Blog carnivals allow you to get a lot of information about a single topic through a variety of links all compiled in one post. A good blog carnival is aggregated and edited carefully to make sure that the links are all of high quality.

Right now there are two personal finance blog carnivals that I want to draw attention to:

1. Best of Credit Cards and Money Blog Carnival. One of the posts in this article is a review of the Continental Airlines One Pass Plus credit card.
2. The Carnival of Credit Score and Debt. One of the posts in this article is a review of the Escape by Discover credit card.

Tags: Blog Carnivals, credit cards, money, Personal Finance

Today’s question of the week is inspired by a book that I recently read. It’s called The Secret Currency of Love: The Unabashed Truth About Women, Money, and Relationships. It’s a fascinating anthology from women authors about the different methods they have of handling money in their marriages. The stories there run the gamut from women who keep their bank accounts entirely separate from their husbands and split all bills down the middle to women who let their husbands deal with the entire financial realm of their relationships and don’t even know what their household income is.

So, today’s question of the week is:

How do you deal with money in your relationship with your spouse or significant other?

I currently don’t live with the man that I’m dating so it’s easy for us to keep our money separate. When we go out on dates, he either pays for the date or we split it. We haven’t discussed it in too much detail but I think we’re both comfortable with this arrangement. When we’ve gone on vacations then we’ve split the costs in half, more or less, although we’re not strict about keeping tabs on who owes what. We just kind of naturally take turns paying for the bill on a trip. At holidays, we tend to buy each other small gifts and don’t spend a lot of money on each other. I’m not honestly sure how all of this would change if it came to the point where we were living together so I’d love to hear how other people are doing it. Leave your answers in the comments.

Tags: money, money and relationships, question of the week

One of the most common pieces of advice that I see on frugal living blogs is the advice that you should buy in bulk. There are pros and cons to buying in bulk but as a general rule it’s true that you’re going to save money if you buy items that you use regularly in bulk at a good price. But is that still true if you’re only shopping for one person?

The majority of articles that exist out there about buying in bulk assume that you’re buying for a whole family. But what about all of us who live alone or who live with roommates and shop only for ourselves? Does buying in bulk work for us? I think that it can if we’re smart about it.

Tips for buying in bulk when you live alone include:

• Buy only non-perishable items in bulk. It doesn’t make sense to buy things that are going to go to waste if you’re the only one using them.
• Make a list of what you use regularly. If you buy something every week or two then it’s probably a safe item to buy in bulk.
• Get a group together to buy in bulk. Just because you don’t live with your family doesn’t mean you can’t buy for a group. Get a group of friends together who would like to buy in bulk. Split the cost and split the items so that you each get only the amount of stuff that you need at a lower bulk price.
• Get smart about money. Make sure that you’re able to calculate the benefit of buying something in bulk. You may get a better deal buying a single size item and using a coupon. Do the math!

Do any of you single people out there buy in bulk? What are some other good tips?

Tags: buy in bulk when you live alone, buying in bulk, kathryn vercillo, money, Personal Finance, savings, should i buy in bulk, smartchick

Normally when I participate in a blog carnival, I write it up as an entire post on its own. That’s because I like to share the different articles and links that were included in the carnival along with my thoughts on the writing there. However, I’m doing it differently this week since I participated in several blog carnivals at once. I’m just doing a roundup because the same post was included in so many carnivals. If you’re interested in the topic of the carnival, I encourage you to follow the link to check out all of the other great articles that were included along with mine.

The post was an educational article called Beware! 15 Common Scams that Can Steal Your Money. It was included in the following carnivals:

• Struggling Bumbling Newbies carnival
• Working at Home Blog Carnival
• Carnival of Money Stories
• Carnival of Everything Personal Finance
• eBay and Small Business Carnival
• Money Hacks Carnival

I thought it was a good article and I hope that others do as well. It’s certainly included with some top articles in these carnivals!

Tags: blog carnival, links, money, Personal Finance, scams

I recently wrote an article with ten tips to avoid picking up the bill. As a general rule, these tips weren’t about skipping out on your part of the bill. They were simply about how to avoid paying for other people when you go out.

These tips fell into three basic categories:

1. Getting your mind straight. These tips were related to making sure that you understand why you feel obligated to pick up the bill and to work on not feeling that way.
2. Making smart payment choices. These tips included ideas like paying your part in cash (so you don’t end up with the whole bill on your credit card) and making a mobile payment transaction at the table to repay someone who has just paid for your part of the bill.
3. Find ways to avoid paying altogether. This could mean going out with someone who will pay for you or simply doing things that are free.

Some people responded to me by saying that they didn’t think that picking up the bill should be that big of a deal as long as you’re not picking it up all of the time. I think that’s true but I also think that attitude can cause you to pay more for other people than your budget should really allow.

What do you think? Should we pay our part but avoid picking up the bill for others?

Incidentally, one thing I didn’t say in my article was that you can just get separate checks and pay for your own. That was pointed out to me in the comments on an article on The Consumerist which referenced my original article. That’s true but I’ve found that there’s a lot of places that won’t do that for you easily. If that’s an option, do you think it’s the best one?

Tags: don't pay for others, money, money etiquette, Personal Finance, picking up the bill

We all know that scams exist. We’ve all seen those letters from the person in need of baking assistance in Nigeria. Many of us have received emails telling us that a friend is in need and we must wire money to them. Some of us have gotten phone calls trying to convince us that our car warranty is up and that we need to renew it. These are all common scams that are designed to steal our money. We know that they exist and yet people continue to have their money stolen from them again and again.

