A few people have asked, so I thought I’d confirm that I still hope to re-launch my “making money from a blog” project in January. Stay tuned. Meanwhile, here’s a brief look at some of the drama behind the scenes.
This week, I found a fantastic idea for an awesome blog, one that I’d love to run, one that I think people would love to read. And I came up with the perfect name, too. Only trouble? A domain speculator has it.
This usually isn’t a big deal: I pay them their ransom (which can range from $10 to $1000) and I get the domain. This time, though, the guy wants big bucks. I offered $100, and he countered with $5000. I offered $250, and he countered with $4900. I even offered $1000, but he wouldn’t drop below $2650.
This is a business expense — it wouldn’t come out of my personal finances — but that doesn’t mean I’m willing to be stupid with my money; I feel like $1000 is the most I could possibly pay for this domain (especially since the site I want to build probably wouldn’t bring much revenue). So, I broke off negotiations. But it hurt. I may have to give up on my perfect domain name.
Now, though, it’s time to look at other personal-finance articles from around the web. The unofficial theme to this week’s links is “numbered lists”. Like everyone else, I have a love-hate relationship with these. (You’ll note that I rarely post them at GRS.) Sometimes, though, they contain useful tips. Such as:
The folks over at AOL’s WalletPop have a keen list of 5 big household expenses you can easily cut. These are things that many folks can trim to save big bucks. Their suggestions: a car, home heating and cooling, a swimming pool, satellite or cable TV, and a landline phone. Before just dismissing the list out of hand, take a look at the reasoning. As much as I love my Mini, I’m sometimes sorely tempted to give it up. I could save a ton of money! (But a swimming pool? Or those really common outside of the southern U.S.?)
Similarly, Kiplinger’s has put together a list of 10 things we overpay for. Though some of the list is silly — are greeting cards really going to break the bank? — this article includes tips for saving on groceries, checking accounts, cell phones, and more.
Want to save even more? Joe at ChristianPF lists 7 reasons to rent instead of buying a home. We’ve covered this topic a couple of times in the past here at GRS: as much as home-buying is pushed in the U.S., renting is often the better financial choice. This article at ChristianPF does a good job of explaining why.
Finally, in my ongoing quest to encourage all GRS readers to think about boosting their income, here’s an article from Wise Bread: 4 reasons everyone needs side income. Xin Lu’s post is short and sweet and to the point.
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J.D., it is possible to move your postpaid number over to a prepaid account. We moved my wife’s postpaid number from Sprint over to a T-Mobile Prepaid account.
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I just decided to make the switch from Blackberry on AT&T to Android on Virgin Mobile, which will save me $55 per month on my cell phone bill. I haven’t activated my new phone yet (as it’s in the mail), but Virgin Mobile’s site claims that number porting is possible.
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Thanks for the info Mark and Beth. Let me ask a more specific question: Does anyone know if its possible to port you number from an iPhone (AT&T) to a prepaid plan for a basic phone? I’d love to know. (And, in fact, will now go google this…)
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To answer you question, yes, you can keep your number when switching to a pre-paid service. At least, that’s the case with Virgin Mobile (http://web.virginmobileusa.com/help/service/local-number-portability/switch-to-vmu)
You won’t be able to keep your iPhone with VM, though. You have to buy one of theirs.
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You can port your number from any cell carrier to any other cell carrier. In fact, I believe it’s required by the FCC under their number portability guidelines.
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You should be able to port your number from AT&T to any prepaid plan that allows it (no wireless carrier can block a port unless things have changed wildly in the past half-decade with the rules) but you probably can’t use the iPhone on whatever new network (unless maybe you switch to AT&T’s prepaid option).
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The iPhone is a GSM network phone, which means it works on AT&T and T-Mobile, but not Verizon or Sprint. (I don’t know about Virgin, etc.) If you get it unlocked, you may be able to port your number over to T-Mobile if you don’t like AT&T’s prepaid options (if they have them?)
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5 reasons I dislike numbered lists….
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I don’t have an iphone, but I’m excited to switch from ATT to Virgin Mobile. It will cut my bill in half each month AND I’ll have unlimited text afterwards.
