Mortgage interest rates are rising. But it's not too late to refinance your mortgage and hit a home run while you do it. While interest rates aren't quite at rock bottom, it's still a great time to refinance. If you have the ability to refinance, do it. Even if you have already refinanced, if you can [...]
With student loan debt topping $1 trillion and the cost of college rising at four times the rate of inflation, many parents and high school seniors are asking themselves a fairly obvious question: Is college still worth it? According to data released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the answer is still yes. [...]
In The College Solution, Lynn O’Shaughnessy provides an easy-to-use roadmap that you can use to find the right colleges (not just the most hyped) and to dramatically reduce your costs. In this excerpt, learn more about saving for college and finding private scholarships. If you’re interested in hunting for private scholarships, here are some tips to increase your [...]
In The College Solution, Lynn O’Shaughnessy provides an easy-to-use roadmap that you can use to find the right colleges (not just the most hyped) and to dramatically reduce your costs. In this excerpt, learn more about saving for college and your family’s expected financial contribution. Read more about financial aid and your family’s expected financial contribution. The formula does play [...]
In The College Solution, Lynn O’Shaughnessy provides an easy-to-use roadmap that you can use to find the right colleges (not just the most hyped) and to dramatically reduce your costs. In this excerpt, learn more about saving for college and your family’s expected financial contribution. How rich is too rich to qualify for financial aid? A mother who [...]
The military is known for turning ordinary citizens into soldiers but not usually for teaching those soldiers about money management and how to handle their personal finances. However, the military did teach Steve Repak, Army veteran and Certified Financial Planner™, all he needed to know about personal finance so that he could dig himself out of debt and build his [...]
Summer is here and so are adventures in the great outdoors—jetting around the lake in a boat or flying over hills on a dirt bike. Driving through open terrain on an ATV may be fun, but the truth is that accidents happen on all types of recreational vehicles and vessels, causing hundreds of deaths, thousands [...]
Flooding causes billions of dollars in damage annually—last year it was nearly $8.5 billion—yet only 14 percent of homeowners have flood insurance, according to the Insurance Information Institute. Flood damage can happen suddenly, whether it’s from a hurricane, a heavy storm, or rising river water. Last month, torrential rains flooded parts of Minnesota and Wisconsin, forcing [...]
Everyone knows that saving money is important, whether it’s for retirement, for emergencies, or just for a rainy day. But if we don’t know why we’re saving money or what we’re saving for, savings strategies become increasingly ineffective. It’s easy to raid your savings when you need extra cash if the money is sitting there without purpose. “A lot [...]
Consider renovating your homeowner’s insurance policy before picking up a hammer or hiring a contractor. If a fire gutted your home, how would you feel if your homeowner’s insurance policy paid only three-quarters of the cost of rebuilding it? Not too happy—and understandably so. Unfortunately, that’s what can occur if you forget to update your insurance for such big-ticket [...]
