Do you regard yourself as a skeptic?  Does a clever advertisement or plausible testimonial convince you to buy a product, or do you normally suspend judgment until you can check it out?  If you fall into the latter category, you’re a skeptic—and if so, it’s a good thing, particularly in managing your money.  The world of finance is a hazardous place, perhaps more so today than ever before.  You’ll need to be extra cautious if you want to avoid losing your shirt.  Let me describe five areas in which you must exercise skepticism.

1.  Dealing with Marketers. A person’s possessions speak volumes on what that individual regards as important.  The advertising industry is devoted to identifying what the citizen considers significant.  Even more so, the market manipulator creates those choices.  There are massive sums to be spent and the competition is as fierce as it is grotesque.  It’s for this reason you avoid the overpriced junk foisted off regularly on the consumer: lottery tickets, $300 per ounce bottles of perfume, timeshare projects, Las Vegas weekend getaways, $8,000 wrist watches, and any variety of items which serve no other purpose than to proclaim your affluence.  The point is, sharpen your buying habits with a healthy dose of skepticism.  In most of our purchases we are less familiar with a product than are its vendors.  We can overcome this disadvantage by educating ourselves.  The results are cumulative and your performance will improve with time.  Remember always that if a vendor must buy a dozen pages of advertising to say how wonderful its product is, it can’t be.

2.  Dealing with Financial Advisors. It’s the rare citizen with an ability to invest wisely.  This takes a talent few possess.  So, with billions of investment dollars in the hands of Americans, professional investment advisors occupy a position of prominence.  Unfortunately, many practitioners who offer their advisory services are equally devoid of investment expertise.  The result is predictable; huge sums are woefully misdirected.  To protect yourself, you may try to prequalify your counselor.  However, don’t expect credentials, such as certification, ensure proficiency.  Comedian Mel Brooks provided this classic definition of certified: “You’re a nice guy . . . we like you . . . you’re certified.”  Understand, as with many other products, financial planning is an exercise in pure marketing.  You’ve seen the newspaper and television advertisements guaranteeing each client will prosper.  A sense of skepticism suggests the persons who write the ads are unrelated to those who recommend the investments.  A final warning: You cannot depend upon a hired advisor to responsibly invest your money.  You must develop an understanding of what constitutes an acceptable investment so that the final decisions are yours.

3.  Dealing with Mutual Funds. How do most Americans invest their money?  In mutual funds, of course.  Quite simply, a mutual fund controls a pool of money provided by its shareholders which it invests in a portfolio of securities selected by the fund’s managers.  Because of its universality, it is an industry devoted to investment by default.  Though in theory the mutual fund meets the intended needs, those of knowledgeable selection of securities and advantageous portfolio diversification, theory and reality do not always coincide.  There is no particular magic involved.  These vehicles merely rise and fall with the general fortunes of the market.  Recognize this is an industry in which the placing of investors’ money is, at best, a secondary consideration.  The primary justification for their existence is to enable the operators to regularly skim a percentage of the gross assets of the funds while performing little more than marketing activities.  It’s my belief if you choose to invest in the securities market, you’ll fare better if you select individual stocks.

4.  Dealing with your Banker. Over the past decade or so, banking officials made a fascinating discovery.   They found their customers to be an untapped source of bounty, with depositors willing to accept minuscule interest on their savings while tolerating the payment of fees and assessments limited only by the imagination of the bank hierarchy.  Now, in the third year of what appears to be a prolonged recession, interest rates paid on bank savings accounts can be seen as low as one-twentieth of one percent annually.  However, those ultra-low rates are not reflected in the charges your bank may impose for any variety of “services.”  Should you issue a check for one dollar over your account balance, or pay your credit card bill one day later than the deadline date, you’ll be slapped with a penalty which can calculate out to annual percentage rates of twenty percent or higher.  My advice: Regularly scrutinize your bank statements to see what might be slipped in.  Only your active participation will protect you.