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Re: saving on phone service
I hate using my cell phone. I keep it for emergencies and convenience, but I would never use it 100%. Therefore we switched to a VOIP, specifically Ooma. It has an up front cost, but I haven’t paid a phone bill in a couple years and I am able to keep my cell phone at the absolute minimum (I won’t do prepaid because the coverage maps aren’t as good).
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I have successfully kept my AT&T phone and switched to pay as you go on AT&T with the same phone. I plan on trying the same thing with my iPhone when the contract expires.
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Dude, no domain name is worth 5k, unless its already a well-known brand. I’ll bet you can come up with another name that won’t cost you that much and be just as effective.
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How do you convince someone they dont need cable TV?
90% of the content on TV you can find online, legally and for free. Is the other 10% really worth $100 a month?
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Check out Lifehacker and see if you could actually jailbreak your iPhone to use with another carrier….
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I hate HATE HATE domain name squatters. I have never bought a domain from one of them, as a matter of principle. Whenever you buy a domain name from a squatter, you just encourage domain name squatting as a viable business model.
Also, did you notice that the ChristianPF article you linked lifted the table from my 2007 guest post, without noting the date of the comparison? Yikes, that’s a bit misleading.
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J.D., Check out Howard Forums for anything related to mobile phones.
http://www.howardforums.com/forum.php
To answer your question it is possible to move your number over to prepaid service. You just need to do the following.
(Source: http://www.fcc.gov/cib/consumerfacts/numbport.html)
Contact the prepaid provider and tell them you would like to port your number from ATT. Be prepared to provide the new company with your 10-digit phone number, customer account number, and five-digit zip code. If you had created a passcode to protect your account, you may also need to provide that passcode.
If the prepaid service provider is a GSM operator you can use your iPhone on their network if you jailbreak it. The legitimacy of jailbreaking your iPhone is unclear but it can be done and more information can be found on Google.
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Urghhh.. I hate domain name squatter too. I got a .org instead of .com. I’m just starting out and really can’t spend any money on speculators.
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If I wasn’t so reliant on my iPhone for the Internet, going prepaid would be great for me too. I think you can just insert your prepaid sim card into your iPhone and use it. You just wouldn’t get the data plan, but the benefit there is that you wouldn’t have to pay for the data plan either. You could always just hit up WiFi hotspots.
As for domain speculators, I hate them. At one of my old jobs, my boss paid something like $25k for a domain name because of a squatter.
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I love when you put up a list of worth reading links to personal finance or just interesting articles to read. I just don’t do a lot of other PF reading on the web on a regular basis.
I like what you do link us to, obviously.
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I have to seriously disagree with that list that suggested free e-cards instead of real cards. I’d personally rather not receive anything from a friend on birthdays or holidays than get one of those awful, generic e-cards. Ugh.
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J.D.- you can jailbreak the iphone port your number to T-mobile prepaid and use the Tmobile Sim in the iphone. I have been using an iphone like this for over a year. The reason for tmobile is the prepaid minutes are cheaper than AT&T. If you are looking for a different network (Can’t use the iphone)go prepaid with pageplus cellular it uses the verizon network and is the least expensive prepaid option out there.
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I hate domain squatters as well. The one that owns the domain I wanted charges $10 just to bid for it!
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J.D. – I just switched to a StraightTalk prepaid phone and plan. You can port your existing number over and choose a phone that works on either the Verizon (CDMA) or AT&T (GSM) network. So far I love it, particularly at $30 month for everything I need. You can buy online or at Walmart. Also, if you will use a Google Voice number like I do, it won’t matter what your cell number is, ever.
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Hi JD – I recently went through the same ordeal with AT&T that you’re exploring. I wanted to dump my iPhone (which they let me do, since I was moving out of coverage area and I already owned the device) and move my existing number to an AT&T prepaid number. I went back and forth with them about it, and they swore that I couldn’t switch my existing, postpaid number to a prepaid account with AT&T. That seems unlikely to me, but I got tired of wrangling with it. I wouldn’t be surprised if you could move to another network, though. The other networks had better deals than AT&T but I wanted to stay on a group plan. Good luck!
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And here I’ve been wondering if buying domain names might be a good investment…? I kinda thought that’s what this post would be about, from the title!
