Archive for the ‘Newsletter’ Category

Posted on January 9, 2010 - by admin

How to improve your Credit Scores

Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 67 January 9, 2010

++ News -

We hope you and your family had a wonderful Christmas and a festive New Year. Today we’ll be continuing our series on Credit Reports.

We’ve covered how to get your free credit report as well as How to read your credit report. Today we’ll be talking about how to improve your credit report.

Links you can Use

Not getting enough from your checking account - try this site to search for the best checking account for you.

https://www.checkingfinder.com/

++++++++++

How to Improve your Credit score / Credit Report

These tips fall into categories -

1. Payment History

- Pay your bills on time.
- If you have gotten behind before make it a goal to pay them on time.

With online bill paying, paying your bills ontime is a no brainer. If you don’t use online bill paying then try to pay the bill a week early.

2. Amounts owed - your score includes the amount you owe, plus the amount of available credit you have.

- keep your balances as low as possible
- don’t move your debt around, try to pay it off
- don’t open new accounts, and don’t close accounts you already have

3. New credit -

- don’t open too many new accounts at once, build slowly

4. Other things -
- If you have a credit card you’ve had for a long time, but don’t use. Use it once in a while to make a purchase.

Make sure to report any things that aren’t correct on your credit report.

Enjoy your weekend.

Posted on September 19, 2009 - by admin

Starting the Conversation - Building your network

Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 54 September 19, 2009

Summer Savings for you.

++ News -

Had some hiccups in our hosting system this past week - apparently too much traffic with one of our sites.

Hopefully we have corrected that.

Links you can Use

If you enjoy tailgating to a sporting even then you’ll enjoy this site.

http://www.tailgating.com/

Keeping the Job you Have - Finding folks to network with (offline)

How to start a conversation - the trick here is to focus on being a friend. If people think you’re using them, then they will run away from you.

1. Be yourself.
2. You have to give to get.
3. If you’re talking to someone that is shy, use open ended questions… ask them about their work or hobbies.
4. Some conversations won’t lead anywhere, and others will. Just realize that every conversation won’t build your network. As you work on it though, you’ll get better at it.
5. If you’re shy, set a goal to start one conversation. As your confidence builds, set your goal at two for the next outing and so forth.

Posted on May 2, 2009 - by admin

Would you throw out the dish and cable for free TV - OOG

Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 38 May 2, 2009

Saving Money on Your Cable Bill
This issue brought to you by

Plus Size Wear to Work

Saving Money The Nitty Gritty - Can you get rid of the tv cable and dish.

I know this week that we were supposed to continue to talk about saving money on cars but one of my friends announced recently on facebook that he is ditching his direct tv package.

I started thinking about this… after all if you spend $100 / month on your cable bill that could add up to $1200 for the year. So I did some research on it.

Before You Cut the Cord -

1. In order for you to cut the cord, make sure that you have a reliable internet connection. If you have cable internet (especially if you have a plan that saves money based on the number of services you have) find out how that canceling your tv would change your bill.

2. You will need to have some way of getting internet to your television. It would be no fun watching tv in your easy chair on your laptop.  Below are a couple of articles on how you can do that.

http://www.seanpaune.com/2008/02/16/how-to-watch-internet-videos-on-your-tv/

From USA today

From the NY Daily News

3. You can find live feeds of just about everything - however local programming may be delayed (ie you would watch episodes when they are available on the internet - usually that is the next day. News you can usually get live from the stations website. Other local programming (daytime) you may have a hard time finding so if you have any shows you really enjoy, make sure you are able to get them before cutting the cord.

My suggestion would be that before you do it, you pretend that you don’t have cable for a week to see if you miss it or not.

Places to Find Programming - below are just some of the places to find things on the internet. Do your research and you can find just about anything.
Finding shows that you will like / enjoy.

Here is a list of lists - places you can find tv shows / movies etc.

http://www.cucirca.com/2007/02/21/13-places-to-watch-tv-online-for-free/

A show / movie search engine.

http://www.surfthechannel.com/

Have a wonderful weekend!