5.  Dealing with Government. The most frightening words you will ever hear are: “Hello, I’m from the government, and I’m here to help you.”  Let’s wade into the center of what government is all about.  It can be summed up in one word: Taxes.  Regardless of location, party denomination or political structure, just as an army reputedly “travels on its stomach,” a bureaucracy travels on its citizens’ billfolds, and everyone who enters government service sooner or later comes to share this attitude.  Left to the devices of the officials, there is no limit to the amount to be collected, and any attempt by the payors to minimize the tribute will be met with the usual warnings of dire consequences that never end.  It’s for this reason you must be cautious in your dealings with government.  Do not fail to respond to notices from them.  Do not accept their offer to calculate your income taxes.  Keep records of all contacts with officials.  And above all, never entertain any doubts about what the government expects from you.  It wants your money.

Al Jacobs has been a professional investor for nearly four decades and a nationally syndicated columnist. He is the author of Nobody’s Fool: A Skeptic’s Guide to Prosperity.  Subscribe to his financial column, “On the Money Trail,” at no cost or obligation at www.skepticsguidetoprosperity.com.

Vehicle Frugality
In addition to fixing (what I can) when things break down on our vehicle, I like to give my car a complete tune-up every 30,000 miles.  I purchased the mechanics manual for my car this year and it took me from pre-beginner mechanic to still-know-nothing-but-try mechanic.  Try I did and the savings were huge this year, as you can see below.  Like I have mentioned before in posts, my wife and I still drive her Junior High 1995 Dodge Neon, which now has 181,500 miles on it.  We know we are going to have to purchase another car eventually, but in the meantime, we will continue to do regular maintenance and hope the engine and transmission stay alive; otherwise, any other fix is worth fixing in my opinion.  Below is my 2008 savings related to our car, not listed is finding our car this year when it was stolen when riding the bus to the subway!

• Speedometer and Odometer. Our speedometer and odometer would work until we would hit a bump and it would stop working.  Or, it would stop working for no reason and we would hit the dash and it might start up again.  After researching a little on Google, I fixed the problem by taking off the dash and soldering a few contacts, which fixed the problem forever and for free.  Savings = $150

• Air Bag, Horn, and Cruise Control. These are listed together because they were all fixed by replacing one part in my car.  The mechanic wanted $350 for the part and another $150 for labor to fix all three.  Not wanting to spend the money, I cracked open the mechanics manual and found the part on eBay for $10 from a person that was parting out the same vehicle.  I then bought a $10 part to remove the steering wheel (needed to replace the part) and a few swear words later, everything was fixed.  Savings = $480

• Tune-up. Every 30,000 miles I give our car a tune-up.  Not only do I save money by doing this myself, but it keeps our old car running pretty good.  This year our tune-up included replacing the fuel filter, air-filter, spark plugs, PCV valve, transmission fluid, radiator fluid, and of course the oil.  I also changed the oil every 3,000 miles at home, which doesn’t save a whole lot of money, but does allow for using better quality oil for cheaper.  Savings = $300

• Brakes. My wife held on for her life after I changed the breaks for the first time, but it worked!  Again, our maintenance manual gave me a great step-by-step tutorial to changing our cars breaks and rotors.  Not surprisingly, the brake pads and rotors are fairly cheap, it’s the labor that gets you.  Savings = $200

House Frugality
My wife and I have only lived in our condo for about two years.  We purchased the unit as a foreclosure and have done a lot of work to it, of course all of the work we have done ourselves (some of it we have done twice, because we are doing it ourselvesJ).  Besides renovations, we have also saved quite a bit of money this year by fixing various things in our home ourselves.  Below is our list of 2008 house savings by being frugal and stubborn.

