Education without going to class

After attending a meeting presented by the Chicago Camera Club in Oak Brook Illinois, I realized there are other alternatives then traditional education that can help you advance your lifestyle and self worth. At the meeting, they were having a picture competition. In those three hours, I learn more about taking pictures without paying the cost of attending a class. If I want to continue to learn, it only costs me $30 for the year to attend the meetings.

What type of investor am I?

After reading “The Intelligent Investor” by Benjamin Graham on page 101, he points to two types of investors, one who continually researches and the one that creates a permanent portfolio. What is dictating my investing approach is the hostile work environment that I have to endure because of the lack of jobs. For me, I am adopting the later approach of crating a permanent portfolio that runs on autopilot in order to focus my time on finding a new job

Making the right business and financial decisions

On Sunday, November 15, 2009, I read Zweig article on “Ignoring the Yes-Man in your Head” in the Wall Street Journal. I can relate to that article because of my judgment, which resulted in bad business and financial mistakes. These mistakes occur because I am not asking the right questions by trying to disprove any business or financial situation. In the past, this was true especially when I was buying and selling stock continuously in which money was being lost. In terms of present and past business decisions, this is especially true with the Tastefully Simple consulting business and other entrepreneurial adventures previously tried.

Feedback is great

I am very blessed to have great friends that give me feedback and advice. I think now in this economy, having great friends is also important especially when they help you. I asked my friend T. what he thought about my blog. In his response, he gave critical information I think will help other people. In his email, he states “Mark it looks like you have put a lot of time into your posts. It is a good start. Perhaps simple things like how you save on shopping would be good too. For us we shop at the neighborhood stores which are regularly cheaper than the big stores like Jewel or Dominick’s(we have an Italian Market called Amicis and a fruit and vegetable stand called Nature's best-both have delis that are a lot cheaper than the big stores). In addition, we shop at the outlet stores for bread products (Pepperidge farm and Sara Lee). How about using coupons? Coupons.com is a good site”.

Making priorities

I always ask myself, what is the most important priority that has to be made when paying bills or even saving money? Today, Tuesday, November 10, 2009 I took money out of my savings account and put the money into my checking account. With the money I took out my savings, the amount dropped below $200. Why did I take the money out of my savings account? The main reason was to accomplish my goal or writing a book to generate money.

Finding the right broker

Over the past 12 years, I must have had 10 brokers through A.G.Edwards. Of the 10 brokers, I could trust at least three and then they left the company. After my last broker left the company, I moved my account to another company. What I like about the broker now, she shares the same sentiment as Graham and Zweig belief that it is hard to predict what the future brings. Additionally, she is also honest with me about the risks. According to my broker when I was asking questions about REI’s and TIP’S, her reply was Real Estate Investment trusts certainly did well when the real estate market was booming, and they also pulled back quite a bit when the market fell. In almost any growth, allocation model there is a component that has real estate. You do not own any specific mutual funds geared towards real estate investment trusts but inside the mutual funds, you will have some exposure. TIPS are great way to play inflation. If you think Inflation is going up then TIPS are a very good idea. Both are good investments if bought at the right time, but like everything else each one will have its day in the sunshine.

Working as a team

In this economic time, it is important families work as a team to increase their wealth. The way I am trying to help my wife, is by doing the business operations (E.g. bookkeeping) of her tastefully Simple consulting business that she just stared last June. However, I am still not pulling my weight since Tupperware is not included as part of me helping her out. I also realized it would not be in her best interest to be a consultant under her guidance since it detracts from her sales quotas. The challenges my wife and many other new consultants are facing is increasing their sales in a declining economy. By helping my wife, I am able to free up her time to make sales calls. On the other hand, I also need to learn the consulting businesses that my wife is participating as a consultant without being a consultant to increase our financial success.

Decreasing expenses to increase wealth - Stocks

When choosing a broker to handle my stocks, I switched from A. G. Edwards Company to American Stock Transfer in order to save money because there is no service charge for reinvesting or adding money to the investment. For Zweig, there is always a cost to any investment. For most people, it is hard to tell what the fees are because, like myself did not ask the right questions. In this case, I asked if a cost was associated with reinvesting and the answer was no. In this case, a cost did not occur when dividends where reinvested. However, when you add additional money to increase your investment, a cost incurred when adding money to purchase additional stocks. Nevertheless, what I found out, I should have asked the question, if I want to reinvest by adding additional money is their a cost?

The benefits of using Under-earners Anonymous vision and goals to improve your wealth and happiness

I am not happy with my life because of the types of abuses my employers used to victimize me. Most of the problems occurred because of the risks I have taken to improve my life. However, in one way they have improved my life by making me mad and taking control of my life and setting new goals and visions. As of Sunday, November 01, 2009, I sat down and worked on two work sheets provided by Under-earners Anonymous www.underearnersanonymous.org at no cost. However, generating income is not as easy as it seams. My life experience has taught me you need to focus on your strengths or your hobbies into a career that generates financial stability and happiness.

Putting every little penny away for a rainy day

I am trying to get back into my old habits of saving money by collecting every penny, nickel, dime, or quarter and putting them into a jar. This saving behavior started when I was young when my parents encouraged me to save. They told me you have two choices, save money or pay us rent. Of course, I decided to keep the money myself. This parental guidance help me save over $30,000 before I got married even working part time jobs due community colleges decisions to save money by not paying employees benefits. On Saturday, October 31, 2009, I was able to deposit $33.00 from change collected in a three-week period and generated .01 cents in interest.