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why dont you get a google voice number and you can forward that anywhere, including gmail chat (i talk for free every day)
ps- prepay FTW. my cellphone is turned off most of the time. google voice + chat take care of most things. i used to have voIP but with google voice it’s mostly unnecessary, especially since my laptop runs all day AND i hate to be available all the time.
pps- i had to stalk my domain until the squatters abandoned it. i had to bid on it ($79) and apparently that i was the only bidder. what a waste! but it’s now forever mine. i hate squatters!
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There are people with with serious greeting card habits. I worked with a woman who sent cards on multiple holidays to the children of neighbors who moved away. And a card for each child, so none of them would feel left out. She got incredibly miffed when she didn’t get a card for Secretary’s Day. I pointed out nobody did, but that didn’t help. There are also women who buy greeting cards for their children on everyday sort of events. Am not going to speculate on the pathologies involved.
As for home swimming pools, there are far more in the Boston suburbs than around DC. Some of this is that homes are less likely to be air conditioned and people put in pools rather than retrofitting for central air. Also, not as many developments with a shared central swimming pool.
Double me on the domain name squatters. There was a proposal to charge more for domains the more you owned, but I don’t think it went anywhere.
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I write the numbered list posts, They seem a little trite, but they have a catchy title. Plus it makes me fill out a list. Hard to say 7 great things I like”. Should be a little longer and deeper.
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I’ve been very happy with service from Consumer Cellular. I had a $20/month plan that provided 250 minutes and when I had an accident and ended up in a hospital on vacation — dramatically increasing my cell-phone usage — I was able to go online to my account and change my plan mid-month (to one providing 1000 minutes for $40) and have the changes take place not just immediately but actually, retroactively — so that instead of getting billed by the minute for overage I just paid the higher $40 amount. I’ve since bounced back down to $30 for 500 minutes because, landline-less, I find I do use that much, generally. But I watch because I know if I can get it back down under 250, I can immediately change my plan and save $10 for that month … even if I later have to bounce it up again. And I can stop (i.e. cancel) service at any time.
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Greeting cards are ridiculously expensive! Especially when you consider what you’re getting. I’ve rarely seen a plain card for under 3 or 4 bucks
Add glitter, doo dads and thingamabobs, and you can pay up to $10 for a normal sized greeting card
I have been buying my greeting cards from a friend who has been hand making hers for at least the past 5 years. i pay as little as $2 for my cards, depending on what i want, and how many i get.
plus, she gets a little bit of extra cash in her pockets.
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I agree with Bruce – T-Mobile has a great value prepaid plan. I fill my account up with $100 when it runs out (about twice a year) and then I pay 10 cents per minute, 10 cents per sent text message, and 5 cents per received text message. Combined with Vonage, this works great for me! I actually ported my number to them from Boost Mobile with no issues. T-Mobile gave me a temporary number when I activated and then within 24 hours, my number had been ported.
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I agree with Mary R- I live in the Boston suburbs as well and pools are prevalent. My MIL spends a mint on hers.
I ported my number from Tmobile to Virgin to get their $25/month plan. Customer service isn’t great but it’s the cheapest cell phone plan I’ve ever had, no contract.
It’s easy to make greeting cards even if you don’t think of yourself as a crafty type, just get some card stock and a rubber stamp! Or a potato stamp, even.
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Make sure you DO NOT cancel your contract before porting over your number. The number has to be “live” when they port it over. If you cancel, the number goes into the ‘pool” where it “can’t’ be extracted for 24 months…although with a lot of coercing you can in fact extract the number but it’s difficult so save yourself some hassle and buy the prepaid phone before cancelling your contract. pulling the number off your iphone should automatically cancel your contract
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I switched from a regular ATT cell phone account to a prepaid ATT account a few months ago for my Blackberry. ATT has several options for levels – I picked one for $25 that is good for 3 months. It costs something like $1.50 per 24 hours anytime I activate the phone which is normally just when we are traveling plus a small amount for connect time. However if I had an iPhone and used it as a minicomputer and was on the web much with it or did much email/texting with the cell phone I doubt that a prepaid plan would be worthwhile. Ask your carrier how many minutes you use in an average month and how many data/text minutes/messages you send and receive and just do the math. We found that we use my wife’s cell phone enough in a typical month that converting her plan to a prepaid one would cost us more that the plan that we are on. For our landline we have the least expensive option we could find (~$20/month) but that allows us to have a handset in three rooms (downstairs, one BD and in the BD room we use for the television) so we don’t have to keep the cell phone nearby all the time. We are trying to get more family members to add SKYPE to their computer and use its free videoconference capability.
