Money Hacks

This is a test. Money Hacks has been hacked. This is just a test to see if posting something new will remove the malicious code.

Interest rates are in the toilet. With the government targeting a 0% Federal Funds rate, yields from online high-yields savings accounts have dropped sharply. Where’s an investor to turn for a safe return?

Many people are discovering certificates of deposit. These accounts lock up your money for a set period of time (a few months to a few years) in return for higher rates of return.

At Get Rich Slowly, I recently published a list of current CD (certificate of deposit) rates. In general, CD rates are higher than savings account rates (though this isn’t always true).

But big banks aren’t always the best source for CDs. Right now, my local credit union offers the best CD rates I could find: right around four percent! I plan to move a portion of my savings over to them next week.

Online high-yield savings accounts are a great way to save your money. An online savings account offers convenience, safety, and a great interest rate. While my credit union is offering a fraction of a percent in interest, my high-yield account usually returns 4% or 5%.

But with the recent move by the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates as low as possible, even high-yield savings accounts are seeing their rates dip to 3%. Or 2%. Or even lower.

How can you be sure you’re getting the most bang for your buck? Get Rich Slowly offers a regularly-updated list answering the question which online high-yield savings account is best? This list is divided into two groups of banks: reader favorites and other good choices. Best of all, there are nearly 1200 comments on this article in which readers offer their feedback on the various choices.

So, if your money is parked someplace where you’re only earning pennies, take the time to explore the value of a high-interest savings account!

Always check your receipt. After you’ve paid, and before you leave the store, step to the side and take some time to scan your receipt for errors. You’d be surprised at how often the price you’re charged doesn’t match the price on the shelves. You can save a lot of time and money by double-checking receipts.

I’m still not perfect at this, but I’m learning. IKEA once charged my wife not for one yard of fabric, but ten. That was a $53.91 difference. I phoned the store to ask for a credit, but nobody answered. Instead, I had to drive 40 minutes back across town, wait in line for half an hour, and then drive 40 minutes home.

Most mistakes aren’t this big, but you’d be surprised at how common smaller mistakes occur. And it takes very little time to scan a receipt to be sure things are right.

This information via The Simple Dollar.

After evaluating the per-hour cost of my hobbies, I discovered that television viewing was the most expensive and reading was the least expensive, so I turned off the television and opened a book. What happened?

We trimmed our cable bill to just the basic channels (a savings of about $15 a month), cut down our electricity usage (television and surround sound were off for two hours when they used to be on) which saved about $0.50 a month, and rediscovered a hobby that makes me consider the world instead of sitting there absorbing whatever the television feeds me. We’re even thinking about eliminating the cable entirely, since the few shows we now watch are almost all on network television.

See also: Cheap alternatives to cable television. Photo by Aaronyx.

John December took a year off from life to write a book that he describes as “my Walden“, a book about living simply, about learning to make do with less. Live Simple: Radical Tactics to Reduce the Clutter, Complexity, and Costs of Your Life explains how a simple lifestyle can help you pursue your dreams. It’s available online in a free hypertext edition.

This is a great book. It’s short and filled with practical tips. Even if you don’t buy into the idea of simplicity completely, there’s a lot you can learn from the methods December describes.

Ron at The Wisdom Journal suggests a “sneaky” way to save.

Get a return on investment from that movie. If you rent movies (from Blockbuster or Netflix or any other source), pay yourself $2 for every movie you watch. Also: “When you return a movie (hopefully on time) to the rental store, pay yourself the late fee.”

[This information via The Wisdom Journal, and used with permission.]

Studies have demonstrated that there’s a direct correlation between obesity and net worth. The heavier the person, the less they earn. My initial reaction is that it’s impossible to determine which is the cause and which is the effect — does obesity lead to low net worth, or does low net worth lead to obesity? — but apparently this is a known problem with the research. Regardless, significant weight loss can lead to an increase in wealth.

According to a New York Times article about how extra weight leads to higher costs:

A baby boomer whose [Body Mass Index (B.M.I.)] drops from 27.5, the middle of the overweight category, to 21.7, the middle of the normal category, sees an increase in wealth of $4,085.

Read more about the high cost of being fat.

Live a more fulfilling life by saying “yes” to opportunities and experiences instead of being afraid of them.  I’ve learned more from the bad experiences than I have from the good.

Try one new thing each week.  Exercise mindfulness. When fear creeps into your head, name it for what it is, and let it pass by.  Ask yourself, “What is the worst thing that could happen?” Then ask yourself, “What is the best thing that could happen?” 

Recognize that failures and mistakes are not the end. Often they’re the beginning.  We all have dreams, but most of us make excuses for not pursuing them. Often these excuses aren’t overt. It’s more a matter of inertia, of just ignoring the dreams, of maintaining the comfortable status quo. But you can break out of your comfort zone to get more out of life through the simple power of yes.

Read more about the power of yes, a simple way to get more out of life.

It’s more important to track your spending in a broad sense than it is to make sure you’ve tracked every penny precisely. I used to divide my trips to Safeway into various categories within Quicken:

• Food: Groceries
• Food: Junk
• Periodicals: Newsstand
• Sin: Alcohol
• Household: Supplies

I still break my receipt into these categories when I have time. But often I simply lump the entire trip as groceries — that’s what 95% of it is, anyhow. Worrying about niggly little things can be counter-productive to good personal finance. Often it’s more to make the right general choice, and to worry about optimizing things later.