Carnival of Personal Finance: The House of Rose Edition

Welcome to the 215th edition of the Carnival of Personal Finance!  I finally get my chance to host…..woo-hoo!   So many previous bloggers have done an excellent job hosting that I knew there was a lot of pressure. You can see previous hosts at the Carnival home page. Unfortunately, I’m not nearly as creative so the only thing I could up with was showcasing my wonderful family through my best friend’s artistic photography.  One of the most frugal things that I’ve been fortunate to take full advantage of his having my best friend, Jason of Jason York Photography, take all of our family pictures. Talk about a huge savings! This was our most recent family shoot.  Be sure to check out the last picture.  As you can see, trying to keep a 22 month old entertained during a whole photo shoot was completely wishful thinking.  Also, thanks to my wife for already having the pictures uploaded to her blog, House of Rose.  Saved me a lot of time!

Editor’s Picks

• Joe Plemon from Personal Finance By The Book presents How You Can Afford to be a Stay at Home Mom. This was a discussion at our household when our first child was on the way. We’re lucky to have a supportive family that has allowed my wife to continue her job which she really enjoys.
• Frank Curmudgeon from Bad Money Advice presents When to Start Collecting Social Security.  Although Frank previously disagreed with my Roth IRA Conversion logic -No worries, Frank , he shares an excellent post on a topic that comes up frequently in my financial planning practice.
• Studenomist from Studenomics presents Credit Card Fees College Students Should Know About. A credit card in college can help boost your credit rating or it could damage your credit rating to the point that you can’t get a mortgage one day. Either way before getting a credit card you should know about the following fees.
• Matt Jabs from Debt Free Adventure presents A Journey of a Thousand Miles begins with A Single Step. Matt shares a dissertation on what finally helped him to become a goal oriented person… and how the change has been paramount to Matt’s success in personal finance as well as all other areas of his life.
• Squawkfox from Squawkfox presents 6 Surefire Ways To Avoid a Mortgage Meltdown, You’d be financially wise to crunch the hard numerical data before signing for that big mortgage.  Many people have been shaken up due to the mortgage mess.  Don’t let it happen to you.

Investing

• Bob from Christian Finances presents How to create wealth: 10 tips to get started!, and says, “Building wealth doesn’t happen by accident. It requires diligence to do the things that wealthy people do. These are 10 habits worth emulating.”
• FMF from Free Money Finance presents Ouch! Here’s a Reason You Need to Be Very Conservative in Retirement Planning, and says, “A great example of why you need to be very careful when planning for retirement.”
• D4L from Dividends Value presents Should You Still Buy-And-Hold Stocks?, and says, “The buy-and-hold investment strategy has taken a lot of abuse since the market turned down. But this isn’t the first time it has happened. Eventually, the market turns, the naysayers disappear and the buy-and-hold investors make a lot of money.”
• The Financial Blogger from The Financial Blogger presents 6 Investing Rules Revisited Part 1: Stocks Always Go Up, and says, “Blinded by our greed (or by our naivety!), we though, once again, bad things could only happen to others; that our economic system was stupid proof. Well, we actually proved that it was stupid Based on what recently happened on the stock market, I decided to revisit some fundamental investing rules.”
• Dividend Growth Investor from Dividend Growth Investor presents Dividend Reinvestment is important .
• Matt_Sf from Steadfast Finances presents How to Spot an Investment Bubble.
• Madison from My Dollar Plan presents Risk Tolerance and Smart Investing, and says, “Thanks for hosting!”
• Investing Toolkit from Investing Toolkit presents What’s A Stock Market Index?, and says, “Looking forward to participating in the carnival. Info for new investors.”
• Dorian Wales from The Personal Financier presents Diversification is dead. Long live diversification, and says, “Don’t give up on diversification through asset allocation just yet “
• The Dividend Guy from The Dividend Guy presents Alternative Investments, and says, “There are a number of investments to choose from to fill out your asset allocation – some are good and some are rubbish. Here is a list to get you started.”

Budgeting

• Lynnae from Being Frugal presents Five Steps To Making Your Budget Work, and says, “You have taken the plunge and decided that you are going to make your money behave.These five steps will help.”
• Peter from Bible Money Matters presents Ten Ways To Improve Financial Intimacy In Marriage, and says, “Money related issues in marriage can draw a husband and wife closer together. Here are ten ways to make that happen.”
• The Incidental Economist from The Incidental Economist presents Household Budgeting the Easy Way, and says, “Describes the simplest possible way to make a budget that supports tracking, projections, and investment planning. This post is part of an eight-post series on investment planning for which I’m soliciting feedback. Bloggers and investing aficionados will not want to miss this series.”

Finance

• Banker Saver from Banker, Saver presents Is The Inflation Protected Certificate of Deposit Still Around?, and says, “Ever notice how bank products come and go?”
• Ray from Financial Highway presents Risk Tolerance-Determine Your Investor Profile, and says, “Understanding ones risk tolerance is a crucial step in financial planning investing. “