• Oven. This is a true story, this Thanksgiving our oven quit working mid-turkey.  With some people over to eat and a half done turkey, we started a fire and roasted the rest of the turkey in the fireplace!  Our oven, which is slightly over a year old and barely past the warranty, picked a horrible time to break down.  After a little research, I purchased a part for $113 and installed it and our oven was back in business.  Savings = $200

• Renovations. This year was round two of our renovations, we did quite a bit of stuff when we first purchased our condo, but then the money ran out.  Now that there is money again, we are busy again.  This year we saved money by doing the following projects ourselves: installed recessed lighting in our kitchen, removed carpet in our bedroom, installed wood flooring in our bedroom, painted kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom, removed popcorn ceiling in bedroom, and installed new closet hangers and shelves.  Savings = 1,350

• Energy. Although hard to accurately guess the savings in this category, we have take a few steps to reduce our heat/cooling bills.  We put weather-stripping around the doors and windows, put plastic around the windows that let in a breeze (winter), purchased a programmable thermostat and set it for the following schedule: (winter) 63 degrees when sleeping and when we are gone (summer) 83 when sleeping and away and 78 while we are at home. Savings = $100

• Miscellaneous. Hung our plasma TV over our fireplace, installed a new electrical outlet next to the fireplace (for TV), built and installed shelves in our storage space. Savings = $200

Shopping Frugality
Although it’s hard to argue that we saved a lot of money by shopping this year, it’s of course impossible to not shop at all.  Here are a few of the ways we saved money by spending money???

• Plane Tickets. Because of a funeral, I purchased a last minute plane ticket to a small Midwest airport.  Searching on Kayak, the ticket cost $1600, after calling the airline and getting a bereavement flight, the cost was $515.  Savings = $1085

• Craigslist. I purchased a climbing tree stand for hunting and picked up a free printer this year on craigslist.  Savings = $175

• Firewood. We used to keep buying the packages of firewood at Safeway for $5 a pop, which would basically last one night.  We then had somebody deliver firewood at a cost of $80, but for the amount of wood, it was worth the deal.  Savings = $40

Total 2008 Savings = $4280

Of course, these were not the only ways we saved money this year and there were plenty of times this year we probably splurged on things we shouldn’t have, but it puts a year’s worth of hard work into prospective.  We were able to substantially increase our emergency fund this year, something that would never or happened if we contracted out more of our jobs or foolishly shopped.  On top of savings, I learned a lot this year on car repairs and basic household projects. I’ll be fair and say I was frustrated a lot by doing many of these things, but while I’m at home working on projects, I’m not out spending!

How did you save this year?  $

So MilkYourMoney.com has decided to feed this monster and highlight our data, in the form of tools that we have put together as well as gleaned from the web.  All of the following can be found down there on the right side of the page…Use them, and share them!

Become a Millionaire in 30 Years With Your Current Salary
This is a popular one, as it has a veritable list of things that you might be able to cut from your budget in order to have money to set aside for a savings account. We have run some numbers and gotten some estimates and have found that this is easy to do. It leverages compound interest and you might be affected by inflation but to be honest, its a great plan.

Broker Check
In the event that you are at the point where you want to buy securities, you might want to use a broker.  This is an individual buys securities on your behalf, like firm like an Ameritrade, E-Trade, or Sharebuilder.  (We like Sharebuilder by the way, as its the most affordable and integrates nicely with ING as the merged earlier this year.)  To be sure that your new broker (or soon to be new broker) is on the up and up, take a look at FINRA’s Broker Check page.  (FINRA stands for Financial Industry Regulatory Authority and are tasked with quite a bit but…well that’s a whole other article.)

Guide to House Hunting
Freddie Mac put together a nice over all check list that any new home buyer should consider taking with them to cover all your bases.  Be sure not to miss something important and get this list!

Light Bulb Comparisons
Ever wonder if the bulbs you have in your house are really saving you money?  When will Compact Florescents pay for themselves?  Is it worth the switch?  Take a look and see if its worth your time and money.  If you would like this in pdf, feel free to ask and we will send one right over.

Loan Repayment Calculator
This will allow you to figure out what you might be paying each month given a certain loan amount as well as factor in your interest for the life of the loan.  An invaluable tool that any borrower should take advantage of.

Monthly Budget
Ahh, one of our favorites!  This spreadsheet should take you from debt to profit and show you the best way to manage your money.  Give it a shot and see if its something that could help you.  If you have suggestions on this, feel free to let us know as we are always working on budget spreadsheets.  If emailed, we can even start one for you.

