes and found one from 2006 – [...]

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The Retirement Gamble

April 23, 2013

One of the nerdiest things about my nerdy self is that I love documentaries. Love them. And one of the best sources for well-done documentaries is PBS’ Frontline. Tonight’s program is a new one about America’s retirement industry and how the 401(k) and IRA fees we’re being charged may be costing us years of retirement [...]

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How to Pay for College and Save for Retirement at the Same Time

February 23, 2013

Midlife is a tricky time of life, financially speaking. If you have kids, it’s expensive. Especially if you choose to pay for all or part of their college educations. It’s also a time when you realize that you don’t have decades and decades to save for retirement. Like an object in a rearview mirror, retirement [...]

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Get a $25 Account Bonus When Opening a Capital One 360 Savings Account

February 13, 2013

Last week I shared with you how I used multiple savings accounts at Capital One 360 for different savings goals. This week I discovered that there are new account bonuses available to new Capital One 360 customers, so I wanted to share them with you here. The bonuses range from $25-$50, depending on which kind [...]

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How to Create Accounts for Individual Savings Goals at ING/Capital One 360

February 6, 2013
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Since writing this post, I’ve discovered that new customers to Capital One 360 can earn bonuses for opening new accounts. Read my post on that here.) I’ve been a satisfied ING Direct (now Capital One 360) savings customer for at least five years now. One of the things I love best about my accounts is [...]

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The Challenge of Saving in a Time of Record Low Interest Rates

November 14, 2012

The U.S. is living through a time of record low interest rates. That’s great if you’re buying a house, refinancing a mortgage, or paying down credit card balances. If you’re trying to save, however, it’s hampering your efforts. So what are savers to do when low interest rates rule the day? As a family who [...]

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Dividend Investing: One Year Later

August 28, 2012
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Last August I wrote a blog post about taking my first baby steps into investing in dividend stocks. I’ve long been fascinated by dividend investing, because you not only get the gain (hopefully) from the increase of the price of stocks over time, but you get the dividend payments as well. At the time I likened [...]

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Simple Investing Strategies: Dollar Cost Averaging

October 31, 2011

Even people who aren’t into the stock market know that first rule of investing is “buy low and sell high.” Unfortunately, another common piece of investing advice is “don’t try to time the market.” Well if you don’t try to time the market, how in the world are you supposed to buy low and sell [...]

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2 Factors to Determine How Much Money You Really Need for Retirement

September 16, 2011

The following is a guest post by David Bakke. David writes about financial topics like saving money and investing for retirement on Money Crashers, a top-ranked personal finance blog. As a guy in his mid-forties, the thought of how much money I need to retire gains more importance with each passing year. Even after reading quite [...]

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Investing in Dividend Stocks: My First Baby Steps

August 8, 2011

Warning: This blog is about to get very nerdy. Another Warning: This is a great time to remind you that I am not an investing or financial professional. This blog is for entertainment purposes only and should not be construed as financial advice. From 2007 – 2009 I contributed just shy of $5000 to a [...]

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