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Even in Pittsburgh pools are more common than you might expect.
You can get really nice greeting cards very cheaply at Costco. I got a box of like 30 cards for $15 a while ago, and they all have lots of beautiful embellishments on them. I don’t send them that often, so they’ll last me a long time. I don’t count ecards as actually getting a card.
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Hi J.D.,
I know you asked about AT&T, but my wife successfully transferred her phone number from Verizon to pre-paid T-mobile. Be aware that if you go with T-mobile, they don’t allow data access via cell tower on their prepaids (your iPhone’s WiFi would still work). However, I’m now paying under $7 a month for the limited amount of calls and texting that I do (10c/min voice, 10c TXT sent, 5c TXT received). If you want data, you should go with another provider.
And, as a previous commenter noted, you should probably make the change while your AT&T number is still live.
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I recently cancelled my service with Sprint, and ported my number over to a Tracfone. Previously, I was paying about $80/mo for my Blackberry service. Finally, I got fed up, and bought a VoIP adapter (using Sipgate service) and re-used an old speakerphone. Then, I set up my Google Voice to ring all my phones (Sipgate+Cell) and just have everyone call my Google Voice number. I rarely use my cell phone unless I’m out of town.
When you port your number to the new service, the old provider should cancel your service. Or at least that as been the case the half dozen times I’ve ported my number (I’ve had the same cell phone number since college).
The best part is the Tracfone was like $30 (w/ double minutes for the life of the phone), then I bought 450 minutes (900) which don’t expire for a year. So, all-in-all about $165 ($40 VoIP adapter, $30 phone, and about $95 for the minutes) for the Tracfone with 900 minutes for a year. It’s paid for itself in about two months.
The only bad part is Tracfone charges you as soon as it begins connecting a call, so even if the call doesn’t go through, you get deducted minutes. However, after 3 months, I’ve only used like 100 minutes. Also, incoming calls to Sipgate are free, so as long as you use GV to connect the call, it doesn’t cost anything.
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Another happy Page Plus Cellular user here. I kept my Verizon phone and number. I decided not to use Straight Talk since they required me to buy a new phone. As others have already pointed out, if you want to keep your iPhone, you need to jailbreak it AND make sure you pick a GSM provider. And the data plan may or may not work, depending on which carrier you choose.
One thing to watch out for with the prepaid plans are some of the “refresh” requirements. It’s not always just a case of having money in the account. I have to add money every 120 days to keep the account active. So I started with an $80/2000 minute card, and add a $10/100 min. card every 119 days. So far I’m averaging a little over $5/month in usage, but I don’t use my phone that much. Still way better than the $39.xx/month I was giving Verizon.
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I agree with Elena, I love when you provide links to other PF articles, since I rarely search around for them myself.
Re: 7 reasons to rent instead of buy
Reason #1 is Less Risk. It says you shouldn’t calculate the mortgage you can afford based on two incomes because, “With unemployment at 10%, there is a one in ten chance of a single income being lost” That is not what 10% unemployment means, it means that 1 in 10 people are unemployed. And I have no idea why the author thinks that additionally means “even greater odds that one of your two jobs could disappear.” That makes no sense.
A counterpoint to the actual argument: When people get married or combine incomes, even if they don’t get a mortgage based on their new combined income, they often move to a bigger apartment or rent a better home based on their combined income. You still run a risk of not being able to pay rent if one of you loses your job. Breaking your lease or being evicted from your apartment may not be as damaging to your credit as defaulting on a mortgage, but it is damaging to your credit and it makes you just as homeless.
Also, you can always buy a house with a mortgage payment that can be supported by one income.
It’s great that someone is pointing out the “throwing your money away” fallacy and explaining why owning shouldn’t be a goal simply because everyone says it should be. It’s just that I’ve heard the argument so much, it’s really old news, at least in the PF world.