Mutual Fund Expense Analyzer
Most of us are given options to choose at our jobs when it comes to mutual funds.  We select what we would like and the percentage and then wait for a really long time to see what we made.  What if we could find the cheaper ones that accrued just as much in gains?  That would mean more money in your pocket and less in some bankers, right?  Check your funds!

Savings Calculator
This will allow you to start with a given amount of money and apply a reoccurring payment to it, in order to see how much you might eventually make after a set amount of time.  Use this to set goals for yourself and see what you need to do in order to meet those goals. $

For a copy of our letter sent to the Federal banking regulators, click here.  Or click on the image to the left.

Overall, we feel that the proposed rules are long overdue and in general are legitimate in their intentions. While we generally feel the proposals do not go far enough, we applaud the Agencies for taking the first and necessary steps to curb these abusive practices related specifically to credit cards.  MYM proposed amendments to the proposals in the following areas: Allocation of Payments, Applying Rate Increases to Existing Balances, and Firm Offers of Credit.

In addition to the suggested amendments, MYM also suggested that reform be addressed in the following areas that are not currently incorporated into the Fed’s proposal:

• The number of overlimit fees that may be applied in a single billing cycle should be fairly determined to properly put responsibility on the account holder to stay within their limit, but not overly punish them into unaffordable debt.

• Finance charges are often applied at the transaction date and not at the posting date when the money is actually financed. Finance charges should not be charged before the money is actually lent to the consumer.

• Fees charged to a consumers account for non-use of a card should be banned. Credit is something consumers earn and being charged for not using available credit is cruel and irresponsible.

• Penalty interest rates should be capped at a reasonable rate to both interested parties.

• A disclosure should be added to each monthly bill that clearly states the amount of time it will take and the cost to the consumer to completely pay off an account when only making the required minimum monthly payments. $

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The 8 Worst Money Saving Mistakes -by MilkYourMoney.com

1. You think about money anxiously before you fall asleep.
   This happens to me every once in a while, I get anxious thinking about all the things I need to pay for and even though I might have enough, its still a little daunting.  I get to sleep by making sure that I have a handle on my finances and by keeping up with them regularly.  If things are getting a little crazy, just map out a budget and get a game plan and stick to it.
2. You find that the day after pay day is one of the best days of the month to buy something.
   This is a tough one.  The day after is hard because you have a fresh wad of cash and a few extra digits and suddenly everything is an option.  Amazon starts looking like every book is the most interesting book you have ever read, and there are few things on eBay you have had your eye on that suddenly make sense to bid on.  Pretty soon you have blown 25% of your paycheck on stuff you don’t need and nothing to really show for it.  Go pay rent and bills and groceries and then you are down to the bare minimum to get by until the next pay day.  Best way to combat this?  Grit your teeth and keep moving.  If you can make it to the next Wednesday and have all your other bills paid, its so much easier to say to yourself that you are building up some nice money for a change.
3. You have a running list of things you are going to buy the next time you get some “extra” money.
   If you constantly have a list of things ready to burn a hole in your pocket, that’s what you are going to do.  If you don’t even have a list then you don’t have that excuse to run out and spend the money.  I used to keep a list of not only things I wanted but the url to the website that would purchase it.  As soon as that extra money came along, boom boom boom, that list was toast and there was another in its place.  Now that I am a little older, I see what is needed and what is wanted.  Of course I treat myself like anyone but I do its a little more efficiently and always make sure I have put money away for more important things.
4. Your definition of want is very similar to your definition of need.
   Its very easy to convince yourself that those things you want are actually something you need.  Listen to that small voice that knows the truth.  Allow the purchase to wait at least a few weeks and see if it truly is something you need.  chances are you will have forgotten about it and you will realize that you really didn’t “need” it.
5. You put off putting more money towards debt because you are already paying the minimum.
   I get guilty of this from time to time.  Even though I have told myself that the minimum to pay monthly is about 5x more than what they require, I can’t help but think that its never enough.  This extra pressure seems to work well though as I have made quite a bit of progress by not putting off extra payments.  Make your minimum payments at least so that your not digging any deeper, but inch your way out anyway you can by paying a little extra here and there.
6. You are not sure what your interest rate is for your savings account, what your APR is for your credit cards, and you can’t remember what your rate is for your vehicles insurance.
   If you don’t know your digits for these things, find out.  Log in to the respective company’s website and either find out online, or contact them.  You have a right to know and its in your best interest.  Not sure if that pun was intentional but it works the same.  Be sure that you do a little self education and find out what those rates mean and why you got the rates you did.  It might be bad: late payments before, or it might be good: you have good credit etc.  Then you can target what you need to do in order to improve your situation.  This takes a few minutes and is well worth it.
7. You don’t know the exact amount of money you have right now.
   Check your balance every single day.  And don’t just check it, spend at least 20 minutes looking at all the purchases you buy.  This is not to give yourself a guilt trip or anything but the more frequently you become familiar with the trends and habits of how you spend your money, the better you will be able to stop from poor decisions down the road.
8. You can’t stomach the idea of having money and not doing anything with it.
   You want to shop because you are afraid of not having something to play with, look at or whatever it might be.  The object of your desires are calling to you and you feel helpless without it.  You have a fear and the only way to feel in control is to buy something.  This leads to greed and simply fuels more aimless purchasing.  And you know what else?  Every other person you know or have ever met does the same exact thing and feels identical to you in that regard.  Everyone gets torn by fear and greed and the quick solution of buying little gifts for ourselves.  Its a tough habit to break but a big one.  Self reflection, education and discipline are your supports for getting through it.  It might seem a little harsh or extreme but to some extent, those feelings are present.

