When J.D. announced that this week would be Book Week at GRS, I was excited about a set deadline for tackling a book from my ever-growing reading list. Since micro-finance and micro-credit have been of interest to me for the past four years or so, I decided to read Banker to the Poor: Micro-Lending and The Battle Against World Poverty by Muhammad Yunus. (J.D. reviewed the same book in 2007. Read his take here.)

Nobel Peace Prize winner Yunus is the founder of Grameen Bank, an organization that helps the world's poorest, especially women, escape poverty through micro-loans, which are small loans given to start a business.

Banker to the Poor chronicles Yunus' journey from a "bird's-eye-view economist, teaching elegant theories in a classroom, to a worm's-eye-view practitioner" and the creation of Grameen, a bank owned by its poor borrowers that boasts a loan recovery rate of 97.29%.

Over the last few months, I've spent countless hours researching the process of selling items online for a large project I've been compiling. It's taught me that as much as I thought I knew about selling online, there's so much more that I have no clue about!

For example, a family member recently asked for my help selling an unneeded car on the internet. "Sure!" was my first thought. "Heck, maybe I'll even use this as a case study!" However, there's one major problem with this situation: I'm completely ignorant when it comes to cars.

Actually, I shouldn't say completely ignorant. That's not correct. I'm inexcusably ignorant when it comes to cars.

Who doesn't dream of quitting their day job? Every day, countless hours are spent in corporate cubicles daydreaming about lives of adventure, creativity, and play — lives spent doing what you love.

Last month, I took the leap. I quit my day job to write full time. Now I'm sitting in Buenos Aires writing while my kids play with their grandparents nearby. And I'm getting paid for it.

To say this is the achievement of a dream would be a vast understatement; I've wanted to be "a writer" since kindergarten. But I didn't just want to be a writer — I worked hard and planned for it.

In continuing celebration of Financial Literacy Month, my GRS contributions throughout April are covering basic techniques to raise your financial awareness. Last week we covered a few methods of getting to know your debt. This week we're going to attack the income side of the equation.

When it comes to income, there are two situations that can benefit immediately from increased awareness:

1. An individual who earns a decent living, but is squandering their money.
2. An individual who is not earning up to their current value (let alone their potential).

There are variety of causes for each of these scenarios. Lifestyle inflation could be causing a high-income earner to live paycheck-to-paycheck, a timid person may feel anxiety over negotiating a raise (even if well-deserved), or fear of failure may keep an entrepreneur from launching a much-needed product or service.

Recently, J.D. wrote about the value in finding something that you enjoy making by hand. As I read his post, I couldn't help but to think about my mom, who is hands-down one of the craftiest, most creative people I know. (Yes, I'm biased, but everyone who knows her agrees.)

While she can make just about anything — from floral arrangements to jewelry to gorgeous Christmas ornaments — the thing she does most these days is sew. She started her hobby as a little girl, turning scraps of fabric into Barbie clothes. Then when she had a little girl of her own (that's me!), she sewed the dresses that I wore to elementary school. The teachers bought them as soon as I outgrew them. She continued to sew clothes for me, hem pants, and fix buttons, and when I bought my wedding dress, she hemmed that, too. She also embroidered and stitched the ring pillow, among other things. Now she has come full-circle, starting her own side business creating clothing for Japanese ball-jointed dolls. Most of her dresses sell for more than $100, as these collectors are quite serious about their hobby.

I almost never pay the entirety of my rent. I don't have roommates and I've never been evicted. In the four years I rented a one-bedroom New York City apartment, I paid the full rent only one month. I now own a condo in Portland, Oregon, and I almost never pay my mortgage.

I'm able to keep my condo and apartment because I let strangers pay my bills for me. I've created a situation where my home generates income.

Letting Strangers Pay My Rent

Here's how I did it in New York City for four years: I traveled nearly every week for my job as a management consultant. I was out of town Monday-Thursday most weeks. I reasoned that other people like me may have the opposite commute pattern, where work brings them to New York weekdays. I posted an ad on Craigslist for a “part-time roommate”, and sure enough, lots of people were interested in paying me for the privilege of staying in my cute, East Village apartment three nights a week while I was away.

Do you have piles of papers lurking on your desk? Mountains of laundry looming beside your bed? Shelves double-stacked with knick-knacks? I have a bit of a clutter problem myself. The other day, I spent an hour looking for the vacuum cleaner, which eventually turned up buried under a pile of laundry almost as tall as I am.

All that clutter isn't just annoying. It's expensive. That's right: Excess Stuff can keep costing you money even after it's been bought and paid for.

How expensive is your Stuff? Professional organizer Jen Hunter of Find Your Floor in Boston says clutter can cost us real money in a lot of ways:

This is part two of a three-part series on how he stumbled into real estate investing at age 23. Be sure to read part one here.

When we last left off, I'd just walked away from my first real estate closing with an eight-unit apartment building and $1000 cash in my hand. I was riding high. Unfortunately, the reality of the situation hadn't sunk in. Over the next year, my low-income, eight-unit apartment building was going to take me on the most wild roller coaster ride of my life.

Instead of providing a chronological list of events (which may be entertaining, but of little use), I want to share the mistakes I made and the biggest lessons I learned throughout the process. In this second installment, I'll share the first two mistakes (of what could be dozens). Neither of these first took long for me to realize.

When I was 23, I bought an eight-unit apartment building with no money down. And I walked away with $1,000 cash at closing! Sounds pretty fancy, right? Wrong.

It was one of the dumbest real estate investing mistakes I've made in my young life.

I've been a full-time professional blogger for more than a year now. It has been a fantastic experience, a sort of dream come true. But blogging for dollars is not without its drawbacks. As I've shared before, I feel socially isolated. I spend most of my time in this office, writing about money.

Also, the income can be irregular. For some bloggers, it is very irregular. One month you might have record earnings — and the next you might experience your own personal financial crisis. Bloggers aren't the only folks who struggle with the fluctuating incomes, of course. Many self-employed people face the same issue, as do those whose pay is tied to commission.

Creating a budget when your income fluctuates can be a frustrating experience. I am sure that each of us finds our own ways to cope. Today, I want to share the method that I've developed. Continue reading...