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My wife isn’t a big blog reader. She reads my sites and the sites of our friends, but that’s about it. Recently, though, she’s become hooked on two new blogs: This Garden is Illegal (which I’ve mentioned before) and Orangette. (These blogs are new to us, not new to the world.)
Orangette is an amazing blog about amazing food. One recent entry contained euphoric praise for a recent New York Times chocolate chip cookie recipe. Spurred to action, Kris baked a batch over the weekend. Oh my. These are very good.
But did you really come here for dessert? No. You came here for personal finance links. I have a few of those, too:
First, Flexo at Consumerism Commentary has a great article about net worth. Net worth is an internal metric, he says — it’s useful to track your own progress. It’s not meant for comparing to other people. I don’t write much about net worth at Get Rich Slowly. In part that’s because I don’t find it particularly useful. But it’s also because I think discussions of net worth too often become competitive. Flexo’s post is one of the best I’ve seen on the subject.
“You have to own a credit card,” people always say, “if you ever want to rent a car.” But is it true? Jim at Blueprint Financial Prosperity decided to find out. He recently posted a roundup of major company’s policies for renting a car with a debit card. His conclusion? It’s not impossible to rent a car without a credit card, but it’s kind of a pain.
Samir sent me a story from Yahoo! and Investopedia featuring five signs you’re living beyond your means. Is your credit score less than 600? Do you save less than 5% of your salary? Are your credit card balances rising? Does more than 28% of your income go toward housing? Are your bills spiraling out of control? If you answered yes to any of these, author Glenn Curtis suggests it’s time to reevaluate your spending and your long-term financial plan.
Finally, David forward a story from Success Soul outlining Warren Buffett’s 7 secrets for living a happy and simple life.
July 23rd, 2008 at 7:01 pm
oh geez. living beyond your means at more than 28% income for housing? i couldn’t get a tiny place in GSW central for that. sorry, we lived with a dozen gunshots a night, car alarms, bank alarms, police sirens, etc on the EDGE of GSW central. the stress of that makes 40% (of take-home) for rent in a safe neighborhood worth every penny.
i make ends meet just fine for the most part, and this is all a PART of our long term financial plan.
July 23rd, 2008 at 7:12 pm
July 23rd, 2008 at 7:17 pm
Keep in mind it is 28% GROSS income, not net.
July 23rd, 2008 at 7:50 pm
I regularly rent cars for business without a credit card. I use my business debit card and have had no problems renting. I use Enterprise and Budget and they do put a hold on a certain amount ($100 - $300) depending on the location and company. I usually see the hold released or refunded within a few days. I’m keep a close eye on my money and budget for this like anything else.
I’ve lived without a credit card for over three years and travel regularly with a debit card. No problem!
July 23rd, 2008 at 7:52 pm
I wonder if a combined housing plus transportation expenses would be a better rule of thumb. Many people in urban areas pay a lot for housing but don’t own cars, which are money black holes. I think 28% is probably a decent guideline for a standalone house in the suburbs, but it doesn’t really work for urbanites.
July 23rd, 2008 at 7:54 pm
I remember trying to rent a car with a debit card, and the company had a policy that allowed it, apparently the place I went to pick the car up wasn’t informed. They wouldn’t release the car unless I used a credit card. Irksome to say the least.
Lesson learned: If you are going to do this either take a copy of the policy with you, or call ahead to make sure that the particular place you are dealing with honors that policy. Maybe both.
July 23rd, 2008 at 8:57 pm
OOO, I love “This Garden Is Illegal” as well! Tell your wife to check out “101 cookbooks” and “Use Real Butter” - fantastic.
July 23rd, 2008 at 9:04 pm
Speaking as someone who has never had a credit card and buys everything with cash (including my car) it is a huge pain to try to buy a house. I had three banks and a mortgage broker say they could do nothing for me in the initial interview once I laid out that for all intents and purposes I had no credit score. Even when I had on hand documentation on five different accounts (insurance, phone, rent, power, and cable) that I had paid on time for five years. They all told me to go get a credit card and come back in a year.
Fortunately for me I found a two that were willing to quote me anything so I could do some comparison shopping. It seemed counter intuitive to me. I live within my means, save my money, pay all my bills on time and never needed to borrow money, all of which I can prove on paper. But according to the view of the money guys that makes me a “credit risk”. I’m beginning to think the whole financial sector are nothing but pushers.
July 24th, 2008 at 5:26 am
“This Garden Is Illegal” seems interesting, but they don’t seem to offer a full RSS feed; I don’t bother with partial feeds. To me, that defeats the purpose of syndication.
July 24th, 2008 at 6:46 am
Orangette is fab. She writes for Bon Appetit now while still maintaining her blog. You and Kris should read about how she met her husband through her blog. It’s a great love story.
July 24th, 2008 at 7:42 am
Chocolate chip cookies are my favorite food, especially when with milk. I’ll have to try the recipe out (i.e. hand it to my wife to make for me).
July 24th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
I’ve also rented cars with a debit card. I think the last time was from Hertz. They checked my credit score first, though. Weird.
July 29th, 2008 at 9:21 am
Although i find it VERY silly to place something like 28% as a limit as well (100% determined by where you are living of course, and how much a higher/lower cost of rent/mortage would cost/save you in gas/time, &c), i think it is still useful as a tool to get people THINKING about how much are they putting aside?
Besides, let me tell you, living AT that percentage is really hard, anyways!