My husband and I recently purchased a home.  I started to think about how I would decorate the house, even before we owned the house!

Kohls is one place that I love to look for home decor items; their clearance section is amazing.  Many times, when browsing the clearance sections at other stores, I rarely find anything good.

The key to shopping at Kohls is to NEVER buy anything unless it is on sale.  If you have your eye on a particular item, wait for it to go on sale.  Better yet, give it a couple of weeks and it will be put on the clearance shelf.  Check out my amazing deal:

Tall Candle Holder: Orig. Price: $24.99/I got it for: $4.99

Short Candle Holder: Orig. Price: 19.99/I got it for: $5.99

Two candles: Orig. Price: $7.99 each/I got them for: $2.39 each

Total Savings: $50.20

I don’t own a Kohls credit card, but I found out that if you sign up to receive their emails, you get coupons that you can use without being one of their credit card holders.  Just for signing up, I got a $5 coupon towards anything in the store.  That means, my purchase above only came to $11.74!

While looking at the home decor section at Kohls, I was also pleasantly surprised to find the same exact clock that I had recently bought at Marshalls.

Kohls price: $44.99

Marshalls price: $14.99

Total Savings: $30!

When you take the time to shop around and if you have the patience to wait for good deals, you can really save a lot of money!  Have you found any good deals lately?  Please share!

For those of us who own pets, we know that a trip to the vet can drain the pocket book, especially when it is an unexpected visit.  Awhile back, my dog Luther inadvertently got locked in the garage for about five minutes.

Those five minutes were probably the best five minutes of his doggie life because my Mom had just placed a garbage bag, filled with scraps from dinner, out in the garage.

Of course, Luther did what any dog would do; he dove into the heap of garbage and managed to gobble down several cobs of corn.

After researching the effects of a dog eating corn on the cob and after a phone call with the vet, we decided that Luther had to be taken in for x-rays.

Apparently, the cobs of corn can get lodged in their digestive track!  A few hours and a couple hundred dollars later, we walked out of the vet’s office with a happy dog and x rays that only showed a belly full of food.

Now, fast forward a couple of years.  I recently took Luther to the vet for two routine, necessary shots.  Two shots that should have cost below one hundred dollars.

Before starting any work on Luther, the vet’s assistant brings in a page of “suggested” procedures that we should have done that day.  The total cost: $450!  Having owned Luther for 4 years now, I have become very familiar with the necessary  procedures and shots that dogs should have to maintain their health.

I also know when the vet is trying to convince me to pay more money for things that are unnecessary for my own dog.

That experience at the vet got me thinking more about money and how we spend our money.  Someone who has never owned a pet before may get roped into spending way more money than is necessary, just because they didn’t know any better.

We have choices on how we can spend our money. There are circumstances in life that give us no other choice but to pay a large sum of money, but those are usually emergency situations; unexpected occurrences that come with living life.

Day to day living provides us with circumstances that allow us to choose how we are going to spend our money.  When we spend more money than we need to, we are wasting money.

I am here to provide you with simple ways to save money.  I will NOT suggest that you spend hours on the internet, printing off grocery coupons and bringing all the local grocery shopping ads with you to the store.

Realistically, there are not many people who have time in their lives to do such things.  I want to give you ideas on how to save money in all areas of life, just by thinking before you buy; it’s as simple as that!

I started investing in my Roth IRA when I was fifteen, after my first taxable job. I only contributed $333 that year but the habit was established.

It gave me the mindset that if i added a little whenever I could early in my life, the rest of my life I wouldn’t have to worry about saving for retirement.

I motivated myself by announcing to my dad every time I contributed, “DAD, I just made $15,000 today.”

Of course I was speaking of the future value of money it added to my total retirement account when I am 65.

With that as my motivation, my goal is to add as much to my retirement accounts early, so I can stop contributing and use that money for other things like raising a family or investing in a small business. This also adds some security to my psyche knowing that my retirement will be funded.

It does present a problem though because I don’t like the idea that I can’t touch my money until I’m 59 1/2. I want to retire at 40, so where is my money going to come from.

I could withdraw on my 401(k) early. NOT! That is extremely stupid, unless you like giving your money to the government.