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Pass these along to others who might benefit and print them out for yourself to keep in mind.

“A personal loan from CitiFinancial will help you pay for your time off without departing from your budget.”  First, if you need to finance your vacation, your vacation is not in your budget.  A vacation that is on credit is like a car that takes $4/gallon gas to run.  In other words, every purchase that is made requires additional money to enjoy.  Every cocktail has an additional cost, coming in the form of the APR on your vacation loan.  Depending on how long it takes to pay off the loan, the interest on your cocktail could actually acquire interest – talk about a long hangover.

The other troubling part of this email from Citi, is the relative ease of acquiring credit.  “Apply now and you could pick up your check at one of nearly 2,100 local neighborhood branches tomorrow!”  Or “Less than perfect credit? No problem.”  It is no wonder our nation is in the economic shape it is in today.  People owe so much to so many different entities, there is not enough money for the basics, like a home mortgage.  It is easy to blame the Financial Institutions for pushing bad lending products down our throat, like Citi has done here.  It is just as easy to blame the irresponsible consumers for taking on credit they could not afford.  More importantly, we need to start shielding ourselves from these tempting ads and start saving again.  If you are paying interest and not making it, you will never have money.  $

These questions seem impossible to answer but we have found an answer for you. CNN Money has a nice little compilation of sites that might become your next stop in getting the low down on getting some answers. Here are the meat and potatoes:

Your financial life: Track it. Improve it. – Moneycenter.yodlee.com - Mint.com - Savingadvice.com/forums

Buying a new ride will never be the same - Edmunds.com - KBB.com - CarDeals.org

Where you can go for advice you can trust (really) - CakeFinancial.com - Zecco.com - TradeKing.com - Diehards.org - Pimco.com - leggmason.com/funds - EfficientFrontier.com

Create your own “network effect” - LinkedIntelligence.com

Get the lowest price on anything - FatWallet.com - SlickDeals.net - Amazon.com (reviews, especially those with badges by their names) - Epinions.com - PriceGrabber.com - Ebates.com

Know your home’s future – Trulia.com-Zillow.com - Maps.Live.com - Walkscore.com - SchoolMatters.com - GreatSchools.net - Outside.in

Click your way to the right school – PrincetonReview.com- CollegeBoard.com - Petersons.com - nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator - CollegeConfidential.com - CampusTours.com

Be sure to read the whole article here! Got Subscription?

A Tipping Point is essentially that point when you realize your finances have gone wild and then become under control and you are getting traction to increase your net worth. I should be more specific and say that I am more going to describe a few Mini-Tipping Points that happen frequently that will eventually accumulate into one Big Tipping Point.