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I owned a Jaguar XJ8. Brake pads (uninstalled) $300, shocks $245…each…uninstalled…not to mention the normal 10,000 mile maintenance that was $500 to $1,000. It was insane. Ever time the car made a “ping” I got a sick feeling in my stomach wondering how much THAT was going to cost. So, I sold it. Bought a 2006 Scion Xb from my brother-in-law. Now, when things go ping…well, they don’t go ping anymore.
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Both the landline and cell phone companies are required by law to let you port your number to a new provider.
I ported my landline from Qwest to Virgin Mobile. I’m on a pay-as-you go plan, but they also have monthly plans (all without a contract and no penalty for switching plans at any time).
They have an unlimited text and data plan (300 talk minutes) for $25 a month. You need a phone from them, but they do have the Samsung Intercept Android phone.
VM uses Sprint as the carrier.
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An article on why its good to have multiple income streams appeared yesterday on Yahoo Finance, and just like the article you linked to, it was completely useless. I think a 5th grader can tell you why its good to have extra money. A more useful article, in both cases, would be one that gives already over-worked readers ideas on how to go about generating additional revenue streams. That’s like telling us why it is good to eat food, rather than telling us how to go about feeding ourselves with good food.
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When I left my last job I gave up my company paid bberry and went to Net10. Love the service. You can port your number right on the website. Last I did a comparison the per minute rate was cheaper than Tracphone (always changing though).
I worked in the telecom industry for many years, the folks that are saying the phone companies must allow porting are absolutely correct – it is a federal law.
Like #37 I’m a huge advocate of Google Voice/Talk (I love FREE). I set up a Google voice number and configured it to ring my prepaid phone. If I’m staying at a friend’s house I can add that phone number to the list and it will ring my friend’s number and my cell phone. Since I have Skype already set up I have it ring that number too. If you add the Google Talk app to your gmail page you can answer phone calls right there (and make them). All FREE in the US. I’ve only use the prepaid cell rarely now.
Another cool feature is that you can set it up to have unique vmail messages for certain people or groups of people. You can direct certain people or groups of people directly to voice mail. You can add a widget to your website that uses Google talk to have people call you (which you can direct to vmail, etc.) You can conference call folks together at no charge. If you use the Google voice mail it will transcribe the message for you and send it to your via email and/or txt. You can screen a call and listen to the voice mail as it is recorded and “pick” up the call if you’d like, etc., etc., etc. So many very cool features.
I have a friend that has a home business that I turned on to this. When a business call comes in it rings both his landlines, his cell phone and his wife’s phone – they never miss important calls now. Personal calls he directs to just his cell phone, etc.
Good luck, if you need any help with this feel free to email me.
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I’m strongly considering going to Virgin Mobile when my Verizon contract is up now that they offer a smartphone. I hope you write about your decision and experience.
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I switched from Verizon to Virgin and ported my number. It was really easy to do. That said, my husband tried to do the same and had some trouble (he ended up switching first to T-mobile, then to Google Voice with a different number). the transition to Google voice was gradual (there was a message on his old number)– he now only uses his Google Voice number, though he’s with T-mobile, and it’s worked super well for him. The advantage to T-mobile is that, if you’re mainly at your computer, you use very few minutes on your cell and T-mobile minutes last a full year after you’ve spent a certain amount, which means it becomes really cheap.
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Greeting cards can definitely break my bank! After travel, cards are one of my major “extra” expenses. I try to be as frugal as I am comfortable with, but I like to get birthday cards, wedding cards, and Christmas/New Years cards for family, friends, and co-workers. I send out hundreds of cards every year. It is my way of staying in touch, networking, and keeping track of everyone. Holiday cards are the best, because I can typically buy them in packs and pick up about 150 reasonably good ones for maybe $30. Individual cards for birthdays, etc, can’t always be bought in packs (especially if you know the people well and can’t give person x a green card because they hate the color, etc). They can run well over $5. I try to stick to the $.99 cards, but for really close people or really awesome cards, I will go more. If you use stationary, that can be cheaper, provided you use it all and don’t get the expensive kind. Really, though, if I were buying expensive $7-$10 cards (or even $20 packs of 20 holiday cards) I would exceed my luxury spending very quickly.
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