Yesterday, I became invigorated by my 401(k) because my company’s matched contributions kicked in! For me that means a 2:1 match (completely vested) on the first 2% of my pay. Now that is exciting!

If I’m lucky enough to get social security, I’ll have to wait until I’m 69!

So what am I supposed to do to secure my retirement at 40?

1. Control my spending
2. Keep working my day job
3. Begin to surround myself with team of advisers
4. Start a side business
5. Begin transfer from day job to business full-time
6. Invest in rental properties, streams of monthly income
7. Keep expanding business and real estate investments
8. Invest in church bond offerings from church-building projects (default rate tends to be lower, “higher” motivation to repay debt faster= higher ROI)
9. Invest in low cost no load index mutual funds
10. Invest in dividend reinvestment plans (DRIPs) of individual stocks (not very diversified, but little to no commission fees per purchase)

That’s my game plan, what’s yours?

Submit your “gap analysis” now? How are you going to retire, before your IRA and 401(k) let you retire?

Give thanks that you have a job, many people do not. If you don’t have a job, keep going, don’t give up.

Use the frustration of getting turned down at a job interview as adding fuel to the fire to motivate you to get a job. If you don’t like your job at the moment be grateful that you have a job and second do something about it. Look for another job, but remember that your skills are valued in your current job, which you will lose if you go to a new job.

The economy is looking brighter, at least the stock market has rebounded, but the unemployment rates and job markets may be just reaching their bottom point now. Businesses are watching budgets and laying off people directly or by attrition, in that they are not hiring to replace vacancies.

A job produces a income stream, probably your main income stream. What other sources of income do you have? what can you develop to offset your monthly expenses? Your life is a business and you should model it after a reliable business system.

You can change your place in life, better yourself and your family, and do good for others in the process. Sure you will have your down points in life, but stay focused on your goals.

Goals are very important to have in life. Written goals are better. You can look back on the list and track your progress and re-evaluate them. Tracking your money and budgeting is the same thing. If you don’t write it down your money will go out the window and you won’t know where it went! Well it’s gone! In the future be thankful for what you are given and utilize your resources to better your business.

Don’t let go of your dreams because you are down and in debt, use your debt as motivation to destroy your debt once and for all. Then financial freedom will be yours. Imagine you have over 1000 dollars in monthly debt, credit cards, student and car loans, if you paid all of this off, you could become a wealth building machine! 1000 dollars invested a month could provide your family with financial independence for generations to come. Just don’t go blowing it all in Vegas. And if you do, learn from it!

God created the world in six days or six years or six million years, the point is, the guy worked hard and probably really long. We work hard and long for our money in this life, but we seemingly keep going for days and years.  Let’s not forget, God rested on the seventh day. He stopped to admire his work, ski Mount Hood, or maybe the big guy was tired and took a nap. The point is, he rested, and so should you and me.

We go to work, rest, go to work, rest… repeat. But do we ever rest at least one day of the week? We work for money. Money buys us things, but it can also buy us time. Not that money will extend our lives, but it can shape how we go about our lives, spending our time working or enjoying our free time playing or just taking a nap.

A budget of one’s money, well executed, can free up some of that money, to exchange it for time, to exchange it for an increase in our life’s values.

job<money<time<goals<values!

Life is not about money, but money is the lifeblood of society. It’s what makes this go up and down, back and forth, this way and that way. One should embrace the money they have in this life, what they are given, as an opportunity to do something with it. Good or bad, society tells you what to do with money.

But you have control!

A budget frees your mind. There isn’t a question of where the money is coming from where it is  and where it will be going, because it is all accounted for on paper.

I will should you how to draft your initial budget then forget about it, and pick it up again, and want to redo the whole thing, then forget about it all over again.

The first thing we will talk about is an emergency fund of money. This must be set up to begin to let the money work for you, and let you rest more.

A restful mind is better than a restless mind. Say your transmission on your car goes out, if you haven’t any extra cash, you’re gonna charge that to your credit card. But if you have some money saved up just for emergencies, you can keep your mind at rest. You used that money for its very reason, you don’t have to feel bad about shelling out that money, you can just go on replenishing that fund for your next emergency.

More on emergency funds soon…

the professor