I’ve been writing Llama Money for three full months now – since November 1, 2007. In that time I think I’ve written up some pretty good posts. I’ve certainly laid everything on the line with regards to my financial picture – my net worth updates each month are quite detailed. My readers, however, seem to [...]
Many employers these days offer something called a Flexible Spending Account, or FSA for short. What this basically does is allow you to set aside money for healthcare expenses, in a pre-tax manner. Meaning, if you set aside $2,000 for expected health costs, that amount of your income will not be subject to the federal [...]
After last weeks’ unexpected .75% rate cut, you had to figure that the Fed was done playing for awhile. Not so. Today, at their scheduled meeting, they announced an additional .5% federal funds rate cut – that’s a total of 1.25% in a single week. Before this rate cutting madness, the federal funds rate stood [...]
HSBC has announced a rate drop on their Online Savings Account. Their new rate is 3.80% APY. When I first opened up my HSBC Online account, the rate was 5.5% APY ( I think ). 3.8% is a big drop from 5.5, and a part of the reason that I moved my funds elsewhere. Granted, [...]
Though I’ve been blogging here for awhile now, I’ve never really shared my financial history. I’m going to take you back to the year 2004, when my financial house of cards finally collapsed. The Beginning Back then, I was living on the military base where my wife worked. That meant no rent, but also no [...]
January is here, and so is the third electric bill at the new house. Naturally I got the bill in my email, as I do all my bills. Paper statements are usually a waste of paper and time, since I don’t want to write out a dozen checks every month. To see my bill in [...]
The US Federal Reserve is panicking. They’re in full-blown panic mode, and their latest rate cut proves it. Rather than holding the federal funds rates steady, or cutting it by a quarter point, they went all-out with a .75% rate cut. The new short-term interest rate is 3.5% – the lowest it’s been August of [...]
When you’re making / updating your budget, remember to leave a spot for medical expenses. These days, even with health insurance, medical care is very expensive. Earlier this month, I had to visit the doctor because I had a 102+ fever for 4 days, along with a nasty cough. It turned out to be nothing [...]
That pretty much covers it. I’m trying to gather up all the paperwork I’ll need to do my taxes this year. Most likely I’ll be paying someone for that honor, but they’ll still need all the paperwork. I’ve done a horrible job of keeping everything this year, and it’s going to bite me in the [...]
No good news on the Llamafolio front. PEP and WMT are in the tank a little bit, and are really taking their toll on my portfolio. WM ha been down from where I bought it at, but it’s coming back up. I’m nearly even on WM, and I expect big things from that stock. Time [...]