Next Issues and what’s up:

Car -
Gas
Maintenace

Entertainment -
An Overview
Doing the Audit
Entertainment alternatives

Posted on April 26, 2009 - by admin

Save Money when buying a used car - OOG

Saving Money When buying a used car
Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 37 April 25, 2009

This issue brought to you by

Plus Size Wear to Work

Saving Money The Nitty Gritty - Buying A Used Car

Make sure you save / Print your information in a folder.

Here are some tips when buying a Used Car.

One important thing to remember. Used car inventories at car lots have declined, when that happens you can expect to pay more for a used car if you go to the lot than you did last year.

1. Decide what car that you want - we gave you some guidance on that in our issue on Buying A New Car
2. Ask around to your friends, family and neighbors and ask them if they have heard of someone selling a car.
3. Make sure you check the blue book values on the car and make sure to check out carfax. Reports are around $30.
4. Test drive the car and take it to a mechanic. Even if you go to a car lot and they say it’s went thru a million checks, take it to your mechanic.
5. Make sure to check out the used car lots in your area. Once you have some general prices make sure to check out…

Ebay - http://www.motors.ebay.com/
Auto Trader - http://www.autotrader.com/
Cars.com - http://www.cars.com/go/index.jsp

Next Issues and what’s up:

Car -

Gas
Maintenace

Entertainment -

An Overview
Doing the Audit
Entertainment alternatives

Posted on April 18, 2009 - by admin

Save Money when buying a New Car OOG 36

Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 36 April 18, 2009

Saving Money on
This issue brought to you by

Design Firms St. Louis Missouri

++ Savings Tip of the Week

If you’re thinking about Buying A New Car then you want to check out these spreadsheets first.

http://www.carbuyingtips.com/download.htm

Saving Money The Nitty Gritty - Buying A New Car

Make sure you save / Print your information in a notebook.

Make sure that you have downloaded the spreadsheets I mentioned above.

Step 1 - Figure out (as close as possible) the car that you are going to buy.
One thing I would suggest in doing would be to find the ‘true’ cost of owning that car. A helpful tool for that can be found here.
http://www.edmunds.com/popupinfo/abouttruecosttoown.html

Is it within your budget use the budget template spreadsheet from the Car Buying Tips

I was talking to a guy that owned a tire dealership and he was talking about how people were floored when he told them the price for four tires on their shiny sports car would be over a grand… so think before you buy. Get insurance quotes too.

Step 2 - Find the new car price from the following websites -
Invoice Dealers
Cars.com
http://www.myride.com/buy/index.html

Step 3 - If you’re going to trade in your card - figure out what its worth.
Cars.com
My Ride

Step 4 - Find out any incentives that may be available.

www.edmunds.com/incentives/step1.jsp

Get the Sunday paper - watch the advertisements on your local TV station. Jot rebates and incentives down in your notes.

Step 5 - Get your credit score - Find out if you could get a car loan elsewhere - Up 2 Drive is a good place to start.

For the actual buying of the car I would highly suggest you check out this site (it’s better than many of the paid books out there and it is free).

http://www.carbuyingtips.com/car3.htm

Next Issues and what’s up:

Car -

Buying a Used Car (Tuesday)
Gas
Maintenace

Entertainment -

An Overview
Doing the Audit
Entertainment alternatives

Posted on April 11, 2009 - by admin

Saving Money on Your Car - OOG 35

Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 35 April 11, 2009

We would like to wish you and your family a wonderful Easter.

++ News -

I saw this in Smart Money http://www.smartmoney.com/

Five ways to Stretch Your Retirement Savings.

1. Wait to Retire. Each year that you wait to retire can increase the Social Security you get from Uncle Sam by about 8%.

2. Move. Many people save by moving to a cheaper location. Some save money by selling their home and renting.

3. By a used car - keep the old car longer. We discuss this some in our feature article below.

4. Spend the right cash. Spend money in regular IRAs before tapping Roth IRAs. Use bond holding before stock holdings.

5. Much is spent on Restaurants and Travel - try cutting back.

++ Savings Tip of the Week

A good Resource - http://www.cheapcheapcheap.com/

Make sure to check out the “weekly ad” link - it gives you a link to all the major stores ads - all in one convenient place.

We have a twitter account so we can send updates when we find good deals… one thing that is the only time we’ll tweet.