The first came when I took a serious look at my finances and mapped out everything I was spending my money on. I found that I was leaking money everywhere. Eating at restaurants on a weekly basis that should have been on a monthly frequency. Signing up for services that I did not use. Buying things that I felt I needed but actually didn’t. It was rampant and wildly inappropriate. By taking serious inventory of my in flow and outflow I was better able to map out what I truly needed to focus on. My car payment, my credit cards, my student loans, rent and a myriad of other debts that needed to be taken care of. Once I had my road map it gave me a discrete goal to meet every month and showed me the power of socking away extra money.

The second one might be a little bit controversial but not really. For about 2 months I lived like a monk and put a complete clamp down on extra expenditures. By biting the bullet for a little while and not allowing myself any financial pleasures I built a healthy buffer and was then able to somewhat automate my bill paying process. Some might say that this is not the way to go; “you shouldn’t do away with things that make you happy just for the sake of saving” and/or “automation of bill paying takes you out of the loop and you aren’t able to fully maximize the amount you save.” The way I see it, this was not a perpetual thing, just temporary and the results and rewards are exponentially better then I imagined. I was able to better optimize my bills and see what need to be focused on without stressing if things were going to get paid for. Allow me to reiterate: I am not advocating that you live like a Spartan forever or that you should let go of your bills. Just buckle down and see what happens. Work now, play later. Once you get your homework done, you can go out and play. After your term paper is over, you can go to the party. After you build yourself some buffer for the future, you can pursue other endeavors that you have always wanted to do. You get the idea…

The third is a good one. Self education. I am huge believer that the human mind holds nearly an infinite amount of potential for knowledge and if you embrace your will to learn new things, 20 doors will open to you where normally only one would. Starting this site with Frank has been a complete eye opener that even 2 years ago I would have never known. I had no idea what I didn’t know and now I know tons of stuff I don’t know. Believe it or not, that feels really good to know what you don’t know. Strangely liberating. Probably due to the fact that you can actually do something about and empower yourself. Not only that, but you can then teach and show others. It goes round and round and does nothing but benefit. One thing that I always try to keep in mind is that while the saying goes that its a small world, its really not. Its actually huge. Its far bigger than you can imagine. The amount of people alone is staggering let alone all the ideas out there. Take as much in that you can, due your homework, find the truth and what it means to you and then you can go out and play.

How can you reach your tipping point? Its easy. The only way to start any journey no matter what it is, is to take small steps. Try doing one thing a day that adds to your goal of eliminating debt, saving money and building your net worth. No matter how small, just do something. Lets make a list:

Look at your bank account every day. Start by just looking at it the same time everyday. Thats it. Most people do this anyway, just not everyday. The reason why I suggest this is because your primary account is kind of like a beating heart and by checking it everyday you are feeling its pulse. This is important because invariably you will start seeing some surprises. Don’t worry if you get discouraged or mad at yourself for spending needlessly, you have made the first step: Noticing that there is a problem.

Set aside time. Now that you are in the habit of looking at your finances everyday, increase the amount of time you spend looking at your money and start working on your money. Work up until you are spending about 20 or 30 minutes everyday. You probably workout about that much right? Or you should be. You have to in order to do any good….same with money. Wild, I know.

Get frugal. Where can you milk your money? :-p Where can it best be used? What sorts of things should be paid off first? What should you avoid? Heres is a hint: high interest that you pay is the worst, focus on that first. Another easy one is find the best deals on food: Take your lunch to work, and make dinner at home. The margin that restaurants make on every sale begs the idea as to why we are all not owning them. Jump start your frugality. For the rest you are just going to have to subscribe.

Research, research, research. I cannot stress enough the value of having the hobby of finding ways to both make money as well as keep it. I have read more books on finances then is probably healthy and dig through the newspaper and as many financial magazines then any other creepy hobby and the more I learn the more I realize there is more to learn. Become curious as to what you can do to save more and spend less. There is an amazing amount of content out there.

If you ever feel as though you want to learn more about something…ask us! While we don’t claim to have the answers to the universe, we will do our best to find out as much as we can or at least point you in the right direction. Thats really what we are here for. We answer every email and respond to just about all the comments we get.

