Reading books is a passion for many, but this recession might have prompted you into slashing that extra expenditure that you make on purchasing books.  Don’t worry; here are some cost saving ways for you to pursue your intellectual interest. Join a purchase rewards program- Barnes and Noble; Book a Millionaire, Border’s Rewards are all bookstores that offer you attractive reward programs once you buy books from them. Watch out for their coupon reward system which is going to offer you discounts. But these discounts are profitable only for regular buyers of books and not occasional purchasers. Barnes and Nobles and Book a Millionaire offer 20 % to 40 % discounts. Border’s Rewards prizes you with $5 on purchasing books worth $ 150. Along with rebates you get emails and offer letters [...]

Product recalls are not a rare occurrence. It happens. But here are a dozen products with the worst recall history. If you are planning to buy products from one of these companies, just consider this information before taking the decision because these have not been recalled due to ordinary reasons like low quality or average performance, but they’ve had disastrous effects. Some were known to cause death of consumers, while others resulted in the company CEO’s resignation while still others brought about huge financial losses. With these reports you cannot view the other products of these companies with jaundiced eyes because they may be good. But knowing these products will keep you well informed about how cautious you should be before making the purchase. Tylenol Drugs You might be already [...]

I’m sure you’ll agree with me that health deserves prime importance and you cannot neglect it at any cost. You might slash down upon your festive shopping due to the economic epidemic, but you can’t probably slash down upon your health costs, especially during the flu season. You are well aware of how threatening swine flu has become to the country and along with that the seasonal flu is another threat. Nasal sprays and vaccine shots have come up to immunize you against H1N1. A host of retailers say that they can immunize you for low costs. But you simply can’t get a health job done from anywhere. You’ve got to be extra cautious in that. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported that out of 2,126 cases of flu reported from the 20th -26th of September this year, only [...]

Christmas is still more than a couple of months away, but you might be contemplating starting your shopping for the event. After the recession, if you are comfortable with your money, you can always go ahead right now, but shopper news doesn’t seem to be very encouraging. Well, I really don’t want to disappoint you but with unemployment rate at almost 10 % and the foreclosure episodes still being quite frequent do you expect people to shop big this holiday season? In August, we might have rejoiced about consumer confidence rising up to 54. 5 %, but according to the Conference board report it has again plummeted to 53.1 % in September. A confidence index of 90 % is indicative of sound economic health for the nation. When our confidence is so poor, can we really spend much on shopping this [...]

Personal Savings seem to have reached an all-time low this year. I’m not surprised. Given the very stormy economic conditions, the average American would have been thinking about surviving in the present day, rather than saving up for the future. Apart from the economic conditions, the level of financial literacy of the youth and the public in general is also responsible for this. Americans being spendthrifts by nature and being too optimistic about the future, till the recent recession, did not find the necessity to save up for the future, but the economic famine has woken up people to the harsh reality. Another reason that seems to have made the Americans sleep over the personal savings issue was the highly available consumer credit which has grown at an alarming rate in the last few years. [...]

If you are paid on an hourly basis, you’ll understand that every minute you put in work counts. My employers are very strict about their time schedules and they have a delivery quantity allotted for that period of time. For me, even one minute of paid time is going to affect my total output for the day and so I make it a point to not waste time. Many of us may not be paid on an hourly basis, but on a fixed monthly salary basis, but we are expected to deliver a certain quantity of work at the end of every day. Time management is most important, and hence here are i have discussed some time management tips. Working overtime is not going to please your boss always, as you might expect. It only speaks of your inefficiency. If you are allotted 8 hours a day for your work, try to complete it during [...]

Summers are really unbearable for many! I remember a friend of mine who unable to tolerate the heat, went on the hottest day to the markets to buy an air conditioner. He got a beautiful piece, but that costed him a fortune. Had he predicted this and made this purchase during the winter months, he’d surely have saved a lot of currency! Best purchases are more about the timing of purchase and surprisingly, you’ll see that you save a lot in the process. You might think that saving means restricting your expenditure. Saving money on groceries is not only about not buying things, but it’s about buying them at the right price…and when do you think you can buy something at the right price? Obviously, as you might have thought, not during any special sales or something, but at normal times [...]

As a school kid when I’d talk about money frugality, my friends would tease me saying I was stingy. But now the recession has taught even the greatest spendthrifts amongst us to be very prudent with our money. No more is it fashionable to spend big bucks for a lavish lifestyle. In fact, these days, you’re looked upon as a fool if you do that! Everybody is talking about money saving ideas. That gives hopeless misers a chance to be proud of their ways! Isn’t it ? Here are some easy time-tested ways that have been around for quite some days now. They are simple, short and effective. If you were to go by Financial Literacy survey 2009 of the National Foundation for Credit Counseling, about 45 % of people spend lesser than what they used to in the previous year. It seems when conditions will [...]

The holidays are coming and you might have planned to travel to your favorite travel destinations. Tesco Personal finance has advised people to watch out their travel expenditure when going on a holiday. According to their spokesperson you need to consider your dining expenditures. Most people consider travel costs. But you’ve got to be mindful about the costs that you might have to face when you are in the city. You’ll have to spend on your accommodation, food and shopping. According to Tesco officials, "If families really want to holiday on a shoestring then they need to do their research to really make their money go further". In the past three years, a third of the population had gone on a last minute holiday. These last minute holidays don’t let you plan well for the holiday. Your [...]

You might be already aware of scores of ways in which you should budget your spending. You might have gone to financial experts visited money management websites or taken courses on financial literacy etc. But did anybody give you a step by step direction on what you should do and what you shouldn’t to manage your money efficiently? Most often, unless you personally took the trouble for acquiring in-depth knowledge, you are given broad and generalized outlines. These don’t necessarily relate to your unique life situation. Moreover, you are not very precise about your plans. This is the reason for many of us there is a slip between the sip and the cup. Here’s some advice with a difference. You are not asked to do this and do that for controlling your expenses. More than the implementation [...]

Next time you bite into an ice-cream and simply scream “ Aaaaaah my tooth hurts !” but feel that you’ve got to pop in some pills instead of going to a dentist as a temporary  remedy because you can’t afford the fee, just relax…there’s good news for you. It seems this recession has tamed the dentists’ desire of charging exorbitant prices for their services, because many people have put dental care out of their budgets as it appeared optional to them. I don’t agree with them though because when  you get a devastating toothache you’ll know that dental care is the most essential thing for your survival. However, those people who were blessed enough to not have a rendezvous with a toothache have decided not to go to dentists and now this is the reason many dentists are offering [...]

For many people divorce is a sad thing. Either or both the partners is in an emotional trauma and as though that is not enough there are huge monetary expenses involved too. As you might have expected divorce is not like breaking with your dating or living-in partner where you just walk out of the relationship without actually having to pay a dime. Divorce involves a lot of legal hassles which involve the expenditure of money. Laws have made it worse or good depending on the party that is at a loss or gain. Most often it’s a win/lose situation with the partner wanting to separate having to pay compensation to the other. A win/win situation happens when people divorce by mutual consent where you separate willingly from each other without any financial hassles. These are not the only expenses [...]