You can follow us here - http://twitter.com/savingmoneyon

Saving Money The Nitty Gritty - You and Your Car

We’ll be talking about Saving money on your Car / Automobile expenses over the next few weeks.

Your car is one of your biggest expenses next to your home. Years ago if you bought a used car it was impossible to know exactly what you’re getting, now you can have a pretty good idea of what your getting. With this recession though there has been a flood of used car buying, and although many dealers have their inspections and warranties, there inventory is getting lower and they are being less choosey. This means they are selling older cars with more miles.

With the current situation with the auto makers, everyone is a little tense if you talk to them about buying a new car… will the company even be in business when the warranty runs out? We’ll talk about those things in some upcoming posts and give you some ways to make sure that you’re getting an awesomen deal.

Tuesday we’ll give you some money saving tips on buying a new car.

Next Saturday we’ll give you some tips on saving when you buy a used car.

Next Issues and what’s up:

Car -

Buying a New Car (Tuesday)
Buying a Used Car (Weds)

Gas
Maintenace

Entertainment -

An Overview
Doing the Audit
Entertainment alternatives

Posted on April 4, 2009 - by admin

Credit card Co’s have you over a barrel OOG 34

Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 34 April 4, 2009

++ Savings Tip of the Week

I keep trying to teach my daughter the benefit of long term thinking… if you save $1 / day, by the end of the year you’ll have saved $365.00. While that may not seem like a lot, if you saved just $10/day by the end of the year you would have over $3,600. Remember as well that small changes do add up.

We have a twitter account so we can send updates when we find good deals… one thing that is the only time we’ll tweet.

You can follow us here - http://twitter.com/savingmoneyon

Saving Money The Nitty Gritty -

As with anything related with your finances, make sure to consult your personal accountant before making any decisions.

This week we were super busy (no complaints). I saw a news bit earlier this week on one of the morning shows and they were talking about credit cards and some recent changes they’ve made.

Now I know that some of you are saying, you have no pity or sympathy with someone that gets over their head with credit card debt. One thing I would like to say is sometimes it can’t be helped. People lose their jobs, have medical bills, unexpected expenses or loss of work, there are many reasons. Not just that they wanted to buy a new wardrobe.

The situation happened to me when I got married. We really didn’t have any money but Uncle Sam called me up to go to Desert Storm #1. So we let Uncle Visa pay for the honeymoon.

Many credit card companies have started lowering the credit limit and started to increase the interest rates on many of the cards.

Reasons behind the changes involve the number of slow / no payments they’ve had of late.

So what does this mean for you (even if you have no debt).

About 30% of your credit score involves the amount of available credit you have (your credit limit) and its relationship to the amount you have charged.

Say you have $10,000 in credit card limits, you have $1,000 on the cards. Your magic number would be 10.

What happens when the available credit limit goes down to $5000, your magic number decreases to 5 (or half of what it used to be).

While it doesn’t seem like much, those numbers can decrease your credit rating.

So what happens when your interest rate goes up to 22%. You can ‘freeze’ the card and keep the same rate (but again that would cause the amount of your available credit to go down).

So what can you do in these situations (here are some ideas).

Monitor your credit score (this is something you should be doing anyway).

If they decrease the limit - you can call the credit card provider and ask them to increase your limit. Nine times out of ten they will not.

This happened to us recently - it did impact our credit rating but not by very much. If it had been a big drop I would have opened up another credit card.

If your interest rate goes way up, call and ask the company will they revise it. Explain how you’ve paid them well, been a good customer, etc. If they will not lower the interest rate and you have a balance that you can’t pay off, look at your other cards.

Call them and ask them about any special rates for balance transfers. Beware… if they give you a low rate for six months, what will the interest rate be after six months. Many times they will offer you a low rate for a certain time period and then offer a higher rate for a longer time. Note that any interest you accumulate you will be billed your current rate. So I would suggest trying the lowest card first.

Next up:

Car -
Overview
Gas
Maintenace

Entertainment -

An Overview
Doing the Audit
Entertainment alternatives

Posted on March 28, 2009 - by admin

Saving money on interest rates OOG 33

Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 33 March 29, 2009

++ News -

We had a great time on Spring Break.