This all came about due to Free from Broke’s Contest about Tipping Points. Want in on the action? Ok here’s the scoop:

The Prize: $25 Amazon Gift Card.
How to Enter:

1. Leave a comment on this post telling him your personal finance tipping point. It can either be the moment you realized you needed to fix your finances or that point where you discovered you were finally in the black. Make sure you leave a valid email address in the comment. This will give you one (1) entry.
2. Subscribe either to his feed or via email. There will be a secret phrase at the bottom. Email him using his contact form and tell me the secret phrase. This will give you five (5) entries. (Note: If you are already subscribed you can still email him the secret phrase)
3. If you have your own blog, write about your personal finance tipping point and link back to him. Email him through his contact form with your link. This can be a full-on post or a quick few sentences in a round-up. This will give you ten (10) entries.

You can enter each way once. He’ll put all of the entries into an online randomizer to choose the winner. Entries can be submitted up to 11:59 am Friday, June 13th. He’ll contact the winner to email the gift certificate. If the email address is not valid he will award the prize to the next email address in the randomizer. Good luck! $

SmartMoney Magazine has recently ranked their top sixteen discount brokers by doing “rigorous analysis,” taking into consideration various elements including: commissions; interest rate on cash waiting to be invested; mutual funds and investment products; banking services; trading tools; research; and customer service. Where did my discount broker rank? You guessed it, dead last. Sharebuilder is number 16 on their list of 16. Should I panic and switch alliance to a more noteworthy broker? I don’t thinks so and here is why…

Ignoring mine and my wife’s employee sponsored retirement plans; my investing consists of about one trade once every two months in my Roth IRA. Nearly all of my investments are in large indexes like the S&P 500 via an Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) – always being mindful of expense rations. I typically wait to invest until the market starts sliding or investors start panicking and selling off. Occasionally, I will purchase separate stocks, but in relatively low dollar amounts and always keeping my portfolio of single stocks to less than 10% of the whole. I guess you can say I am a conservative and patient investor betting on the long-term gains of the market.

Hello? Buy, buy, buy! No wait….Sell, sell, sell you idiot!

Because of my investing approach, Sharebuilder works perfect for me. With only $4 trade commissions (on Tuesday’s), I manage to keep all of my commissions down to less than one percent of my total investment. Sharebuilder also ranks high on this list of interest on cash waiting to be invested. This is important to me because money waiting to be invested should be earning top dollar. Sharebuilder ranks low on the list for research, trading tools, and banking services – all options I don’t really care about. I’m not researching penny stocks or making quick trades from my cell phone and I do my primary banking with Wachovia. Although I am disappointed in Sharebuilder’s customer service ranking, I hope this article will give them an incentive to invest more of their resources back into their customers.

Who’s your broker? Where do they rank? Do you agree/disagree with the rankings? $

A number of consumer advocate groups are teaming up in hopes of spreading the frugal gospel. In what will hopefully be a successful nationwide advertising campaign, the groups will try to change the spend first, borrow/spend second, and save last attitude that has slowly become our norm.

This new coalition has released a report, which mainly explains the relative ease debt is to acquire. Also in the report, are a number of consumer friendly proposals to help slow our spending and promote savings. MilkYourMoney applauds this and other similar efforts to educate our financial literacy starved country.

Because financial blogs are starting to reach people in big numbers and usually on a daily basis, we challenge bloggers to try to piggyback this nationwide advertising campaign and send a much needed unified message of frugality and basic financial education. Hopefully, our schools will soon mandate financial education at early ages and continue to progress the complexity of the education all the way through graduation. Education has the potential to keep us out of man-made situations like the one our country currently finds itself. Again, we congratulate these consumer advocates for bringing attention to the issue of financial literacy and we hope to contribute to the cause.

The list of participants:

• The Institute for American Values
• The Institute for Advanced Studies In Culture
• The New America Foundation
• Public Agenda
• Demos
• The Consumer Federation of America
• The National Federation of Community Development Credit Unions

Check back with us later on to see the answer to the mysterious missing stimulus check ordeal…