The best way to make sure that you do not become a victim of a scam is to educate yourself about scams. Learn about which scams are most common. Find out how they convince you to give up your money or your financial information. Arming yourself with this knowledge makes it a lot easier for you to identify when you might become a victim of a scam so that you can avoid that terrible fate.

One great resource for getting this type of education is an article called Beware! 15 Commons Scams That Can Steal Your Money. This article lists fifteen scams and describes them so that you can understand them better. It also provides details about variations on the scams. And finally, it has loads of links to resources that can help you get even more information. Protect your money and protect yourself!

Tags: common scams, money, Personal Finance, scams, victim of scam

It’s amazing how many marriages end because the two people involved in them can’t reconcile their financial differences. It’s sad that money comes between us and our lovers so often, isn’t it? So how do we stop fighting about money.

Here are some of the tips that I think make sense:

• Deal with your emotions surrounding money. People fight about money because they have all kinds of money emotions. Issues related to fear, power and control dominate people’s money conversations. If you learn to deal with your money emotions and to keep them out of your financial talks, you’ll fight a lot less with your partner.
• Create a plan for handling money in your home. It’s not easy to come up with money solutions that work in your home. You need to consider who will pay the bills and how, which purchases need to be discussed in advance and which don’t and what your long-term savings goals are. This is tough. But if you create a plan, you’ll have something to work with and won’t fight as much anymore.
• Pick a date to deal with money. You don’t have to fight about money every day of the month. Pick one date (perhaps when rent is due) to deal with your money problems. Commit to solving them on that date. Then put the rest on the back burner until the next month and just enjoy your spouse without money being an issue.

I think we just need to start being more responsible and more respectful in our conversations about money and we’d have a lot fewer fights about it!

Tags: fighting about money, kathryn vercillo, marriage, money, money fighting, Relationships, stop fighting about money, talking about money

I recently wrote an article about the methods you can use to get startup capital for a new business. There are a lot of different methods (including the ten that I wrote about in that article). One of the ones that interests me most is one that isn’t so common. It’s called a ROSCA group.

ROSCA stands for Rotating Savings and Credit Association. This is a small group of people that agrees to get together to lend one another the money that they each need to start a new business. From what I understand, the way that it works is this:

• A group is formed among people who have a small amount of money but not enough to start their own business.
• Everyone in the group meets monthly and brings a membership fee to the group each month.
• The fee is collected and put into a group account for one year. At the end of the year, the fee goes to the first member to start his or her business.
• The group continues to meet. The fees collected for the second year go to a different member.
• This continues until everyone in the group has taken their turn at getting enough money to start a business.

There are obviously risks that you take when you get involved in a group like this. It requires a commitment from people to stick with the lending process over a long period of time. As a result, it’s typically only done in developing nations where other options for getting loans are limited.

However, I think that this might be something that would be beneficial to people in today’s economy. It’s getting harder to get personal loans. At the same time, people in some communities are trying to come together to help one another out. Small community-driven ROSCA groups seem like a smart solution.

What do you think?

Tags: get a loan, get money, kathryn vercillo, loans, money, Personal Finance, rosca, rosca group, rosca loan

One of the topics that I write about on a regular basis is personal finance. I write about many different aspects of this topic but my focus is on saving money and living a frugal life. I believe that living within our means allows us to pursue dreams and focus on what really and truly matters to us.

Some of the things that I’ve written in relation to this during the past week or so include:

• How to find and attend free events. People waste a whole lot of money on entertaining themselves. That’s sad when there are actually tons of free events that you can enjoy with your family, your lover or by yourself.
• How to use coupons during summer travel. There are a lot of people who use coupons to save money. Do you know how many of them forget to do that when traveling? Too many! Hopefully these tips will inspire people to take their coupons on their trips with them.
• How a frugal life is a healthy life. Some people live a frugal life and are also unhealthy but it’s not that common. It’s especially rare among people who choose frugality (instead of having it forced on them by circumstance). Here’s a look at why frugal and healthy go hand-in-hand.
• Choosing foods that pair well together. If you buy two inexpensive foods that can be combined to make many different recipes (like broccoli and cheese!) then you can save money on groceries.
• Coupon news. I like to stay on top of news about coupons. News this week included a new printer that’s great for coupons, statistics about online coupons and problems with in-store coupons.

I love writing about saving money. I also love reading about it so if you know of good blogs or articles on this topic then feel free to drop a line!

Tags: Frugal Living, kathryn vercillo, links, money, Personal Finance, saving money

People who read my writing regularly know that one of my favorite topics to write about is personal finance. I have specifically taken an interest recently in frugal living. I’m trying to implement more frugal living tips into my own life. I’m also trying to find the links between frugal living, simple living and green living. These are all ways I want to live and I believe that they go hand-in-hand.

There are tons of great posts and articles out there around the web about personal finance and frugal living issues. I would like to think that my voice contributes to this base of knowledge at least a little bit. Here are links to some of my frugal living and money-saving blog posts that have been around the web so far this month:

• The Difference Between Promotional Codes and Coupons
• How Frugal Living Simplifies Your Life
• Tips for Coupon Use During Summer Travel
• 5 Ways to Save When Shopping Online
• Frugal Tips for Family Day Trips
• Massive Coupon Fraud Case

Would love to know any thoughts that you have on these different frugal living topics!

Tags: Frugal Living, guest posts, kathryn vercillo, money, money saving, Personal Finance, save money