++ Savings Tip of the Week

An excellent site for all things related to credit and loans.
http://www.bankrate.com/

We have a twitter account so we can send updates when we find good deals… one thing that is the only time we’ll tweet.

You can follow us here - http://twitter.com/savingmoneyon

Saving Money The Nitty Gritty -

Your house payments and interest

First if you’re having trouble making your house payment then Obama’s housing bill may help you.

Details of that bill can be found here - http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/02/18/business/0218-housing-graphic.html

I’m definitely no expert on mortgages so below are some links for you to check out.

One thing I would caution is to never put your email address for more information or you will have more email than you could read in a month.

Getting the best mortgage (more than an interest rate)
http://www.realtor.com/home-finance/mortgages/how-to-get-best-interest-rate.aspx

From the Federal Reserve
http://www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/mortgage/mortb_1.htm

A Refinance Calculator
http://www.bankrate.com/brm/calc_vml/refi/refi.asp

Next up:

Car -
Overview
Gas
Maintenace

Entertainment -

An Overview
Doing the Audit
Entertainment alternatives

Posted on March 14, 2009 - by admin

Saving Money on your House Insurance - OOG 32

Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 32 March 15, 2009

++ News -

Last week we had temps in the 80’s - Thursday it snowed six inches… don’t you just love March?

Next week our kids will be on Spring Break - so there will be no OOG on Saturday and we’ll have less posts too.

++ Savings Tip of the Week

Lots of good finance videos here -
http://www.genxpense.com/

We have a twitter account so we can send updates when we find good deals… one thing that is the only time we’ll tweet.

You can follow us here - http://twitter.com/savingmoneyon

Saving Money The Nitty Gritty -

Saving Money on your Home Owners Insurance -

There are several parts of your homeowners policy -

The Property Protection Part

This portion is usually broken down into several sections.

Your house
Other structures (like outbuilding, garage, fences, sheds).
Personal property (the stuff in your house)

Then there is

The Liability Portion

This just covers you if someone falls off your porch or slips on the sidewalk. These are usually mandated by your state.

So how do you save Money?

1. Become friends with your agent.
2. Find out what your coverage is for the items we listed above.
3. Make sure that you have adequate coverage - if your contents are worth 50k and you have only 20k of coverage, if something happens then you’ve lost 30k. This past year we bought some major purchases and we added about 10k or so to the ‘contents’, and it cost about $100 extra a year.
4. All policies have a deductable - this is one area where you may be able to save. Get some quotes on what happens when you increase the deductible… you may be pleasantly surprised.
4. Start shopping around for a better price - when you shop around make sure that you ask your friends and neighbors. A lower cost won’t help a bit if they take six months to pay a claim.
5. If you find a better price then ask you current agent can they match it, they usually will.

Other tips

– Put your deductible in a savings account and don’t touch it.
– Make sure you have pictures or a video of the contents of your home. Keep those receipts.

Next up:

Housing -
Payments / Interest

Car -
Overview
Gas
Maintenace

Entertainment -

An Overview
Doing the Audit
Entertainment alternatives

Posted on March 7, 2009 - by admin

Saving Money on your Housing Expenses - OOG 31

Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 31 March 8, 2009

++ News -

It is a beautiful day here with temps already in the high 70’s - last weekend we had a high of 20. What a difference a week can make.

++ Savings Tip of the Week

We have a twitter account so we can send updates when we find good deals… one thing that is the only time we’ll tweet.

You can follow us here - http://twitter.com/savingmoneyon

Saving Money The Nitty Gritty -

Housing an Overview - Over the next few weeks we’ll talk about saving money on some of your housing expenses.

Make sure to review the bills that you have and take an inventory of your house hold bills.

We’ll get in depth about different aspects of money involving your home in the days ahead. The thing to do is to make sure that you have an idea of the bills that are coming in… otherwise you won’t be able to tell how much money that you’re going to save.

Next up:

Housing -

Maintenance - Tuesday
Insurance - Saturday
Payments / Interest

Car -
Overview
Gas
Maintenace

Entertainment -

An Overview
Doing the Audit
Entertainment alternatives