Money Management

• Brian from Building Wealth Together presents Confessions of an Internet Gambler, and says, “This is my first submission to a Carnival since i started blogging last month. This is by far the most “personal” of my personal finance articles and i feel its worthwhile to share with others.”
• FFB from Free From Broke presents Ways To Help Deal With Medical Expenses, and says, “Medical expenses can wipe out your budget and savings. Here are some ways to help deal with medical expenses.”
• Andy from saving to invest presents 7 Tips to Avoid Excessive Bank Fees, and says, “While bank fees are not going to go away or lessen anytime soon, savvy consumers can avoid a number of these fees by being informed and shopping around for the best deals. Here are some of the more common bank fees/charges and tips to avoid them.”
• Matt B from Financial Methods presents Money and Depression-Cause or Effect?.
• Eden from Finance and Fat presents Lazy Money Mistakes and the Importance of Automation, and says, “Thanks for taking the time to consider my article.
• Leigh from Reconciling My Gross Habits with My Net Income presents 6 money talks to have before you marry – 5 down, 1 to go, and says, “This highlights my experience having these money talks with my soon to be husband. He’s a saver and I’m a spender and I found that these six topics were a great way to prepare us for combining our finances.”
• Mr. ToughMoneyLove from Tough Money Love presents Personal Finance Lessons Learned the Hard Way, and says, “Learn the hard money lessons from others. They made the mistakes so you don’t have to.”
• Mr. GoTo from Go To Retirement presents Free Money Management Tools from Google, and says, “Google is everywhere with cloud computing. Don’t overlook its offerings in the world of money management.”
• Jason Unger from Automatic Finances presents How to Be Lazy (And Succeed in Money Management).

Debt

• Dan green from The Mortgage Reports presents In A Market Like This, How Do You Get A Home Loan Approved, Anyway?, and says, “Getting approved for a mortgage is the same as it ever was, just with higher hurdles. Satisfy the Mortgage Income-Equity-Credit Triangle and everything else is cream cheese.”
• PT Money from Prime Time Money presents Who is this Dave Ramsey guy?.
• Silicon Valley Blogger from The Digerati Life presents How To Get A Personal Loan, and says, “Thanks!”

Real Estate

• Aryn from Sound Money Matters presents My Long and Winding Road to Homeownership, Part 1.
• Miss M from M is for Money presents The Hidden Cost of Homeownership – Repairs.

Saving

• CindyS from Oh My Aching Debts presents Today is the First Day of the Rest of My Life, and says, “I tend to lose focus when life gets hectic and I have had to drain my emergency fund this summer. I making a new committment to build it back up”
• Shawanda from You Have More Than You Think presents The Only Tip You Need to Start Saving Money.
• Barbara from Upside of Money presents Making It Through the Recession: The Home Puppy Cut“
• Patrick at Money Saving Deals presents a Free Gamefly Coupon Code so you can enjoy free video game rentals at home.

Frugality

• The Happy Rock from The Happy Rock presents How To Get Free Replacement Laces For Keen Shoes.
• Charlie from Pay Less For Food presents How to Enjoy Your Grocery Store Indulgences Guilt Free.
• Michael B. Rubin from Beyond Paycheck to Paycheck presents Top Ten Ways to Save Money While Ruining Your Life, and says, “Ten ways you can be cheap yet, financially speaking, utterly irresponsible”

Credit

• DR from Doughroller presents How to Get Your Free FICO Credit Score from myFICO.com, and says, “Here’s how to get your official FICO credit score for free.”
• Mr Credit Card from Ask Mr Credit Card presents Leveraging Rewards and Other Rants.
• Karen Chan, University of IL Extension from Plan Well, Retire Well: Saving & Investing Your Money presents Should I cancel this credit card? Will it hurt my credit score? .
• Patrick from Cash Money Life shares how you can use credit cards to rebuild your credit score.

Economy

• Bret from Bret Frohlich.com presents Fixing Health Care, and says, “Here are some simple, no-nonsense solutions to the exploding cost of health care.”
• ElizabethG (Modern Gal) from Modern Gal presents Guarding Against Asset Bubbles.
• Curt from PennyJobs.com presents Obama’s Healthcare Reform Will Cause Prices to Increase Even Faster: Part 1.

Career

• Simon from Realm of Prosperity presents How Twitter and Facebook Can Hurt Your Career.

Taxes

• Green Panda from Green Panda Treehouse presents Cash For Clunkers: Questions and Answers, and says, “President Obama recently signed into law the Car Allowance Rebate System, also known as Cash for Clunkers. The program is designed to stimulate car purchases from participating dealers and remove gas guzzlers off the roads. I included some of the frequently asked questions many readers would ask about the program.”
• The Weakonomist from Weakonomics presents How Do You Want To Pay Taxes?, and says, “There are a lot of ways to pay taxes and like it or not we need to pay them. How would YOU want to pay them if you could choose?”

Other

• J. Money from Budgets Are Sexy presents Introducing The Blogger Showdown Series!, and says, “Two Personal Finance Bloggers will go head to head answering the same set of questions, with the readers voting on the “winner”! A fun & interesting way to learn ”
• Paul @ FiscalGeek from FiscalGeek presents Protect your Identity Online: Facebook a Social Hackers Dream, and says, “What information have you given all of your Facebook friends? How about their friends? Some simple tips to be sure you’re not giving away too much information. “
• Mr. Cheap from Four Pillars presents Professional Begging, and says, “A discussion of charities – are they professional beggars?”
• FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com from Fabulously Broke in the City presents The price of a Stay-at-Home-Mom (SAHM), and says, “Only meant to be a discussion to go over the numbers that say that SAHM’s “earn” $130,000+ a year.”
• Wojciech Kulicki from Fiscal Fizzle presents Why Reading Personal Finance Blogs is Good For You.
• Kyle from Amateur Asset Allocator presents Any “Free” Offer Requiring A Credit Card Is Not Really Free, and says, “If a company really wants to give you something for free, they don’t need your credit card number to do it.”
• Patrick at Military Finance Network asks how much life insurance military members should buy? This is an important question military members need to ask themselves – after all, they put their lives on the line every day.

Reviews

• The Smarter Wallet from The Smarter Wallet presents YNAB (You Need A Budget) Review, Financial Budgeting Software, and says, “I appreciate it. Hope to be included in this edition!”